United States Court of Appeals 

For the First Circuit 

No. 15-2522 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Appellee, 

v. 

CHRISTIAN SÁNCHEZ-COLBERG, 

Defendant, Appellant. 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO 

[Hon. Francisco A. Besosa, U.S. District Judge] 

Before 

Howard, Chief Judge, 

Torruella and Barron, Circuit Judges. 

William S. Maddox on brief for appellant. 

Tiffany V. Monrose, Assistant United States Attorney, Rosa 

Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez, United States Attorney, and Mariana E. 

Bauzá-Almonte, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief, Appellate 

Division, on brief for appellee. 

May 8, 2017 
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HOWARD, Chief Judge. Christian Sánchez-Colberg pleaded 

guilty to two drug- and weapons-related charges; in exchange, the 

government dismissed others. Sánchez now appeals his sentence, 

attacking its procedural and substantive reasonableness. Although 

Sánchez's plea agreement does not bar this appeal, his challenges 

ultimately fail on their merits. We affirm. 

I. Background

Puerto Rico law enforcement officers encountered Sánchez 

and his codefendant while searching abandoned apartments in an 

unrelated case. The officers found Sánchez with cocaine, 

marijuana, drug ledgers, cash, ammunition, and two handguns -- one 

of which was modified to fire automatically.1 Sánchez eventually 

entered guilty pleas to possessing marijuana with the intent to 

distribute, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), and possessing 

firearms in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime, in violation 

of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(i). In exchange, the government agreed 

to dismiss other charges -- one of which carried a mandatory 30-

year-minimum sentence. See id. § 924(c)(1)(B)(ii). 

In the plea agreement, the parties stipulated that the 

appropriate guidelines sentencing range for the marijuana charge 

 1 Because Sánchez pleaded guilty, we draw the facts "from the 

plea agreement, the change-of-plea colloquy, the Pre-Sentence 

Investigation Report ('PSR'), and the transcript of the sentencing 

hearing." United States v. Cruz-Vázquez, 841 F.3d 546, 547 n.1 

(1st Cir. 2016). 
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was 0-6 months' incarceration, and agreed to recommend a sentence 

"at the higher end." The firearms charge carried a statutorily 

required consecutive incarcerative term of at least 60 months, and 

the parties identified the guidelines range as that statutory 

minimum. See id. § 924(c)(1)(A)(i); U.S.S.G. §2K2.4(b) (2014). 

On that count, however, the plea agreement contemplated an aboveguidelines sentence: Sánchez could argue for as few as 96 months, 

and the government could "request a . . . term of imprisonment of 

up to one hundred and fifty-six (156) months." The agreement 

further provided that Sánchez would waive his right to appeal, so 

long as the court sentenced him "according to its terms, 

conditions, and recommendations." 

At the sentencing hearing, Sánchez asked the judge to 

impose a 6-month sentence on the marijuana charge and a 96-month 

sentence on the firearms charge (102 months total). The government 

also recommended a 6-month sentence on the marijuana charge, but 

requested a 144-month sentence for the firearms (150 months total). 

The district court accepted the parties' recommendation on the 

marijuana charge, but found insufficient "the sentence that both 

the government and the defense recommended" on the firearms charge. 

The court then sentenced Sánchez to the top of the range specified 

in the plea agreement for the § 924(c) violation: 156 months (for 

a total incarcerative sentence of 162 months). Sánchez did not 
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object at the sentencing hearing; in this timely appeal, however, 

he argues that the sentence was unreasonable.

II. Analysis

Before addressing the merits, we first determine whether 

this appeal falls within the waiver of appeal to which Sánchez 

agreed. See United States v. Betancourt-Pérez, 833 F.3d 18, 21 

(1st Cir. 2016). It does not. 

A. Waiver

A plea agreement's appeal-waiver provision "is valid if 

it was knowingly and voluntarily executed, and if enforcement would 

not result in a miscarriage of justice." United States v. 

Santiago-Burgos, 750 F.3d 19, 22 (1st Cir. 2014). "But '[e]ven a 

knowing and voluntary appeal waiver only precludes appeals that 

fall within its scope.'" Id. at 22-23 (alteration in original) 

(quoting United States v. McCoy, 508 F.3d 74, 77 (1st Cir. 2007)). 

When determining such a provision's scope, "we rely on basic 

contract interpretation principles, construing the agreement where 

possible to give effect to every term and phrase, and construing 

any ambiguities in favor of allowing the appeal to proceed." Id. 

at 23 (citations omitted). 

