United States Court of Appeals

For the First Circuit

No. 19-2033

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Appellee,

v.

LUIS MERCED-GARCÍA,

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,

Selya and Gelpí, Circuit Judges.

David Ramos Pagan on brief for appellant.

W. Stephen Muldrow, United States Attorney, Mariana E. BauzáAlmonte, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief, Appellate 

Division, and Robert P. Coleman III, Assistant United States 

Attorney, on brief for appellee.

January 25, 2022
- 2 -

SELYA, Circuit Judge. Defendant-appellant Luis MercedGarcía was found in possession of a trove of guns, ammunition, and 

drugs. The district court sentenced him to serve an eighteenmonth term of immurement on a drug-trafficking count and a 

consecutive 144-month term of immurement on a firearms count. The 

defendant appeals, arguing that his guilty plea is invalid because 

the plea agreement lacked a particular signature and that his 

sentence on the firearms count is both procedurally infirm and 

substantively unreasonable. Concluding, as we do, that the 

defendant's asseverational array lacks force, we affirm.

I

We briefly set the stage. Because this appeal "follows 

a guilty plea, 'we glean the relevant facts from the change-ofplea colloquy, the unchallenged portions of the presentence 

investigation report (PSI Report), and the record of the 

disposition hearing.'" United States v. Dávila-González, 595 F.3d 

42, 45 (1st Cir. 2010) (quoting United States v. Vargas, 560 F.3d 

45, 47 (1st Cir. 2009)).

On the heels of a search of a residence in which he was 

staying and the discovery of a trove of guns, ammunition, and 

drugs,1 a federal grand jury returned an indictment charging the 

1 There is some indication in the record that one of the guns 

was found in the defendant's automobile rather than in the 

dwelling. Given the way in which the defendant has framed his 
- 3 -

defendant and a confederate with, inter alia, aiding and abetting 

the possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking 

crime, see 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A), and aiding and abetting the 

possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, see 21 U.S.C. 

§ 841(a)(1). In due season, the defendant entered into a plea 

agreement (the Agreement) and pleaded guilty to both of these 

counts. The district court accepted his guilty plea and ordered 

the preparation of a PSI Report. 

The district court convened the disposition hearing on 

September 19, 2019. Both sides had filed sentencing memoranda, 

and the court acknowledged its familiarity with those memoranda 

and with the contents of the PSI Report. The guideline sentencing 

ranges for the two counts were separate, and neither range is

seriously disputed here.2 For the drug-trafficking count, the 

range was eighteen to twenty-four months; for the firearms count, 

the range was the statutory mandatory minimum — sixty months.

The defendant asked the court to impose sentences on 

both counts at the "lower end" of the guidelines. The government 

arguments, nothing turns on this disparity and, thus, we do not 

pursue the point.

2 The guideline ranges were laid out in the PSI Report. At 

sentencing, neither side objected to these ranges, and the district 

court adopted them. Although the defendant claims in his brief —

in conclusory fashion — that the district court failed to follow 

proper procedure in formulating the guideline ranges, that claim 

is totally undeveloped. Consequently, we deem it waived. See

United States v. Zannino, 895 F.2d 1, 17 (1st Cir. 1990).
- 4 -

recommended a twenty-four-month sentence on the drug-trafficking 

count, to be followed by a 120-month sentence on the firearms 

count. The district court sentenced the defendant to serve 

eighteen months in prison on the drug-trafficking count, to be 

followed by 144 months in prison on the firearms count. This 

timely appeal ensued. 

II

In this venue, the defendant assigns error in three main 

respects. First, he claims that the lack of a particular signature 

invalidated the Agreement and, thus, invalidated his guilty plea. 

Second, he claims that his sentence on the firearms count is 

procedurally flawed because, among other things, the district 

court failed adequately to explain the sharp upward variance. 

Third, he claims that his sentence on that count is substantively 

unreasonable. We address these claims of error one by one. 

A

To begin, the defendant argues that the Agreement — which 

he signed — is nonetheless unenforceable because one section of 

the Agreement, entitled "Stipulation of Facts," lacked his 

signature (even though a signature line appeared at that point). 

Because the defendant did not advance this argument below, our 

review is for plain error. See United States v. Casiano-Santana, 

1 F.4th 100, 101 (1st Cir. 2021); United States v. Duarte, 246 

F.3d 56, 60 (1st Cir. 2001). 
- 5 -

We have made it clear that "[t]he plain error hurdle is 

high." United States v. Hunnewell, 891 F.2d 955, 956 (1st Cir. 

