22

- 2732 United States v. Stiteler



## UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT


# SUMMARY ORDER

RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED BY FEDERAL RULE OF APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT ’ S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRONIC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION “ SUMMARY ORDER ” ). A PARTY CITING A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL.
At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, 1 held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of 2 New York, on the 1 5 t h da y of J u n e , two thousand twenty

- three

. 3 4 PRESENT: 5 ROSEMARY S. POOLER , 6 RICHARD C. WESLEY, 7 MICHAEL H. PARK, 8 Circuit Judges. 9

_____________________________________ 10 11 United States of America , 12 13 Appellee , 14 15

v. 22

- 2732 16 17 Aron Whitney Stiteler, 18 19 Defendant

- Appellant

. 20

_____________________________________ 21 22 FOR APPELLEE : M ONICA J. R ICHARDS , Assistant 23 United States Attorney, for Trini E. 24 Ross, United States Attorney for the 25 Western District of New York, 26 Buffalo, N.Y. 27 28 FO R DEFENDANT

- APPELL ANT : T IMOTHY P. M URPHY , Federal Pu blic 29 Defender’s Office, Western District 30 of New York, Buffalo, N.Y. 312 Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Western District of New 1
York ( Wolford
, J

. ). 2

UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND 3

DECREED that the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED

. 4
Aron Whitney Stiteler pleaded guilty to making “repeated telephone calls .

. . solely to 5
harass any specific person,” namely, certain members of the United States Congress, in violation 6

of 47 U.S.C. § 223(a)(1)(E) . The district court (Wolford, J .) sentenced him to 22 months’ 7
incarceration and one year of supervised release. Stiteler challenges only one condition of 8
supervised release : that he “submit to a search of his person, property, vehicle, place of residence 9
or any other property under his control, based upon reasonable suspicion, and permit confiscation 10
of any evidence or contraband discovered.” App’x at A

- 164. The district court imposed the 11
condition on the recommendation of the probation department’s Presentence Investigation Report 12
over Stiteler’s objection. Stite ler appeals that decision. We assume the parties’ familiarity with 13
the facts, the procedural posture, and the issues on appeal. 14
“[A] district court may impose special conditions of supervised release that are reasonably 15
related to certain statutory factor s governing sentencing, involve no greater deprivation of liberty 16
than is reasonably necessary to implement the statutory purposes of sentencing, and are consistent 17
with pertinent Sentencing Commission policy statements.” United States v. Eaglin , 913 F.3d 88, 18
94 (2d Cir. 2019) (cleaned up); see also U.S.S.G. § 5D1.3(b) (directing district courts to consider 19

certain 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors). “A district court is required to make an individualized 20
assessment when determining whether to impose a special condition of supervised release, and to 213 state on the record the reason for imposing it; the failure to do so is error.” United States v. Betts
, 1
886 F.3d 198, 202 (2d Cir. 2018)

. “We review special conditions of supervised release for abuse 2

of discretion. ” United States v. Farooq , 58 F.4th 687, 694 (2d Cir. 2023). 3
We see no abuse of discretion in the district court’s imposition of the search condition. 4
As the district court explained, Stiteler “engaged in [the offense] conduct from his home,” and 5
“would be more hesitant to engage in more illegal activity if he knows that .

. . it could prompt a 6
search of his premises or himself.” App’x at A

- 155. The need for deterrence was particularly 7

acute given Stiteler’s history of recidivism during pretrial supervision. See id. at A

- 151. And 8
for the same reasons, the search condition furthered “rehabilitation purposes” and was “warranted 9
to protect the community.” Id. at A

- 155 ; c f. United States v. Ett inger , 723 F. App’x 38, 40

- 41 10
(2d Cir. 2018) (affirming a search condition when the prospect of discovery may deter the 11
defendant from recidivating); United States v. Lamica , 689 F. App’x 91, 92

- 93 (2d Cir. 2017) 12
(same). The district court likewise did no t abuse its discretion in finding that “the search 13
condition is not depriving Mr. Stiteler of liberty greater than necessary because it requires the 14
reasonable suspicion before the search can be conducted.” App’x at A

- 155; see United States v. 15

Rakhmatov
, No. 21

- 151, 2022 WL 16984536 , at *3 (2d Cir. Nov. 17, 2022) (explaining that 16

“ limitations on searches to circumstances in which reasonable suspicion

. . . exists

. . . ensure that 17
the condition imposes no greater restraint on liberty than is reasonably nec essary ” (cleaned up)). 18

We have considered Stiteler’s remaining arguments and find them to be without merit. 19
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED

. 20

FOR THE COURT: 21 Catherine O ’ Hagan Wolfe, Clerk of Court 22 23