Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-15-08019/USCOURTS-ca10-15-08019-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Emiliano Francisco Martinez
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

_________________________________ 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

 Plaintiff - Appellee, 

v. 

EMILIANO FRANCISCO MARTINEZ, 

 Defendant - Appellant. 

No. 15-8019 

_________________________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of Wyoming 

(D.C. No. 1:14-CR-00274-ABJ-1)

_________________________________ 

Grant Russell Smith, Research & Writing Specialist, Office of the Federal Public 

Defender, Cheyenne, Wyoming (Virginia L. Grady, Federal Public Defender, and 

Veronica S. Rossman, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Office of the Federal Public 

Defender, Denver, Colorado, with him on the briefs), for Defendant-Appellant. 

Eric J. Heimann, Assistant United States Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, 

Cheyenne, Wyoming (Christopher A. Crofts, United States Attorney, Office of the 

United States Attorney, Cheyenne, Wyoming, with him on the brief), for PlaintiffAppellee. 

_________________________________ 

Before HOLMES, SEYMOUR, and PHILLIPS, Circuit Judges. 

_________________________________ 

PHILLIPS, Circuit Judge. 

_________________________________ 

Emiliano Martinez pleaded guilty to possessing an unregistered, short-barrel 

shotgun in violation of federal law. 26 U.S.C. §§ 5841, 5845(a), (d), 5861(d), and 

FILED 

United States Court of Appeals

Tenth Circuit 

June 7, 2016

Elisabeth A. Shumaker 

Clerk of Court

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5871. Under his plea agreement, Martinez reserved the right to appeal his sentence if 

the district court determined that his total offense level was greater than 23 under the 

2014 United States Sentencing Guidelines. The district court calculated his total 

offense level as 27 after applying a four-level enhancement for using or possessing a 

firearm in connection with another felony. U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B). Key to this 

enhancement was the district court’s finding that Martinez had possessed a firearm in 

connection with another felony offense—a burglary of the home from which the 

shotgun Martinez later possessed was stolen. 

On appeal, Martinez contends that the district court clearly erred at sentencing 

when it considered the hearsay statements of Eduardo Hernandez, who, in a police 

interview, had admitted to committing the burglary with Martinez. Martinez argues 

that Hernandez’s hearsay statements lacked sufficient indicia of reliability to support 

their probable accuracy. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm. 

BACKGROUND 

A. Palomo Burglary

On July 14, 2014, Arlo Palomo’s home in Torrington, Wyoming was 

burglarized. The burglary was extensive, lasting several hours. A burglar even took 

time to eat a bowl of cereal. Among other items stolen was a Remington 870 12-

gauge shotgun. Mr. Palomo told police that his ex-wife, June Palomo, had bought the 

shotgun at a Walmart in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Inside the Palomo home, police found 

a fingerprint left by Eduardo Hernandez. 

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B. Discovery of a Short-Barrel Shotgun 

On July 23, 2014, nine days after the burglary, agents from the Wyoming 

Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) and the U.S. Drug Enforcement 

Administration executed a search warrant—one unrelated to the Palomo burglary—

on the car of Martinez’s girlfriend, Amanda Dowers. In Dowers’s car trunk, the 

agents found and seized a Remington 870 12-gauge shotgun with a 17-inch barrel.1

 A 

witness later told DCI that the shotgun belonged to Martinez. 

Sometime after the agents executed the search warrant, U.S. Bureau of 

Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Special Agents Steve McFarland 

and Matthew Wright took possession of the shotgun and began investigating 

Martinez. The agents ran a trace on the shotgun’s serial number and learned that June 

Palomo had bought the shotgun from a Walmart in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Although 

this was consistent with Arlo Palomo’s statements to Torrington police after the 

burglary, the record doesn’t say whether Torrington police had advised the ATF 

agents about the Palomo burglary before the ATF agents ran the trace. 

C. Interview with Martinez 

 On September 26, 2014, two months after officers seized Martinez’s shortbarrel shotgun, Agents McFarland and Wright interviewed Martinez in Torrington. 

During the non-custodial interview, Martinez said that he obtained the shotgun from 

 1

 Under 26 U.S.C. §§ 5841 and 5845, shotguns with barrels less than 18 inches 

long must be registered in the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record. 

Neither Martinez nor Dowers had registered any firearms, and the seized shotgun 

wasn’t registered to any other person or entity. 

