Case Name: UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Samuel DiPROTO, Defendant-Appellant
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 2016-04-29
Citations: 648 F. App'x 40
Docket Number: No. 15-1675-CR
Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Samuel DiPROTO, Defendant-Appellant.
Judges: Present: ROSEMARY S. POOLER, BARRINGTON D. PARKER, DEBRA ANN LIVINGSTON, Circuit Judges.
Reporter: West's Federal Appendix
Volume: 648
Pages: 40–42

Head Matter:
UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Samuel DiPROTO, Defendant-Appellant.
No. 15-1675-CR.
United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.
April 29, 2016.
Bruce D. Koffsky, Koffsky & Felsen, LLC, Stamford, CT, for Appellant.
Neeraj N. Patel, Assistant United States Attorney, District of Connecticut (Mark T. Quinlivan, Assistant United States Attorney, District of Massachusetts, on the brief), for Loretta E. Lynch, United States Attorney General, and Carmen M. Ortiz, United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, for Appellee.
Present: ROSEMARY S. POOLER, BARRINGTON D. PARKER, DEBRA ANN LIVINGSTON, Circuit Judges.

Opinion:
SUMMARY ORDER
Samuel DiProto appeals from the May 19, 2015 judgment entered in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut (Meyer, J.), DiProto pleaded guilty to one count of receiving child pornography, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(a)(2). The district court sentenced DiProto principally to 84 months' imprisonment and 120 months of supervised release. On appeal, DiProto argues that the 84-month sentence is substantively unreasonable. We assume the parties' familiarity with the underlying facts, procedural history, and specification of issues for review.
A sentence is substantively unreasonable if the sentence " 'shock[s] the conscience,' constitutes a 'manifest injustice,' or is otherwise substantively unreasonable." United States v. Aldeen, 792 F.3d 247, 255 (2d Cir.2015) (alteration in original) (quoting United States v. Rigas, 583 F.3d 108, 123 (2d Cir.2009)). "Our review for substantive unreasonableness is 'particularly deferential.'" Id. (quoting United States v. Broxmeyer, 699 F.3d 265, 289 (2d Cir.2012)). "We will set aside sentences as substantively unreasonable only in exceptional cases where the trial court's decision cannot be located within the range of permissible decisions, that is, when sentences are so shockingly high, shockingly low, or otherwise unsupportable as a matter of law that allowing them to stand would damage the administration of justice." Id. (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).
DiProto's 84-month sentence, which is below the guidelines range of 97-121 months arid toward the low end of the 5-20 year statutory range, is substantively reasonable. "While we do not presume that a Guidelines sentence is necessarily substantively reasonable, that conclusion is warranted in the overwhelming majority of cases, and thus especially when, as here, a defendant challenges a below-Guidelines sentence." United States v. Messina, 806 F.3d 55, 66 (2d Cir.2015) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted), DiProto admitted to downloading child pornography for a period of about four to five years, and a forensic examination of his computer hard drives and thumb drives revealed more than 1,800 images and 1,500 videos of child pornography, including images and videos depicting prepubescent minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct and- images and videos depicting sadistic and masochistic conduct. One of DiProto's devices also contained non-por-nographie images of a young girl bound with rope and gagged in what appeared to be DiProto's bedroom. Under the circumstances, DiProto's 84-month sentence does not fall outside the range of permissible decisions.
Nor do we agree with DiProto's contention that the district court overlooked various mitigating factors. The sentencing transcript belies it. The district court expressly stated that it saw as a mitigating factor the fact that DiProto did not produce or distribute child pornography and that it was impressed by his immediate acceptance of responsibility. The fact that the district court imposed a below-guidelines sentence further suggests that the court took these mitigating factors into account in determining DiProto's sentence.
We have considered the remainder of DiProto's arguments and find them to be without merit. Accordingly, the order- of the district court hereby is AFFIRMED.