United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit

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No. 20-3408

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United States of America

lllllllllllllllllllllPlaintiff - Appellee

v.

Derek Rogers

lllllllllllllllllllllDefendant - Appellant

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Appeal from United States District Court 

for the Southern District of Iowa - Central

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 Submitted: October 18, 2021

Filed: December 14, 2021

[Published] 

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Before SMITH, Chief Judge, WOLLMAN and LOKEN, Circuit Judges. 

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PER CURIAM.

Derek Rogers pleaded guilty to (i) conspiracy to distribute marijuana and 500

grams or more of a mixture and substance containing cocaine in violation of 21

U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1), 841(b)(1)(B), 841(b)(1)(D), 846; and (ii) possession of a firearm

in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(i). 

The Presentence Investigation Report (PSR) determined that Rogers is a career
offender based on two prior predicate felony convictions, a 1995 conviction in the

Southern District of New York for violent crimes in aid of racketeering and drug

distribution conspiracy, and a 2015 Colorado state court conviction for conspiracy to

distribute marijuana. USSG § 4B1.1(a). This resulted in an advisory guidelines

sentencing range of 262 to 327 months imprisonment. § 4B1.1(c). The district court1

overruled Rogers’s objection to the career offender designation, granted a downward

departure, and sentenced Rogers to 210 months’ imprisonment -- 150 months for the

drug-conspiracy offense and a consecutive 60 months for the firearm offense. See 18

U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii). 

Rogers appeals his sentence, arguing the district court abused its discretion by

not granting a downward variance because applying career offender status “overstates

[his] culpability and results in a sentence that is substantively unreasonable.” When

the defendant does not argue the district court committed procedural sentencing error,

as in this case, we review the substantive reasonableness of his sentence under a

deferential abuse-of-discretion standard. The court abuses its discretion if it “fails to

consider a relevant factor that should have received significant weight, gives

significant weight to an improper or irrelevant factor, or considers only the

appropriate factors but commits a clear error of judgment in weighing those factors.” 

United States v. David, 682 F.3d 1074, 1077 (8th Cir. 2012). It is the “unusual case

when we reverse a district court sentence -- whether within, above, or below the

applicable Guidelines range -- as substantively unreasonable.” United States v.

Feemster, 572 F.3d 455, 464 (8th Cir. 2009) (en banc) (quotation omitted). 

On appeal, Rogers argues the career offender guidelines “are among the most

severe and least likely to promote sentencing purposes in the United States

1The Honorable Rebecca Goodgame Ebinger, United States District Judge for

the Southern District of Iowa. 

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Sentencing Guidelines Manual.” While the district court’s calculation under the

guidelines was “technically correct,” he asserts, “application of the career offender

status . . . resulted in a sentence that is substantively unreasonable.” He cites no

Supreme Court or circuit court authority adopting this contention. 

The career offender guidelines are found in Part 4B of the now-advisory

sentencing guidelines. Contrary to Rogers’s assertion that these provisions are “least

likely to promote [the Guidelines’] sentencing purposes,” the career offender

guidelines were adopted to carry out Congress’s mandate that the Sentencing

Commission “shall assure that the guidelines specify a sentence to a term of

imprisonment at or near the maximum term authorized for categories of defendants”

that include Rogers, whose criminal history spans four decades of violent crimes and

drug trafficking. 28 U.S.C. § 994(h); see USSG § 4B1.1, comment. (backg’d). 

Rogers’s frontal assault on the career offender guidelines “is essentially asking this

court to compel the district court to disagree with a guidelines provision as a matter

of sentencing policy . . . . This is not our proper role in reviewing sentences imposed

under the advisory guidelines.” United States v. Heim, 941 F.3d 338, 341 (8th Cir.

2019). 

At sentencing, Rogers moved for a downward variance based on his 

socioeconomic background and health conditions -- asthma, high blood pressure, and

high cholesterol -- that place him at high risk of serious illness or death from COVID19. In denying a variance and imposing a 210-month sentence, the district court

carefully explained that it had considered the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) sentencing factors,

the sentencing guidelines, the seriousness of the offense conduct, the violations

Rogers committed when granted pretrial release, his troubled childhood and health

conditions as mitigating factors, and his extensive criminal history beginning at age

13 and extending nearly four decades as an adult. Though Rogers argues that

sentencing him as a career offender insufficiently accounts for his history and

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characteristics, the district court assigned other sentencing factors greater weight. 

“The district court has wide latitude to weigh the § 3553(a) factors in each case and

assign some factors greater weight than others in determining an appropriate

sentence.” United States v. Borromeo, 657 F.3d 754, 757 (8th Cir. 2011) (quotation

omitted). There was no abuse of the district court’s substantial sentencing discretion. 

The judgment of the district court is affirmed. 

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