Sánchez's plea agreement contains this appeal-waiver 

provision: "Defendant hereby agrees that if this Honorable Court 

accepts this Plea and Forfeiture Agreement and sentences him 

according to its terms, conditions, and recommendations, Defendant 
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waives and surrenders his right to appeal the judgment and sentence 

in this case."

The agreement's "Sentence Recommendation" provision 

reads, in its entirety: 

As to [the marijuana count] the parties agree to 

recommend a sentence of imprisonment at the higher end 

of the above referenced guideline calculation. As to 

[the firearms count] the defendant can request a 

consecutive term of imprisonment of ninety-six (96) 

months and the Government can request a consecutive term 

of imprisonment of up to one hundred and fifty-six (156) 

months. The parties agree that any recommendation by 

either party for a term of imprisonment below or above 

the stipulated sentence recommendation constitutes a 

material breach of the Plea and Forfeiture Agreement.

Sánchez argues that the appeal-waiver provision does not 

apply because the district court sentenced him to 156 months on 

the firearms count, but he requested 96 months and the government 

sought only 144 months -- so the court did not sentence him 

"according to" the parties' "recommendations." The government 

counters that, because it was permitted to ask for a 156-month 

sentence on the firearms count, Sánchez's ultimate sentence "was 

within the range contemplated by the parties in the plea 

agreement," and he was thus sentenced according to the agreement's 

terms and conditions. 

"Plea agreements should be given their plain meaning." 

United States v. Ocasio-Cancel, 727 F.3d 85, 89 (1st Cir. 2016). 

But here, the meaning of Sánchez's plea agreement is ambiguous. 

The appeal-waiver provision bars any appeal from a sentence in 
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accordance with the agreement's "terms, conditions, and 

recommendations." (emphasis added). The underlined language is 

not meaningless: because we "constru[e] the agreement . . . to 

give effect to every term and phrase," Santiago-Burgos, 750 F.3d 

at 23, we do not read the appeal-waiver provision's inclusion of 

"recommendations" as mere surplusage.2 See United States v. 

Garcia, 698 F.2d 31, 36 (1st Cir. 1983) (rejecting a plea-agreement 

construction that would "render the language mere surplusage") 

(quoting United States v. Bowler, 585 F.2d 851, 854 (7th Cir. 

1978)). 

The agreement's ambiguity lies in the meaning of the 

phrase "its . . . recommendations." The phrase could simply refer 

to any sentence within the "stipulated sentence recommendation" 

contained within the agreement's four corners. But the phrase 

could also refer more narrowly to the parties' actual requests at 

sentencing for a term of imprisonment, so long as those requests 

are within the agreement's textually specified sentencing range. 

Cf. United States v. Ríos-Hernández, 645 F.3d 456, 459, 461-62 

(1st Cir. 2011) (construing "its . . . recommendations" to be 

limited by the parties' agreement to recommend a sentence at the 

 2 This language distinguishes Sánchez's case from others in 

which we construed appeal-waiver provisions lacking such a term. 

See, e.g., United States v. Morales-Arroyo, No. 15-1185, 2017 WL 

1395753, at *1 (1st Cir. Apr. 19, 2017); Betancourt-Pérez, 833 

F.3d at 22. 
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lower end of the applicable guideline range). The phrase's meaning 

as used in the agreement is thus ambiguous. And, because we 

construe plea-agreement ambiguity against the government, we hold 

that Sánchez's appeal is not within the appeal-waiver provision's 

scope, and accordingly proceed to the merits. See United States 

v. Newbert, 504 F.3d 180, 185 (1st Cir. 2007). 

B. Sentencing Error

Sánchez's sentencing-error arguments, however, fail on 

their merits. We review these claims in two steps: "we first 

determine whether the sentence imposed is procedurally reasonable 

and then determine whether it is substantively reasonable." CruzVázquez, 841 F.3d at 549 (quoting United States v. Clogston, 662 

F.3d 588, 590 (1st Cir. 2011)). 

1. Procedural reasonableness 

Sánchez contends that his sentence was procedurally 

unreasonable because the district court "did not articulate a basis 

for exceeding the recommendations of the parties." See Gall v. 

United States, 552 U.S. 38, 51 (2007) (procedural error includes 

"failing to adequately explain the chosen sentence"). Because 

Sánchez did not preserve this argument by raising it below, we 

review only for plain error. See United States v. Bermúdez-
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Meléndez, 827 F.3d 160, 164 (1st Cir. 2016).3 There was no error 

here, plain or otherwise. 

"To satisfy its burden of explanation, the sentencing 

court need do no more than identify the main factors behind its 

decision." Id. The sentencing court met that obligation here. 

