Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-04-03158/USCOURTS-caDC-04-03158-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Alfonso Godines
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 17, 2005 Decided January 3, 2006

No. 04-3158

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

ALFONSO GODINES, A/K/A MEXICO,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 04cr00071-01)

Neil H. Jaffee, Assistant Federal Public Defender, argued

the cause for appellant. With him on the briefs was A. J.

Kramer, Federal Public Defender.

Valinda Jones, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the cause

for appellee. With her on the brief was Kenneth L. Wainstein,

U.S. Attorney, and John R. Fisher, Assistant U.S. Attorney at

the time the brief was filed. Roy W. McLeese, III, Assistant U.S.

Attorney, entered an appearance.

Before: SENTELLE and ROGERS, Circuit Judges, and

SILBERMAN, Senior Circuit Judge.

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 1 of 8
2

Godines argues that his mandatory Guidelines sentence 1

violated the Sixth Amendment under both Booker and AlmendarezTorres v. United States, 523 U.S. 224 (1998). Given our disposition

of this case, and given that Godines’s sentence (115 months) fell

below the maximum authorized under the Guidelines based on the

facts admitted in his plea agreement (135 months), we need not and do

not reach the Almendarez-Torres issue. Compare Booker, 125 S. Ct.

at 756 (“[W]e reaffirm our holding in Apprendi: Any fact (other than

a prior conviction) which is necessary to support a sentence exceeding

the maximum authorized by the facts established by a plea of guilty or

a jury verdict must be admitted by the defendant or proved to a jury

beyond a reasonable doubt.”).

Opinion for the Court filed PER CURIAM.

Concurring opinion filed by Circuit Judge ROGERS.

PER CURIAM: Alfonso Godines (a.k.a. “Mexico”) pled guilty

to distributing 150-500 grams of cocaine base, in violation of 21

U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(B)(iii). At the sentencing hearing—which

took place after the Supreme Court’s decision in Blakely v.

Washington, 542 U.S. 296 (2004), but before its decision in

United States v. Booker, 125 S. Ct. 738 (2005)—Godines

objected to the mandatory application of the Sentencing

Guidelines. In response, the District Court entered into the

record two alternative rationales forthe sentence imposed. First,

applying the Guidelines as mandatory, the District Court

sentenced Godines to 115 months imprisonment. Second,

applying the Guidelines “only as advisory, not as controlling,”

the District Court announced that it would sentence Godines to

the same 115-month prison term. Godines timely appealed.

Because we conclude the alternative sentencing rationale

rendered harmless any error in the mandatory Guidelines

sentence, we affirm. 1

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 2 of 8
3

I

We review Godines’s preserved objection to his alternative

sentence under the harmless error standard. See United States

v. Coumaris, 399 F.3d 343, 351 (D.C. Cir. 2005). On the facts

presented, we are confident beyond a reasonable doubt that the

District Court did not commit prejudicial error affecting

Godines’s substantial rights. 

Given the uncertainty surrounding the Guidelines after

Blakely and before Booker, the District Court imposed an

“alternative sentence” in addition to the mandatory Guidelines

sentence:

But I will at this time also give an alternative sentence in

my discretion with reference to the sentencing guidelines,

but only as advisory, not as controlling. And reviewing all

the facts and circumstances that I have already discussed, I

find in my discretion, looking to the sentencing guidelines

only in an advisory way, that for the reasons that I have

already discussed and reviewed, a sentence of 115 months

is the appropriate sentence in this case. That is the

sentence, alternatively, that the Court imposes in its

discretion.

Godines argues that the District Court’s alternative rationale

impermissibly failed to “consider” the numerous sentencing

factors listed in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a). However, even under the

harmless error standard, “we begin our review with the

presumption ‘that the district court knew and applied the law

correctly.’” United States v. Ayers, 428 F.3d 312, 315 (D.C. Cir.

2005) (quoting United States v. Pinnick, 47 F.3d 434, 439-40

(D.C. Cir. 1995)). 

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 3 of 8
4

In this case, unlike in Ayers, there is nothing to rebut that

presumption. To the contrary, the District Court presciently

foresaw the contours of its obligations under the theretofore

undefined “advisory” Guidelines regime, and nothing in Booker

or this Circuit’s precedents requires anything more.

Accordingly, we hold the District Court’s alternative rationale

rendered harmless its mandatory application of the Sentencing

Guidelines. See United States v. Simpson, — F.3d —, 2005 WL

3370060, at *11 (D.C. Cir. Dec. 13, 2005); cf. Ayers, 428 F.3d

at 314-15.

II

At oral argument, Godines attempted to rebut Ayers’s

presumption by arguing that the District Court failed to

“consider . . . the need to avoid unwarranted sentence disparities

among defendants with similar records who have been found

guilty of similar conduct.” 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)(6). Ordinarily,

an issue raised for first time at oral argument is “waived because

it was not raised in [the] briefs.” Ark Las Vegas Rest. Corp. v.

NLRB, 334 F.3d 99, 108 n.4 (D.C. Cir. 2003). However,

because Ayers was decided after the parties’ briefs were

submitted, and because we have not afforded the parties the

opportunity to submit supplemental briefing on the issue, we

consider Godines’s argument, although we reject it on the

merits. Cf. Hormel v. Helvering, 312 U.S. 552, 558-59 (1941).

