Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-15-03175/USCOURTS-ca8-15-03175-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
United States of America
Appellee
Tonney Lee Valure
Appellant

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit

___________________________

No. 15-3175

___________________________

United States of America

lllllllllllllllllllll Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

Tonney Lee Valure

lllllllllllllllllllll Defendant - Appellant

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Appeal from United States District Court 

for the Eastern District of Arkansas - Little Rock

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 Submitted: April 11, 2016

 Filed: July 5, 2016

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Before COLLOTON, ARNOLD, and SHEPHERD, Circuit Judges.

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SHEPHERD, Circuit Judge. 

Tonney Valure pled guilty to armed bank robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C.

§ 2113(a) and (d) while on federal supervised release from two other felony bank

robbery convictions. In sentencing Valure for the instant bank robbery, the district

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court revoked his supervised release fromthe two prior convictions and ordered both 1

of the revocation sentences to run consecutively to each other and consecutive to the

underlying sentence. Valure argues the district court erred when it ordered the

sentences to be served consecutively rather than concurrently.

I.

On July 30, 2013, Valure committed armed bank robbery while on federal

supervised release from two other federal bank robbery convictions: No.

4:10CR00236, a 1991 bank robbery in Tennessee, and No. 4:92CR00007, a 1991

bank robbery in Arkansas. Valure had been sentenced for both No. 4:10CR00236

and No. 4:92CR00007 in the Western District of Tennessee, with sentences running

concurrently and with supervised release to follow. Following Valure’s release on

supervision, jurisdiction for both cases was transferred to the Eastern District of

Arkansas, where revocation petitions were filed in both cases based on the July 30,

2013 robbery.

Valure was sentenced in the instant case, No. 4:13CR00266, on September 8,

2015. After calculating a guidelines range of 51 to 63 months, the district court

imposed a sentence of 63 months’ imprisonment on Valure. Valure did not contest

revocation from his two prior convictions, but asked the court to order the two

revocation sentences to run concurrent to the sentence imposed for the instant armed

bank robbery conviction. Conversely, the government requested the revocation

sentencesrun concurrent to each other but consecutive to the current sentence. Under

the Guidelines, revocation ofsupervised release in No. 4:10CR00236 carried a range

of 33 to 36 months’ imprisonment while revocation in No. 4:92CR00007 allowed for

up to 24 months’ imprisonment. The district court revoked Valure’s supervised

The Honorable Kristine G. Baker, United States DistrictJudge for the Eastern 1

District of Arkansas.

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release in both cases as a result of his violation of the condition that he shall not

commit another federal, state, orlocal crime. Consequently, the district court ordered

Valure to serve 36 months in prison in Case No. 4:10CR00236, with the sentence to

run consecutive to the 63 month sentence in Case No. 4:13CR00266, and 24 months

in prison in Case No. 4:92CR00007, with the sentence to run consecutive to the 36

month sentence in Case No. 4:10CR00236, and no supervised release to follow. 

Valure timely appealed. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm.

II.

Valure argues the district court erred in ordering that all three of the sentences

be served consecutively. We apply the same abuse-of-discretion standard of review

to a district court’s revocation sentencing decision that we apply to initial sentencing

decisions. United States v. Shepard, 657 F.3d 682, 685 (8th Cir. 2011) (citing United

States v. Miller, 557 F.3d 919, 922 (8th Cir. 2009)).

United States Sentencing Guideline (“U.S.S.G.”) § 7B1.3(f) provides:

Any term of imprisonment imposed upon the revocation of probation or

supervised release shall be ordered to be served consecutively to any

sentence of imprisonment that the defendant is serving, whether or not

the sentence of imprisonment being served resulted from the conduct

that is the basis of the revocation of probation or supervised release. 

Further, 18 U.S.C. § 3584(b) grants the district court discretion in determining

whether to order the terms of imprisonment to run concurrently or consecutively and

directs the district court to consider the § 3553(a) factors when making such a

determination. This Court’s precedent establishes that, pursuant to § 3584, a district

court has discretionary authority to order sentences to run consecutively rather than

concurrently. United States v. Baker, 491 F.3d 421, 424 (8th Cir. 2007); United

States v. Cotroneo, 89 F.3d 510, 512 (8th Cir. 1996), cert. denied, 519 U.S. 1018

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(1996). Valure attempts to distinguish Cotroneo on a factual basis, but the fact that

revocationsin Cotroneo were based upon supervised release ordered by two separate

courts on two separate occasions is inconsequential. See 89 F.3d at 511-12. We

clearly stated in Cotroneo that “§ 3584(a) allowed the District Court to impose

consecutive rather than concurrent sentences upon revocation of [the defendant’s]

concurrent terms of supervised release.” Id. at 513. Therefore, Valure demonstrates

no abuse of the district court’s discretion under the Guidelines, applicable statute, or

this Court’s precedent. 

Finally, in reviewing a sentence under the abuse-of-discretion standard, we

“must first ensure that the district court committed no significant procedural error

. . . then consider the substantive reasonableness of the sentence imposed.” Gall v.

United States, 552 U.S. 38, 51 (2007). “A sentence within the Guidelines range is

accorded a presumption of substantive reasonableness on appeal.” United States v.

Robinson, 516 F.3d 716, 717 (8th Cir. 2008). The district court weighed the

§ 3553(a) factors, noting Valure’s prior convictions for crimes of violence as well as

“the seriousness of his noncompliance and his continued lack of regard for the law,”

and imposed revocation sentences permissible under 18 U.S.C. §§ 3583(e) and 3584. 

Given that each of the sentences imposed in Valure’s case fell within the Guidelines

range, we are satisfied that the district court committed no significant procedural error

and imposed a substantively reasonable sentence. Accordingly, the district court did

not abuse its considerable discretion in ordering the consecutive sentences.

III.

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm Valure’s consecutive sentences.

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