Opinion ID: 2822110
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Cummings's Sentence

Text: In his supplemental pro se brief, Cummings argues that his sentence was procedurally flawed because the district court erred in calculating the Base Offense Level for Count Seven (the drug conspiracy conviction). Specifically, Cummings contends that he was not automatically responsible for all of the drugs involved in the conspiracy simply because he was convicted as a coconspirator, and the district court's failure to make an individualized finding as to the amount specifically attributable to him was error. This argument, while right on the law, is wrong on the facts. Under the Sentencing Guidelines, a defendant's Base Offense Level for drug offenses depends mostly on the quantity of -70- the drugs involved in the offense. U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(c). Accordingly, in order to properly calculate the GSR, the district court must first make an individualized finding as to drug amounts attributable to, or foreseeable by, that defendant. United States v. Vázquez-Larrauri, 778 F.3d 276, 291 (1st Cir. 2015) (internal quotation marks omitted). Drug amounts are foreseeable to a coconspirator so long as he or she could reasonably have anticipated [the drugs] would be within the ambit of the conspiracy. United States v. Santos, 357 F.3d 136, 140 (1st Cir. 2004) (citing U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3(a)(1)(B) cmt. 2). Here, the PSR attributed over 538,000 kilograms of marijuana equivalent30 to Cummings, qualifying him for the highest Base Offense Level -- Level 38. U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(c). When Cummings objected to this calculation, the district court rejected his argument, responding that no matter how you look at this, in the context of what the conspiracy rules are and foreseeability and all of that, he's a[n offense] level [of] 38. Though perhaps not the clearest or most detailed of explanations, this statement shows that, contrary to Cummings's contention, the district court did 30 Under the Sentencing Guidelines, when multiple drugs are involved, the quantity of each drug is converted into its marijuana equivalent and then added together to obtain the total drug quantity. See U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1; United States v. Ventura, 353 F.3d 84, 87 (1st Cir. 2003). -71- consider whether or not the entire drug amount was individually attributable to Cummings, and the court concluded that it was.31 Because the district court did address the drug quantity attributed to Cummings, we are left to determine whether the court committed clear error in adopting the PSR's finding. It did not. The evidence showed that Cummings was an enforcer in the organization, sometimes delivered drugs, and would often store drugs for the conspiracy. With all of these roles, Cummings could reasonably have anticipated that such a large quantity of drugs would be involved in the conspiracy, and thus there is no error in concluding that that entire amount was foreseeable to him. See Santos, 357 F.3d at 140. In any event, even if the district court had failed to make an individualized finding, the error would have been harmless. See Vázquez-Larrauri, 778 F.3d at 291 (explaining that in order to vacate a sentence, a defendant must show that an error occurred and 31 At the very least, the statement suggests the district court believed the amount to be a fair approximation of the drug quantity given the huge discrepancy between the threshold amount of marijuana equivalency and the amount attributed to Cummings in the PSR. See United States v. Mullins, 778 F.3d 37, 42 (1st Cir. 2015) (explaining that a district court need not make an exact finding as to drug quantity but rather may base its calculation on approximations, so long as those approximations represent reasoned estimates of drug quantity. (internal quotation marks omitted)). Cummings's counsel seemed to concede this point during the sentencing hearing, agreeing that since the PSR attributed 538,000 kilograms of marijuana equivalent to Cummings and the threshold for the Base Offense Level of 38 was 30,000 kilograms, there was no point quibbling at the margins. -72- that it affected the defendant's substantial rights). The verdict form convicting Cummings explicitly found that at least 280 grams of narcotics were involved in the conspiracy, thus triggering a ten-year mandatory minimum sentence. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(b) (1)(A)(iii). Since Cummings was only sentenced to 120 months (or ten years) on this count, his sentence would have been the same regardless of the individualized drug finding. Accordingly, Cummings's sentence was procedurally sound.