Opinion ID: 4389139
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Aggravated Role Enhancement

Text: Mr. Lozano next contends that the record does not support a three-level sentencing enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1(b), which applies if the defendant was a manager or supervisor (but not an organizer or leader) and the criminal activity involved five or more participants. Id. Mr. Lozano need only manage or supervise one of his co-conspirators to qualify for the three-level enhancement. See, e.g., 10 United States v. Gonzales Edeza, 359 F.3d 1246, 1248 (10th Cir. 2004). “[T]he term ‘supervisor’ [is] satisfied upon a showing that the defendant exercised any degree of direction or control over someone subordinate to him.” United States v. Backas, 901 F.2d 1528, 1530 (10th Cr. 1990) (emphasis added); see also id. (“In order to be a supervisor, one needs merely to give some form of direction or supervision to someone subordinate in the criminal activity . . . .”). Once again, the district court here looked at the whole picture to find that Mr. Lozano was a manager or supervisor of some members of the conspiracy, specifically Mr. Lara-Gallegos and Mr. Molina-Villalobos. In reaching this conclusion, the court reviewed the list of considerations included in the Guidelines’ commentary. The court focused most heavily on Mr. Lozano’s exercise of decision-making authority over these co-conspirators, including provision of the means that enabled their trafficking activities, and his routine claim to a larger share of the profits despite his lack of on-the-ground involvement. It found that “[t]here are all of the indications that he has the ability to exercise decision-making authority. People report to him. They report about drugs. They report about money. They are not doing that for no reason.” Aplt. App. at 119. The court discarded alternate explanations for the communications that occurred between Mr. Lozano and his co-conspirators, reasoning that he is providing means, and . . . when you look at this, and they are reporting to him [] you can say, Well, it doesn't mean in isolation that he is the boss. But when they report numbers up to him, and he corrects them, Uh-huh, buddy. When they report problems to him, all of these things are signs of somebody who is the boss. Not just somebody who you call, because he is a consultant to the drug organization. And you are asking him, Hey, how do I get this fixed? Or, What would you do if? I suppose that's a possible interpretation, but it is 11 hardly a probable one, and certainly not one found by me by a preponderance of the evidence. Id. at 118. Assessing the complete picture created by the evidence, the district court reasoned: If you are controlling the dope and you are controlling the home and you are controlling the cars[,] and the people that are doing the low-level grunt work of the organization . . . are family members that are dependent upon you for transportation, for housing, you are in control. Id. at 121. The court further found that Mr. Lozano received a larger share in the fruits of the crime, noting that the ledgers found by DEA agents listed Lozano as consistently collecting a sizeable cut of the profits—a larger share than anyone else on the Colorado side of the conspiracy. As the government highlighted, these are substantial payoffs “for someone who doesn’t show his face on pole cameras. . . . He is not the one driving around town having to pick up load drivers, yet he gets big payouts, and that’s because he is in charge.” Id. at 107. Based on these facts and corresponding inferences, the district court found by a preponderance of the evidence that Mr. Lozano exercised some degree of control over individuals subordinate to him. Mr. Lozano contends again on appeal that he is a mere middleman who did not manage or supervise any other individuals, submitting that although at times he would direct other individuals to complete tasks unrelated to the conspiracy, he never directed or ordered them to do anything in furtherance of the conspiracy. He relies heavily on the district of New Mexico’s decision in United States v. Cervantes-Chavez, 59 F. Supp. 3d 1295, 1324 (D.N.M. 2014), arguing that he too purchased and sold drugs in arms-length or quasi-arms-length transactions but 12 did not supervise or manage any of the individuals to which he sold drugs. In that case, however, “no single, identifiable individual ha[d] been proposed to the Court as someone whom Cervantes-Chavez organize[d], le[d], manage[d], or supervise[d].” Id. at 1324. In contrast, the government here identified two specific individuals who were supervised by Mr. Lozano and provided factual support regarding each of them. Moreover, our standard for reviewing the evidence is different from that of the district court in Cervantes-Chavez, and Mr. Lozano’s ability to proffer a reasonable alternate view of the evidence is not sufficient to undermine the district court’s factual findings. At the sentencing hearing, the government cited to numerous specific examples in the record of Mr. Lozano’s control over his co-conspirators, and the district court was not clearly erroneous in relying on these examples to infer Mr. Lozano’s role as a supervisor or manager. Nor was it clearly erroneous in choosing the government’s proffered explanations for these specific examples over Mr. Lozano’s. Furthermore, even some of Mr. Lozano’s own statements acknowledge the district court’s view of the evidence as valid. For instance, he argued during the sentencing hearing that both his and the government’s proffered explanations for why he provided his coconspirators with means were reasonable. On appeal he argues that his own depiction of his role in the conspiracy is “just as likely” as the explanation offered by the government and accepted by the district court. Aplt. Br. at 23. But these equivalencies are not sufficient to meet the clearly erroneous standard 13 of review, under which we must affirm the district court’s account of the evidence if it is plausible in light of the record as a whole. See Anderson, 470 U.S. at 573–74. The district court’s factual findings are supported by the record, and we therefore affirm. 14