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an unidentified white male in a field “a couple months” before Dowers’s arrest (so by 

his account he would have obtained it sometime near late May 2014). R. vol. 1 at 11.

Martinez also told Agents McFarland and Wright that the barrel was already cut 

down when he obtained the shotgun and that he had put the shotgun in Dowers’s car 

trunk the day that she was arrested. Further, Martinez said that he had previously 

buried the shotgun in the ground “because there was no need for [him] to be messing 

with it unless he needed it; and he would leave it buried until the appropriate time.” 

Id. (alteration in original) (quotation marks omitted). 

D. Interviews with Hernandez

On November 18, 2014, four months after the burglary, a Torrington police 

officer interviewed Hernandez about a string of local burglaries, including the 

Palomo burglary. At first, Hernandez denied any involvement in the burglaries. After 

leaving the interview room for “a few seconds,” the Torrington police officer 

returned and “became more accusatory” in his questioning. R. vol. 3 at 39.

Hernandez again denied any involvement in the burglaries. But during the same 

interview, Hernandez eventually admitted that he had burglarized the Palomo home 

and had stolen a shotgun during the burglary. The next day, Torrington police again 

interviewed Hernandez. During this second interview, Hernandez confirmed his 

earlier admissions. But this time Hernandez implicated Martinez in the burglary, too. 

Hernandez said that Martinez had stolen some tools while they were both there and 

that Martinez had returned to the Palomo home later in the day and had stolen 

additional property. Importantly, Hernandez told police that Martinez had several of 

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the firearms Hernandez had stolen. Torrington police memorialized both of the 

Hernandez interviews in written reports.

E. Martinez’s Plea Agreement and Presentence Investigation Report 

Following a criminal complaint on October 8, 2014, and a preliminary hearing 

on October 15, 2014, a grand jury indicted Martinez on two counts: (1) felon in 

possession of a firearm (Count One), 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1) and 924(a)(2), and (2) 

possession of an unregistered, short-barrel firearm (Count Two), 26 U.S.C. §§ 5841, 

5845(a), (d), 5861(d), 5871. On December 17, 2014, Martinez agreed to plead guilty 

to Count Two, and the government agreed to dismiss Count One. Under the signed 

plea agreement, the parties agreed to a base offense level of 22 under U.S.S.G. § 

2K2.1(a)(3). 

The parties also agreed to the application of two separate enhancements. First, 

the parties agreed to recommend application of U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(4)(A), which 

adds two offense levels for possessing a stolen firearm. Second, the parties agreed to 

recommend application of U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(3)(B), which adds two offense levels 

for possessing a destructive device. Also under the plea agreement, the government 

agreed to “recommend the court grant a reduction of three offense levels reflect[ing] 

his acceptance of responsibility” under U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1. R. vol. 2 at 10. Martinez 

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reserved the right to appeal if the district court calculated his total offense level as 

greater than 23.2

On January 7, 2015, Torrington police informed ATF Special Agents 

McFarland and Wright about the Palomo burglary; that a shotgun had been stolen 

during that burglary; and that Hernandez had admitted to burglarizing the Palomo 

home with Martinez.

On February 6, 2015, the probation office issued Martinez’s Presentence 

Investigation Report (PSR). As contemplated by the plea agreement, the PSR set 

Martinez’s base offense level as 22 and included the two two-level enhancements for 

possession of a stolen firearm and possession of a destructive device. But the PSR 

included an additional four-level enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B)—

one unaddressed in the plea agreement—for Martinez’s possessing a firearm in 

connection with another felony, reporting that “[Martinez] and [Eduardo] Hernandez 

burglarized a residence on July 14, 2014, and stole the firearm during the burglary.”3

 2

 The plea agreement thus contemplated the district court setting a base offense 

level of 22, adding four levels for the agreed-upon enhancements, and subtracting 

three levels for acceptance of responsibility under U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1.

3

 U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B) provides that if the defendant 

used or possessed any firearm or ammunition in connection with 

another felony offense; or possessed or transferred any firearm or 

ammunition with knowledge, intent, or reason to believe that it 

would be used or possessed in connection with another felony 

offense, [the defendant’s offense level will] increase by 4 levels. 