1989). To prevail on plain-error review, an appellant must 

demonstrate "(1) that an error occurred (2) which was clear or 

obvious and which not only (3) affected [his] substantial rights, 

but also (4) seriously impaired the fairness, integrity, or public 

reputation of judicial proceedings." Duarte, 246 F.3d at 60. As 

the party claiming plain error, the appellant "must carry the 

devoir of persuasion as to all four of these elements." United 

States v. Pinkham, 896 F.3d 133, 136-37 (1st Cir. 2018). 

Here, plain error is plainly absent. Although the 

stipulation of facts contained a line for the defendant's 

signature, there is no reason to believe that such a signature was 

essential to the validity of the Agreement. After all, the 

defendant signed the Agreement itself, and he identifies no 

statute, rule, or case law requiring that a stipulation of facts, 

incorporated in a plea agreement, must be separately signed. We 

have left no doubt that to qualify as plain error, an "error must 

be 'indisputable' in light of controlling law." United States v. 

Rabb, 5 F.4th 95, 101 (1st Cir. 2021) (quoting United States v. 

Jones, 748 F.3d 64, 70 (1st Cir. 2014)). Bereft of supporting 

authority, the error claimed in this case cannot surmount that 

high bar. See United States v. Griffin, 524 F.3d 71, 79 (1st Cir. 

2008) (explaining that when an appellant "cites no case remotely 
- 6 -

suggesting that the rule is otherwise . . . there cannot be plain 

error"). 

In all events, the defendant — in order to show plain 

error — bore the burden of demonstrating that the alleged error 

affected his substantial rights. See Rabb, 5 F.4th at 103. Here, 

however, he has not made even a glimmer of a showing that the 

unsigned stipulation of facts somehow prejudiced his case. For 

one thing, both the defendant and his counsel signed the Agreement

itself, and the Agreement includes a clause indicating that the 

stipulation of facts is incorporated into the Agreement. For 

another thing, even though the defendant left blank the signature 

line below the stipulation of facts, he nonetheless initialed both 

pages of the Agreement on which the stipulation appears. In 

addition, the defendant's counsel signed the stipulation of facts

on a separately provided signature line. And to cinch the matter, 

the defendant — during the change-of-plea hearing — confirmed his 

agreement with the government's oral presentation of the 

stipulated facts. Any error attaching to the missing signature 

could not, therefore, have affected the defendant's substantial 

rights. 

That ends this aspect of the matter. On the facts of 

this case, the missing signature was a harmless oversight, and we 

reject the defendant's belated claim that its absence invalidated 

his guilty plea. 
- 7 -

B

This brings us to the defendant's claim that his upwardly 

variant 144-month sentence on the firearms count is procedurally 

unreasonable. This claim makes its debut in this court and, thus, 

engenders only plain-error review. See Casiano-Santana, 1 F.4th 

at 101; Duarte, 246 F.3d at 60.

As we have said, the guideline sentence for the firearms 

count was sixty months. See United States v. Vargas-García, 794 

F.3d 162, 166 (1st Cir. 2015) (explaining that "the statutory 

mandatory minimum sentence is the guideline sentence"); see also

USSG §2K2.4(b). Refined to bare essence, the principal thrust of 

the defendant's claim is that the district court did not adequately 

explain the sharp upward variance. We disagree. 

When imposing a variant sentence, a sentencing court 

must "state in open court . . . the specific reason for the 

imposition of a [variant] sentence." 18 U.S.C. § 3553(c)(2). That 

explanation, though, need not "be precise to the point of 

pedantry." United States v. Del Valle-Rodríguez, 761 F.3d 171, 

177 (1st Cir. 2014). We have repeatedly stated "that the 

sentencing court need only identify the main factors behind its 

decision." Vargas-García, 794 F.3d at 166; see United States v. 

González, 857 F.3d 46, 62 (1st Cir. 2017); United States v. RiveraClemente, 813 F.3d 43, 52 (1st Cir. 2016). 
- 8 -

In the case at hand, the sentencing court explained that 

an upwardly variant sentence was necessary to "reflect[] the 

seriousness of the offense, promote[] respect for the law, 

protect[] the public from further crimes by [the defendant], and 

address[] the issues of deterrence and punishment." The court 

noted that the defendant possessed what amounted to a small 

arsenal: seven firearms and 1,616 rounds of ammunition. It 

emphasized, moreover, that two of the firearms were machineguns 

and vouchsafed that it "c[ould] conceive of few weapons that are 

more dangerous than a machine gun." 

