UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 15-4787

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff – Appellee,

v.

CRISTINO PARRA MEDINA,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle 

District of North Carolina, at Greensboro. Loretta C. Biggs, 

District Judge. (1:15-cr-00141-LCB-1)

Submitted: September 23, 2016 Decided: December 9, 2016

Before TRAXLER, DIAZ, and HARRIS, Circuit Judges.

Vacated and remanded by unpublished per curiam opinion.

J. Scott Coalter, COALTER LAW, P.L.L.C., Greensboro, North 

Carolina, for Appellant. Ripley Rand, United States Attorney, 

Randall S. Galyon, Assistant United States Attorney, Greensboro, 

North Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
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PER CURIAM:

Cristino Parra Medina pled guilty to conspiracy to 

distribute cocaine and was sentenced to 120 months in prison. 

On appeal, Medina contends that the district court improperly 

denied him application of the safety valve. We vacate Medina’s 

sentence and remand for resentencing.

The safety-valve statute requires sentencing courts to 

disregard any statutory mandatory minimum sentence for a 

defendant who establishes that he meets five criteria. See 18 

U.S.C. § 3553(f); U.S.S.G. § 5C1.2. These criteria include that 

“the defendant does not have more than 1 criminal history point, 

as determined under the sentencing guidelines,” 18 U.S.C. § 

3553(f)(1), and that “the defendant was not an organizer, 

leader, manager, or supervisor of others in the offense, as 

determined under the sentencing guidelines,” id. § 3553(f)(4).

Application of the safety valve is mandatory where the five 

specific factors are present. United States v. Beltran-Ortiz, 

91 F.3d 665, 667 n.1 (4th Cir. 1996).

The probation officer who prepared the presentence report 

(PSR) in this case determined that Medina had zero criminal 

history points, that he did not qualify for a role-in-theoffense enhancement, and that the other safety-valve 

requirements were satisfied. The prepared PSR therefore 

recommended application of the safety valve and calculated 
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Medina’s Guidelines sentence without regard to the otherwiseapplicable statutory mandatory minimum sentence. According to 

the PSR, Medina’s advisory sentencing range was 87-108 months. 

Counsel for Medina and the government agreed with the sentence 

calculations and recommendations contained in the PSR.

At the sentencing hearing, the district court identified no 

error in the PSR’s factual conclusions or sentence calculations, 

but the court nonetheless expressed concern about applying the 

safety-valve statute to Medina. The court noted that, because 

Medina was an illegal alien, he might have had prior criminal 

activity outside of the United States. The court also expressed 

concern about Medina’s role in the offense, given his connection 

to the leader of the conspiracy in Mexico.

In light of these concerns, the district court declined to 

apply the safety valve. The court, however, did not impose an

aggravated role enhancement and did not increase Medina’s

criminal history category. Instead, the court adopted the PSR 

as written, with the exception of the safety-valve-related twolevel reduction in Medina’s total offense level. See J.A. 252 

(Statement of Reasons adopting PSR except for “[t]he two-level 

reduction for safety valve[, which] does not apply based on the 

fact the defendant was residing in the United States illegally 

and there is no way to determine if he had any criminal history 

in Mexico. Therefore, the Total Offense Level is 31.”).
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Medina argues on appeal that the district court erred by 

refusing to apply the safety valve. We agree.

The district court concluded that, because of his status as 

an illegal alien, Medina could not prove that he did not have 

more than 1 criminal history point. The safety-valve statute, 

however, only requires that Medina prove he “does not have more 

than 1 criminal history point, as determined under the 

sentencing guidelines.” 18 U.S.C. § 3553(f)(1) (emphasis 

added); accord U.S.S.G. § 5C1.2(a)(1). It is undisputed that 

the Guidelines calculation in the PSR and adopted by the 

district court met this requirement. The district court’s 

conclusion that there was potentially other criminal activity 

outside of the United States is purely speculative, impossible 

to disprove, and irrelevant to whether Medina had more than 1 

criminal history point, as determined under the Guidelines.

As to Medina’s role in the offense, the statute again 

simply requires proof that “the defendant was not an organizer, 

leader, manager, or supervisor of others in the offense, as 

determined under the sentencing guidelines.” Id. § 3553(f)(4)

(emphasis added); accord U.S.S.G. § 5C1.2(a)(4). The district 

court affirmatively declined to apply a role-in-the-offense 

enhancement to Medina, see J.A. 101-02, and the PSR as adopted 

by the district court determined that Medina did not meet the 

Guidelines’ requirements for such an enhancement. Because 
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Medina did not receive a role-in-the-offense enhancement, he 

satisfied the safety-valve requirements. See U.S.S.G. § 5C1.2 

cmt. n.5 (“‘Organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor of others 

in the offense, as determined under the sentencing guidelines,’

as used in subsection (a)(4), means a defendant who receives an 

adjustment for an aggravating role under § 3B1.1 (Aggravating 

Role).” (emphasis added)).

We therefore conclude that the requirements of the safetyvalve statute were satisfied in this case, and that the district 

court erred by refusing to apply the statute when sentencing 

Medina. Accordingly, we vacate Medina’s sentence and remand for 

resentencing. We dispense with oral argument because the facts 

and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials 

before this court and argument would not aid the decisional 

process.

VACATED AND REMANDED