Additionally, a particularly relevant application note provides that § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B) 

applies “in a case in which a defendant who, during the course of a burglary, finds 

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R. vol. 2 at 21. After subtracting two offense levels for accepting responsibility, 

U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1(a), and one level for assisting authorities in the investigation of his 

own misconduct by timely notifying authorities of his intention to enter a guilty plea, 

id. § 3E1.1(b), the PSR calculated Martinez’s total offense level as 27.

The PSR also itemized Martinez’s extensive criminal history. In addition to his 

other convictions, Martinez had pleaded guilty or no contest to six separate thefts 

between 2003 and 2011. All told, Martinez accumulated 21 criminal-history points, 

far more than the 13 needed for a criminal-history category of VI. The advisory 

Guidelines range for a total offense level of 27 and a criminal-history category of VI 

is 130 to 162 months’ imprisonment. But the maximum sentence for possessing an 

unregistered, short-barrel shotgun is ten years’ imprisonment. 26 U.S.C. § 5871. 

Thus, the advisory Guidelines range became 120 months’ imprisonment. U.S.S.G. 

§ 5G1.1(a).

Before the sentencing hearing, Martinez objected to the PSR’s four-level 

enhancement for his possessing the shotgun in connection with the Torrington 

burglary, arguing that his alleged participation in the burglary was “not readily 

provable nor supported by credible evidence.” R. vol. 2 at 39. 

 

and takes a firearm, even if the defendant did not engage in any other conduct with 

that firearm during the course of the burglary.” U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1, cmt. 14(B). On 

appeal, Martinez doesn’t address whether § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B) requires that he 

personally have possessed the firearm during the burglary. 

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F. Sentencing Hearing 

On March 31, 2015, the district court held a sentencing hearing. To support the 

PSR’s four-level enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B), the government 

called Special Agent Wright as a witness. Agent Wright testified about ATF’s 

investigation. He said that, soon after obtaining the shotgun, he ran a trace on its 

serial number and learned that June Palomo had bought the shotgun from a Walmart 

in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Agent Wright also discussed what Martinez had told him 

during Martinez’s interview. Finally, Agent Wright testified about portions of the 

Torrington police reports memorializing their interviews with Hernandez. Martinez’s 

attorney objected to Agent Wright’s testimony about the Torrington police reports, 

arguing that the “multiple hearsay is so unreliable that I object to any use of that to 

take this sentence from 92 months up to 120 months.”4

 R. vol. 3 at 34. The district 

court overruled the objection.5

 4

 Without the four-level enhancement, Martinez would have had a total offense 

level of 23 and a criminal-history category of VI, yielding an advisory range of 92 to 

115 months’ imprisonment. 

5

 Of course, a district court may consider hearsay evidence at sentencing if the 

evidence has sufficient indicia of reliability to support its probable accuracy. See 

United States v. Brewer, 983 F.2d 181, 185–86 (10th Cir. 1993) (“[I]t is wellestablished that hearsay evidence is admissible at sentencing.”); U.S.S.G. § 6A1.3(a) 

(“[A] court may consider relevant information without regard to its admissibility 

under the rules of evidence applicable at trial, provided that the information has 

sufficient indicia of reliability to support its probable accuracy.”). We interpret 

Martinez’s objection at sentencing to mean that because of the multi-layered hearsay 

here, the evidence was so unreliable that it shouldn’t have been considered under 

U.S.S.G. § 6A1.3(a). 

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On direct examination, with the Torrington police reports in hand, Agent 

Wright testified that Hernandez had admitted that he and Martinez together 

burglarized the Palomo home. On cross-examination, Agent Wright acknowledged 

that Hernandez initially denied any involvement in the burglary, that Hernandez later 

claimed that Martinez had “muscled” the shotgun from him sometime after the day of 

the burglary, and that Agent Wright had never spoken with Hernandez and wasn’t 

present at Hernandez’s interviews with the Torrington police. Id. at 38–40.

Despite having the Torrington police reports in front of him during his 

testimony at the sentencing hearing, the sentencing-hearing transcript reveals that 

Agent Wright wasn’t fully versed in the reports’ contents. At one point during his 

testimony, Agent Wright was asked whether Hernandez had admitted to taking the 

shotgun from the home. He responded, “If it’s in the report, then yes.” Id. at 41. In 

response to another question asking whether Hernandez had initially said that he 

hadn’t committed the burglary, Agent Wright responded, “That’s what is in the report 

as my understanding, yes, sir.” Id. at 39. The government didn’t introduce the 

Torrington police reports into evidence, and the reports aren’t in the appellate record. 