More specifically, Godines argues that, without the

Guidelines in place, district judges will enter disparate sentences

on defendants convicted of committing offenses involving crack

cocaine. Given the impetus for sentencing uniformity contained

in section 3553(a)(6), Godines argues, the courts cannot validly

sentence to an alternative without that consideration. Since

there were no such new sentences without the Guidelines at the

time of the entry of the alternative sentencing rationale, he

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 4 of 8
5

concludes, the judge could not have considered them, and

therefore the alternative rationale must be reconsidered after

Booker. While ingenious on its face, this argument will not

withstand examination. The same requirement of uniformity

applies to all offenses, not just those involving a particular

controlled substance. The same impossibility of consideration

of sentences not yet imposed exists as to all offenses. Were we

to adopt Godines’s theory and conclusion, the sentences upheld

under the Ayers presumption would be an empty set. The

Guidelines, advisory or even if mandatory, did not require an

oracular judge who would consider all of the sentences not yet

imposed. The most a judge can do is consider those other

sentences that do exist. The comparable sentences will be much

smaller in the early days of any sentencing regime than in the

later, but this does not invalidate either set of sentences. As with

any other factor under section 3553(a), we presume the District

Court to have known and done what the law required absent a

showing to the contrary.

For the reasons set forth above, the sentencing judgment

under review is affirmed.

So ordered.

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 5 of 8
ROGERS, J., concurring: I write separately to clarify the

state of the law of this circuit in light of United States v.

Simpson, No. 04-3129, 2005 WL 3370060 (D.C. Cir. Dec. 13,

2005), and United States v. Ayers, 428 F.3d 312 (D.C. Cir.

2005). In Simpson, the court held that a sentence was free of

error under United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005),

because the judgment recited a single sentence with alternative

rationales. Simpson, 2005 WL 3370060, at *10. In addition to

a rationale based on the mandatory Guidelines, the district court

stated a discretionary rationale treating the Guidelines as

advisory after giving proper consideration to the sentencing

factors enumerated in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a). See Simpson, 2005

WL 3370060, at *5-*7. Although the district court was without

lawful authority to impose a discretionary sentence when it

sentenced Simpson because the Guidelines were still mandatory,

this court sidestepped a harmless error analysis by treating the

discretionary rationale as sufficient to support the judgment

despite the Booker error. See id. at *6. By recasting the district

court’s sentence as one imposed under “alternative rationales,”

Simpson placed the burden of proving prejudicial error on the

defendant. See id. at *5. 

The court in Simpson emphasized that this court reviews

judgments, not opinions of the district court about what it might

do under other circumstances. See id. (quoting People’s

Mojahedin Organization of Iran v. U.S. Department of State,

182 F.3d 17, 23 n.7 (D.C. Cir. 1999)(quoting Chevron U.S.A.,

Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, 467 U.S. 837, 842

(1984))). The formal judgment entered on the docket in

Simpson stated both the mandatory and alternative rationales for

the sentence, and identified a separate source of legal authority

for each rationale. See Simpson, 2005 WL 3370060, at *5. By

contrast, the docketed judgment in this case refers only to a

sentence imposed under the mandatory Guidelines. Although

“the order of judgment and commitment is merely evidence of

[the] sentence,” Gilliam v. United States, 269 F.2d 770, 772

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 6 of 8
2

(D.C. Cir. 1959)(citation omitted), the district court, when

pronouncing Godines’ sentence, stated that “the judgment of the

Court” was entered pursuant to the mandatory Guidelines. See

Sentencing Hr’g Tr. at 32-33. The district court also opined that

it would impose an identical sentence if the mandatory

Guidelines no longer applied, see id. at 36, but did not include

an alternative rationale for the sentence in either the docketed

judgment or the pronouncement of the sentence. As the court

held in Simpson, “[t]here is no question” that the sentence

imposed under the mandatory Guidelines was error. Simpson,

2005 WL 3370060, at *5. Unlike Simpson, however, no errorfree source of authority for sentencing Godines was set forth in

the judgment.

Consequently, because our review is limited to the

judgment, see id., the district court’s opinion about the

discretionary sentence it would impose does not stand in the

same posture as “an independent ground by which the district

court reached the same judgment,” id. at *7, and because

Godines preserved an objection, see Op. at 1, the harmless error

analysis in Ayers, 428 F.3d at 314-15, applies. The Government

thus bears the “heavy burden” of proving that the Booker error

was harmless. See Ayers, 428 F.3d at 314. In Ayers, in which

the court was presented with two identical sentences — one

imposed under the mandatory Guidelines and one announced on

the assumption that the Guidelines were no longer mandatory —

the court stated that “the announcement of an identical

alternative sentence might establish harmless error.” Id. The

court presumed that a district court announcing an alternative

non-Guidelines sentence “took into account all the factors listed

in § 3553(a) and accorded them the appropriate significance.”

Id. at 315. It remanded the case for resentencing, however,

because the district court had refused to admit mitigating

evidence, thereby rebutting the presumption that the district

court had properly considered the section 3553(a) factors. See

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 7 of 8
3

id. The “alternative sentence” approach adopted in Ayers, then,

serves as a means to avoid needless judicial proceedings but it

does not eliminate the need for harmless error analysis. Nothing

warrants deviation from our typical approach here.

Under Ayers, the district court’s imposition on Godines of

the mandatory Guidelines sentence was error, and the only

question is whether the district court’s announcement of an

identical “alternative sentence” establishes beyond a reasonable

doubt that the error was harmless. See id. at 314. Suffice it to

say, because Godines has failed to rebut the presumption that the

district court properly weighed the section 3553(a) factors, see

Op. at 2-4, the Booker error was harmless and a remand for

resentencing is unnecessary. Accordingly, I concur in the

judgment affirming the conviction.

USCA Case #04-3158 Document #940347 Filed: 01/03/2006 Page 8 of 8