Source: http://www.leagle.com/decision/In%20FCO%2020170612097/U.S.%20v.%20DAVIS
Timestamp: 2017-06-26 08:44:43
Document Index: 89518403

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 5', '§ 3553', '§ 5', '§ 5', '§ 5', '§ 5', '§ 3584', '§ 5', '§ 3584', '§ 3553', '§ 3553', '§ 3553']

U.S. v. DAVIS | No. 16-2008. | By ROSSITER | Leagle.com
No. 16-2008.
Jody Lee Davis, Defendant-Appellant.
Leslie E. Stokke , for Defendant-Appellant.
Timothy Vavricek , for Plaintiff-Appellee.
Before RILEY and BEAM, Circuit Judges, and ROSSITER, District Judge.
Jody Lee Davis ("Davis") appeals from the district court's2 decision to impose a 210-month prison sentence and recommend that his federal sentence be served consecutively to potential future state court sentences. For the reasons stated below, we affirm Davis's sentence.
"We review the substantive unreasonableness of sentences under a standard akin to an abuse-of-discretion standard, cognizant that it 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. Edwards, 820 F.3d 362, 366 (8th Cir. 2016) (quoting United States v. Sayles, 754 F.3d 564, 567 (8th Cir. 2014)). "A sentence may be unreasonable if the district court fails to consider a relevant factor which should have received significant weight; gives significant weight to an improper or irrelevant factor; or considers the appropriate factors but commits a clear error of judgment." Id.
Davis claims United States Sentencing Guideline § 5G1.3 obligates the district court to examine the length of potential future state terms of imprisonment. According to Davis, by failing to perform this examination, the district court violated the requirement in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) to craft "a sentence sufficient, but not greater than necessary, to comply with purposes" of sentencing. Davis provides no authority to support his novel interpretation of § 5G1.3.
Section 5G1.3(a) applies when "the instant offense was committed while the defendant was serving a term of imprisonment . . . or after sentencing for, but before commencing service of, such term of imprisonment." In both cases, the sentences should run consecutively. Whether or not § 5G1.3(a) applies, the district court could not have violated it by imposing the sentence consecutively.4
The next two subsections of § 5G1.3, (b) and (c), deal with situations where the other term of imprisonment results from relevant conduct to the instant offense of conviction. These subsections do not apply because the prior convictions for theft, burglary, and forgery are not relevant conduct to the making of methamphetamine, and the fact that an offense also results in a revocation of probation "does not make the state conviction `relevant conduct' to the federal conviction." United States v. Jones, 628 F.3d 1044, 1049 (8th Cir. 2011).5
Davis turns to the final subsection, § 5G1.3(d), which provides, "In any other case involving an undischarged term of imprisonment, the sentence for the instant offense may be imposed to run concurrently, partially concurrently, or consecutively to the prior undischarged term of imprisonment to achieve a reasonable punishment for the instant offense."6 See 18 U.S.C. § 3584. He argues that § 5G1.3(d) requires the district court to at least consider the potential state term of imprisonment. However, by its express language, this subsection only applies to cases where there are currently existing undischarged terms of imprisonment, not potential future terms of imprisonment. See Setser, 566 U.S. at 237-39 (acknowledging that § 3584 does not apply to scenarios in which the state term of imprisonment has not yet been imposed).
Davis has failed to provide any authority requiring the district court to weigh the possibility of future state prison terms. The district court considered all the relevant § 3553(a) factors "available at the time of sentencing." Setser, 566 U.S. at 244. The district court did not err by expressly not considering the fact that Davis's probation could possibly be revoked.
Davis argues his sentence is substantively unreasonable because the district court failed to consider the relevant § 3553(a) factors. "Because we previously concluded the district court considered all of the § 3553(a) factors, [Davis's] substantive unreasonableness argument is without merit." United States v. Lewis, 557 F.3d 601, 615 (8th Cir. 2009).
FootNotes 1. The Honorable Robert F. Rossiter, Jr., United States District Judge for the District of Nebraska, sitting by designation.