After Agent Wright testified, the government told the district court that it 

didn’t “have other evidence in support of this offense characteristic.” Id. at 46. After 

hearing argument on the applicability of the four-level enhancement, the district court 

found that Martinez had participated in the Torrington burglary, so it applied the 

enhancement. The district court explained its finding as follows: 

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The things I usually look for in . . . weighing statements such as 

the statement made by Mr. Hernandez would be what did he get 

out of it, was there some sort of promise of special treatment, the 

question not asked or evidence that wasn’t developed here. 

Clearly, Mr. Hernandez went [into] the interrogation intending to 

see how far he could push it by way of denial, and when that did 

not seem to be working, especially given the fact that his 

fingerprint was discovered within the premises, he eventually 

came clean and made admissions that not only implicated him but 

implicated his coactor, the defendant in this matter . . . . Mr. 

Martinez made the poor choice not only to commit the burglary 

but to do it with Mr. Hernandez, who made admissions against 

his interest and, frankly, against his associate, backed up by the 

fact that Mr. Martinez was found in possession of the firearm not 

so—at a later period, and there was a statement that it was 

muscled by this defendant, Mr. Martinez, and chosen by him for 

the, for the taking. 

Id. at 48–49. After applying the enhancement, the district court sentenced Martinez to 

the statutory maximum of ten years’ imprisonment, which also was a withinGuidelines sentence under U.S.S.G. § 5G1.1(a). Martinez timely appealed. 

DISCUSSION 

 Martinez challenges the district court’s application of the four-level 

enhancement for his possessing the shotgun in connection with another felony. He 

contends that the evidence supporting the enhancement was so unreliable that the 

district court shouldn’t have considered it. Specifically, Martinez argues that 

Hernandez’s statements lacked sufficient indicia of reliability to support their 

probable accuracy. We conclude that the district court didn’t clearly err in finding 

that Hernandez’s statements implicating Martinez—especially when considered with 

all of the other evidence before the district court—had sufficient indicia of reliability 

to support their probable accuracy. Therefore, we affirm. 

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We review for clear error a district court’s assessment of the reliability of 

evidence supporting a sentencing enhancement. See United States v. MartinezJimenez, 464 F.3d 1205, 1209–10 (10th Cir. 2006) (“We . . . conclude that the district 

court did not clearly err in finding that the evidence establishing [the defendant’s] 

prior conviction was sufficiently reliable.”).6

In arguing that the district court erred in considering Hernandez’s hearsay 

statements, Martinez relies chiefly on United States v. Fennell, 65 F.3d 812 (10th Cir. 

1995). In Fennell, we reversed a district court’s four-level enhancement for using or 

possessing a firearm in connection with another felony. Id. at 814. The enhancement 

depended on our being willing to credit Fennell’s ex-girlfriend’s telephone account to 

a testifying probation officer that Fennell had shot a machine gun at her. Id. at 813. 

Felonious assault in Oklahoma depended on proof of “the intent to do bodily harm” 

or the “intent to injure.” Id. Among the difficulties applying the enhancement, 

presumably, was that no one explained how Fennell could fire a machine gun at his 

girlfriend and miss. Although acknowledging that the girlfriend’s account might be 

 6

 In view of this, the parties unsurprisingly apply the clear-error standard to the 

district court’s evidentiary ruling made under U.S.S.G. § 6A1.3(a). But we wonder 

whether the abuse-of-discretion standard fits better. See United States v. AlvaradoMartinez, 556 F.3d 732, 735 (9th Cir. 2009) (“We review a district court’s evaluation 

of the reliability of evidence used at sentencing for an abuse of discretion.” (citing 

United States v. Alvarado-Guizar, 361 F.3d 597, 599–600 (9th Cir. 2004))). A ruling 

under § 6A1.3(a) resembles a ruling under the Federal Rules of Evidence, not a 

finding of fact. Regardless, we would affirm under either standard. 

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“potential truth,” we saw problems with basing the enhancement “solely” on her 

account.7 Id. 

