United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit 

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No. 22-3630

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United States of America

 Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

Chris Calvin Bald Eagle

 Defendant - Appellant

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Appeal from United States District Court 

for the District of South Dakota - Western

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Submitted: May 8, 2023

Filed: May 24, 2023

[Unpublished]

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Before COLLOTON, WOLLMAN, and BENTON, Circuit Judges. 

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PER CURIAM.

In 2017, Christopher Calvin Bald Eagle pled guilty to failure to register as a 

sex offender in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2250(a). The district court sentenced him

to 33 months in prison and five years of supervised release. He violated his first 

term of supervised release in April 2019. The district court sentenced him to time 

served and five years of supervised release. He violated his second term of 
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supervised release in November and December 2019. The district court sentenced 

him to 15 months in prison and three years of supervised release. He violated his 

third term of supervised release in 2022. The district court1 sentenced him at the top 

of the guidelines to 14 months in prison and two years of supervised release. He 

appeals this sentence. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, this court 

affirms. 

Bald Eagle argues that his sentence is substantively unreasonable. This court 

reviews the substantive reasonableness of a sentence for abuse of discretion. See

United States v. Thigpen, 848 F.3d 841, 847 (8th Cir. 2017). For revocation 

sentences, this court applies “the same reasonableness standard that applies to initial 

sentencing proceedings.” United States v. Dennis, 35 F.4th 1116, 1118 (8th Cir. 

2022). An abuse of discretion occurs when the court “fails to consider a relevant 

factor that should have received significant weight,” “gives significant weight to an 

improper or irrelevant factor,” or makes a “clear error of judgment” in weighing 

appropriate factors. United States v. Funke, 846 F.3d 998, 1000 (8th Cir. 2017). 

“[I]t will be 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). 

Bald Eagle claims the district court did not properly weigh his mitigating 

circumstances, specifically his age (68), his struggles with chronic homelessness, his 

difficulty managing his physical and mental health, and his limited financial means. 

At sentencing, the court listened to Bald Eagle’s request for a lower sentence because 

of his age and health conditions. The court specifically addressed his chronic 

homelessness: 

You’ve also, in the past, indicated that you had a place where you were 

going to be able to live, and then that didn’t end up working out. So I 

1

The Honorable Karen E. Schreier, United States District Judge for the 

District of South Dakota. 
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really hope that you have a place to go. But what I’m going to do after 

your time in custody is have you go to a residential reentry center for 

three months so that you can get established and have a place that’s 

yours and get resettled so that we can hopefully transition you back so

that we don’t run into these same problems again.

And, as he acknowledges, his mental health struggles were “well known” to the court 

because of earlier questions about his competency.

But the district court also considered his repeated and extensive 

noncompliance history, emphasizing his “multiple convictions for failure to update 

your registration” and “multiple times when you didn’t comply with the conditions 

of your supervised release.” The district court contrasted his noncompliance history 

with his promises to comply: 

So I’m glad to hear you say that you are going to make sure you keep 

your registration updated and that you’re going to keep in touch with 

your probation officer, because that’s what you need to do. But based 

on your past history, I’m kind of leery about whether that will actually 

happen. 

 

Concluding, the district court stated that it had considered the § 3553 and § 3583

factors. Although Bald Eagle disagrees with the weight assigned to his mitigating 

circumstances, this does not justify reversal. See United States v. Moua, 895 F.3d 

556, 560 (8th Cir. 2018) (describing district court’s “wide latitude” to “assign some 

factors greater weight than others”). The district court did not abuse its discretion. 

* * * * * * * 

The judgment is affirmed. 

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