As acknowledged by Sánchez in his brief, the court determined, 

among other findings, that the parties' sentencing requests did 

"not reflect the seriousness of the offense," which included 

possession of "two powerful weapons[,] one of which is modified to 

shoot automatically," in addition to "the ammunition . . . [drugs], 

drug ledgers, and drug paraphernalia." This explanation sufficed 

to meet the procedural-reasonableness requirement. See id. at 

164-65 (finding no procedural error when explanation reflected 

defendant's possession of an "impressive array of munitions," 

including an assault rifle, "in close proximity to a trove of 

illegal drugs"). 

One final note on procedural reasonableness: to the 

extent that Sánchez asserts that the court erred by not explaining 

why it rejected the parties' requested sentences, the law does not 

support him. "Although a sentencing court typically has a duty to 

 3 Sánchez urges that United States v. Guzman-Fernandez, 824 

F.3d 173 (1st Cir. 2016), requires abuse-of-discretion review for 

unpreserved procedural-reasonableness claims. Guzman-Fernandez, 

however, dealt with a preserved claim. Id. at 176 ("Guzman's 

counsel 'objected' . . . .") (alteration omitted). 
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explain why it selected a particular sentence, it has 'no corollary 

duty to explain why it eschewed other suggested sentences.'" Id. 

at 165 (quoting United States v. Vega-Salgado, 769 F.3d 100, 104 

(1st Cir. 2014). 

2. Substantive reasonableness 

Having established that the sentence was not 

procedurally unreasonable, we turn to its substantive 

reasonableness. Once again, Sánchez did not object below. 

Consistent with our recent cases, and favorably to Sánchez, we 

assume arguendo that abuse-of-discretion review applies. See 

Cruz-Vázquez, 841 F.3d at 549 & n.2. We nevertheless reject the 

substantive-reasonableness claim. 

"The essence of appellate review for substantive 

reasonableness is whether the sentence is the product of 'a 

plausible . . . rationale and a defensible result.'" United States 

v. Rivera-González, 776 F.3d 45, 51 (1st Cir. 2015) (quoting United 

States v. Martin, 520 F.3d 87, 96 (1st Cir. 2008)). Sánchez argues 

that his sentence was substantively unreasonable because he 

received a greater sentence than did his codefendant, even though 

there was no reason for the disparity. Though we may find cause 

for concern when one judge sentences "identically situated 

defendants" differently, that is not the case here -- and Sánchez 

makes no effort to explain why he and his codefendant are 
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identically situated. United States v. Reyes-Santiago, 804 F.3d 

453, 467 (1st Cir. 2015) (citation omitted). 

In fact, Sánchez posits a distinction between the two 

men: he claims that his codefendant -- not he -- possessed the 

machine gun, because the label on the evidence bag containing the 

machine gun did not list Sánchez's name. The record, however, 

supports a finding that Sánchez possessed the machine gun.4 The 

plea agreement memorializes that Sánchez "did knowingly possess 

[both] firearms," which Sánchez acknowledged by initialing the 

paragraph describing the two weapons. And later, during the plea 

colloquy, the district court advised Sánchez that the firearms 

count alleged that he "knowingly possessed firearms," described 

both weapons in detail, and asked Sánchez "is that what you did? 

. . . Is that what you're pleading guilty to?" Sánchez replied 

"Yes." Accordingly, because Sánchez has not demonstrated either 

that he and his codefendant were "identically situated" or that 

Sánchez was less culpable, his disparity argument fails. See id. 

("We have routinely rejected disparity claims . . . because 

complaining defendants typically fail to acknowledge material 

 4 There may be a hint of an ineffective-assistance-of-counsel 

argument in Sánchez's brief, but "[w]e normally do not consider 

such claims on direct appeal where . . . they were not first 

presented to the district court." United States v. Hallock, 941 

F.2d 36, 43 (1st Cir. 1991). 
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differences between their own circumstances and those of their 

more leniently punished confederates."). 

Finally, Sánchez argues that his sentence on the 

firearms count was substantively unreasonable insofar as the court 

varied upward from the guidelines sentence. As Sánchez 

acknowledges, however, the parties themselves recommended an 

upwardly variant sentence. It was not unreasonable for the court 

to impose a sentence within the parties' bargained-for range. See 

Rivera-González, 776 F.3d at 52 (finding upwardly variant sentence 

substantively reasonable when "it produced the same aggregate 

period of incarceration to which the parties had previously agreed" 

in plea agreement). 

III. Conclusion

For the reasons stated, we hold that the plea agreement 

does not bar this appeal, but we affirm the sentence.