Fennell guides us in evaluating whether the district court clearly erred when it 

considered Hernandez’s hearsay statements. In finding insufficient indicia of 

reliability in Fennell, we emphasized that “no other evidence . . . corroborates the 

account given the preparing officer.” Id. In fact, we looked to the record to learn that 

Oklahoma authorities had charged Fennell with a misdemeanor, not a felony. Id. We 

took this as evidence that felonious intent to injure was lacking—meaning that 

Fennell hadn’t tried to shoot his girlfriend with the machine gun. We declared that 

this “tends to undermine, rather than buttress, confidence in the girlfriend’s hearsay 

statements.” Id. But in Martinez’s case, we have evidence helping to corroborate 

Hernandez’s statements. 

For starters, Hernandez knew that Martinez would have at least one firearm 

stolen from a burglarized home. Martinez downplays this fact, suggesting that by the 

time police interviewed Hernandez in mid-November, Hernandez could have learned 

about Martinez’s arrest and charges, perhaps as early as October 15, 2014—the date 

of Martinez’s preliminary hearing. But Martinez doesn’t explain how Hernandez 

 7

 We said that “[t]he facts surrounding Mr. Fennell’s arrest, while suggesting 

that the machine gun was fired during an altercation between Mr. Fennell and his 

girlfriend, do not answer the question of whether Mr. Fennell’s actions constituted a 

felony or a misdemeanor.” Fennell, 65 F.3d at 813. Because the government hadn’t 

“bother[ed] to file the arrest report or even to summarize its contents with any 

particularity,” we were “unable to determine if the girlfriend’s contemporaneous 

statements to the state police support the story given the preparing officer [the 

probation officer who prepared the PSR].” Id. at 813 n.2. 

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would have known from this that Martinez’s charged firearm came from one of the 

burglarized homes. 

In addition, Martinez’s possession of the shotgun nine days after it was stolen 

(the date law enforcement searched Dowers’s car and arrested her) also provides 

some corroborative evidence of Martinez’s involvement in the burglary. This is 

especially true given Martinez’s actions during that nine-day period. For example, 

explaining the dirt on the shotgun when agents seized it, Martinez said that he had 

earlier buried it in a field but later unearthed it before putting it in Dowers’s car trunk 

the day that she was arrested. These suspicious actions are consistent with Martinez’s 

having obtained the shotgun from the Palomo home. Martinez also couldn't rationally 

explain how he came to possess the shotgun. Martinez’s story about getting the 

shotgun “in a field” from “an unknown white guy” hardly inspires confidence—

especially since he said that happened in late May 2014, long before the Palomo 

burglary. R. vol. 3 at 44. That Martinez lied about when (and likely where) he got 

the shotgun strongly suggests that he didn’t want police talking to Hernandez. 

Further, in assessing whether Hernandez’s statements had sufficient indicia of 

reliability, the district court was entitled to rely on Martinez’s long history of theft 

offenses—six separate guilty or no-contest pleas in less than ten years. See United 

States v. Ruby, 706 F.3d 1221, 1230 (10th Cir. 2013) (“While prior incidents are not 

necessarily probative of later conduct, Fed. R. Evid. 404(a), this type of evidence 

may help establish another piece of the minimal indicia of reliability necessary to 

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consider hearsay at sentencing.” (citing United States v. Damato, 672 F.3d 832, 847 

(10th Cir. 2012) (quotation marks omitted)). 

Aside from the comparisons to Fennell, Martinez argues that Hernandez’s 

statements are unreliable because they were inconsistent. Specifically, Martinez 

characterizes Hernandez’s Martinez-muscled-me-out-of-the-shotgun story and the 

Martinez-was-with-me-when-I-burglarized-the-house story as conflicting accounts. 

But we agree with the district court that the two accounts were one, evolving story 

reluctantly making its way toward truth. The district court sensibly interpreted 

Hernandez’s statements. Taken together, the corroborative evidence mentioned above 

provides additional support for the district court’s determination that Hernandez’s 

statements were probably accurate. We therefore conclude that the district court 

didn’t clearly err when it considered the statements. 

CONCLUSION 

 

The district court didn’t clearly err when it considered Agent Wright’s 

testimony regarding Hernandez’s statements to Torrington police. Because of 

substantial corroborative evidence, the statements had sufficient indicia of reliability 

to support their probable accuracy. We therefore affirm the district court’s 

consideration of Agent Wright’s testimony and its application of the four-level 

enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B). 

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