United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Submitted January 21, 2020

Decided January 22, 2020

Before

FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL B. BRENNAN, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL Y. SCUDDER, Circuit Judge

No. 19-2077

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

JAMES ASSAD,

Defendant-Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District 

Court for the Central District of Illinois.

No. 07-30099-001

Sue E. Myerscough,

Judge.

O R D E R

James Assad pleaded guilty to possession with the intent to distribute 

methamphetamine. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(C). After completing his term of 

incarceration, he began serving six years of supervised release. Following violations of 

the conditions of release, the district court revoked his supervised release three times, 

twice in 2018 and once in 2019. He now appeals the 12-month prison sentence that he 

received for the 2019 violation. His lawyer, however, moves to withdraw from the 

appeal, arguing that it is frivolous. See Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967). We grant 

the motion to withdraw and dismiss the appeal. 

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1
No. 19-2077 Page 2

Assad had his term of supervision first revoked four years after his release from 

prison in 2014. He admitted to the district court that he violated his conditions of 

release by possessing methamphetamine, an admission confirmed by failed drug tests. 

And just a year earlier, Assad had agreed to extend his term of supervised release by six 

months after he had traveled with a person who possessed methamphetamine. The 

court now revoked his term of release and sentenced him to 49 days’ imprisonment 

followed by two more years of supervised release. 

The district court revoked Assad’s second term of release after he failed another 

drug test just three months after the term began. The court sentenced him to 18 months

of supervised release, commanding that while on release Assad “shall report” to jail 

every weekend, beginning every Friday at 6:00 PM.

Only three months later, Assad violated the terms of his supervised release

again, this time by failing to report for weekend confinement. He phoned his probation 

officer almost a half hour after he was obligated to report to jail, at 6:25 PM on Friday,

and announced that he was not going to jail. He said that he had severe hip pain and 

did not have anyone available to watch his dogs. Describing his excuses as “at best 

disingenuous” and decrying his “utter disregard” for his conditions of release, the 

government argued for 12 months of reimprisonment. Assad responded that he 

behaved reasonably: he had acute hip pain, he went to the hospital after the phone call, 

and when he tried to enter the jail later that evening, officers denied him entry because 

the jail lacked certain paperwork. 

After a revocation hearing, the district court found that Assad inexcusably failed 

to report as required and revoked his supervised release. The district court highlighted 

Assad’s history of violations of his terms of supervised release, noting that Assad was 

“unwilling or unable to comply with the conditions.” Remarking that it had leniently 

imposed sentences “well below” the recommended policy-statement ranges at his past 

revocation hearings, the court stated that longer imprisonment was “necessary at this 

time.” It sentenced Assad to 12 months’ incarceration (between the recommended range 

of 8 to 14 months) with no additional term of supervised release. 

In moving to withdraw, counsel briefs us on the nature of the case and addresses 

the potential issues that this kind of appeal might involve. Assad has not responded to 

counsel’s motion. See CIR. R. 51(b). Because Assad does not enjoy an unqualified 

constitutional right to counsel on an appeal of a revocation order, see Gagnon v. Scarpelli, 

411 U.S. 778, 790–91 (1973), the safeguards of Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967) 
No. 19-2077 Page 3

need not govern our review. Nonetheless, our practice is to follow them. See United 

States v. Brown, 823 F.3d 392, 394 (7th Cir. 2016). Because counsel’s analysis appears 

thorough, we limit our review to the subjects that he discusses. See United States v. Bey, 

748 F.3d 774, 776 (7th Cir. 2014).

Counsel first considers whether Assad could plausibly argue that the district 

court abused its discretion in revoking supervised release because Assad’s hip pain and 

the paperwork dispute may have a factual basis. But counsel correctly concludes that 

this argument would be frivolous. As counsel explains, a district court may revoke a 

term of supervised release if it finds by a preponderance of evidence that the defendant 

violated a condition of release. See 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3). We will assume that Assad’s 

hip pain limited his mobility and that jail officials would not grant Assad a belated 

entry. Nonetheless, Assad could have attempted to comply with his reporting duty by 

phoning his probation officer before 6:00 PM. But he chose not to do so. Thus, Assad 

could not plausibly argue that the district court unreasonably found that Assad violated 

this condition and revoked his term of release. 

Counsel next considers and rejects the argument that Assad’s 12-month prison 

sentence was procedurally or substantively deficient. As counsel explains, the district 

court correctly calculated the policy-statement range of 8 to 14 months’ imprisonment, 

considered the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors (focusing mainly on the “history and 

characteristics of the defendant,” id. at (a)(1)), and permissibly selected a sentence 

within that range. The district court knew about Assad’s lengthy history of violating 

terms of his supervised release and the ineffectiveness of the lenient sentences that

Assad received after those violations. True, in reimprisoning Assad, the district court 

did not expressly acknowledge Assad’s asserted hip pain or his attempt to enter the jail 

after leaving the hospital. But as counsel correctly states, the court had already 

addressed these issues in overruling Assad’s opposition to revocation. Accordingly, 

there would be no basis for us to conclude that Assad’s 12-month sentence is “plainly 

unreasonable.” United States v. Salinas, 365 F.3d 582, 588 (7th Cir. 2004).

Finally, counsel properly determines that any claim of ineffective assistance of 

counsel would not be appropriate on direct appeal. That argument is better saved for 

collateral review. See Massaro v. United States, 538 U.S. 500, 504–05 (2003); see also United 

States v. Eskridge, 445 F.3d 930, 932 (7th Cir. 2006). 

We thus GRANT the petition to withdraw and DISMISS the appeal.