The defendant denigrates this explanation, contending 

that the factors the court relied on were "already accounted for 

in the Guidelines." This contention is wide of the mark: it 

overlooks that a sentencing court may rely on a factor already 

considered in formulating the guideline sentence as long as the 

court "articulate[s] specifically the reasons that this particular 

defendant's situation is different from the ordinary situation 

covered by the guidelines calculation." United States v. ZapeteGarcia, 447 F.3d 57, 60 (1st Cir. 2006). The court below did 

precisely that: the applicable statute and the associated 

guideline provision contemplate the possession of only a single 

firearm, see 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1); USSG §2K2.4, yet the court 

noted that the defendant possessed seven firearms, including two 

machineguns, and a large cache of ammunition. Because the 
- 9 -

additional firearms (including the machineguns) and the large

quantity of ammunition were not accounted for in the guideline 

calculations, the sentencing court did not plainly err by relying 

on them to justify the upwardly variant sentence. 

There is another dimension to the defendant's plaint 

that his sentence was infected by procedural error. He suggests 

that the district court weighed "community considerations" too 

heavily, giving unduly short shrift to his personal circumstances. 

This suggestion is not accompanied by any developed argumentation 

and is, therefore, waived. See United States v. Zannino, 895 F.2d 

1, 17 (1st Cir. 1990). And at any rate, the record reveals that 

the district court paid due heed to the defendant's circumstances 

and to the circumstances of the offense. The mere fact of the 

defendant's disagreement with the district court's balancing of 

the various aggravating and mitigating factors does not constitute

a valid ground for appeal. See United States v. Ruperto-Rivera, 

16 F.4th 1, 6 (1st Cir. 2021).

C

The defendant's last claim of error posits that his 

upwardly variant 144-month sentence on the firearms count is 

substantively unreasonable. That claim is deemed to be preserved, 

see Holguin-Hernandez v. United States, 140 S. Ct. 762, 767 (2020), 

so our review is for abuse of discretion, see United States v. 

Bruno-Campos, 978 F.3d 801, 808 (1st Cir. 2020). We discern none. 
- 10 -

"In the sentencing context, 'reasonableness is a protean 

concept.'" United States v. Clogston, 662 F.3d 588, 592 (1st Cir. 

2011) (quoting United States v. Martin, 520 F.3d 87, 92 (1st Cir. 

2008)). In any given case, "there is not a single reasonable 

sentence but, rather, a range of reasonable sentences." Martin, 

520 F.3d at 92. When faced with a complaint of substantive 

unreasonableness, our role is "to determine whether the 

[challenged] sentence falls within this broad universe." United 

States v. Rivera-Morales, 961 F.3d 1, 21 (1st Cir. 2020). In this 

endeavor, "we cannot substitute our judgment of the appropriate 

sentence for that of the sentencing court; to the contrary, we 

must accord significant deference to the court's informed 

determination that the section 3553(a) factors justify the 

sentence imposed." Id.

"[T]he hallmarks of a substantively reasonable sentence 

are a plausible sentencing rationale and a defensible result." 

United States v. Rodríguez-Cruz, 997 F.3d 362, 366 (1st Cir. 2021). 

This remains true even where, as here, the sentence is an upwardly 

variant one. See Rivera-Morales, 961 F.3d at 21.

In this case, the sentencing court lucidly articulated 

its sentencing rationale. The court addressed the defendant's 

age, dependents, education level, personal habits, prior 

employment, lack of a criminal record, and kindred considerations. 

It described the firearms and ammunition found in the defendant's 
- 11 -

possession, including the two machineguns. The court noted that 

"[s]hort of bombs, missiles, and biochemical agents, [it] c[ould]

conceive of few weapons that are more dangerous than a machine 

gun." Weighing all the pertinent facts and circumstances, the 

court determined that a 144-month prison sentence was appropriate. 

We find this rationale plausible.3

So, too, the challenged sentence achieves a defensible 

result. The offense of conviction was serious: the defendant 

possessed seven firearms — two of which were machineguns — and 

1,616 rounds of ammunition. This armamentarium was made all the 

more sinister by the defendant's simultaneous possession of a 

significant inventory of drugs. Given the gravity of the offense 

and the extent of the firepower that the defendant had assembled, 

we cannot say that a 144-month term of imprisonment represented an 

indefensible result. 

To say more would be supererogatory. The firearms

sentence, though upwardly variant, was within the "broad universe" 

of reasonable sentences. Id. It follows that the defendant's 

claim of substantive unreasonableness goes begging.

3 We recently explained that "an adequate explanation for an 

upward variance and a plausible rationale for that variance are 

almost always two sides of the same coin." United States v. ValleColón, 21 F.4th 44, 50 (1st Cir. 2021). This is such a case.
- 12 -

III

We need go no further. For the reasons elucidated above, 

the judgment of the district court is

Affirmed.