Opinion ID: 180585
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Andrew Sonnenberg’s Sentence

Text: With a criminal history of V, an offense level of 33, and an advisory guideline range of 210 to 262 months, Andrew Sonnenberg was sentenced to 210 months in prison. Andrew Sonnenberg argues only that his sentence was unreasonable because the court did not account for the crack cocaine/powder cocaine disparity, addressed above. III. Margrette Cobb’s Criminal History and Suppression Issues We turn now to the individual issues raised by Margrette Cobb. Her appeal raises two individual issues: first, that statements she made to government officials in the course of their investigation were in violation of her Fifth Amendment right against self‐incrimination and should not have been admitted and, second, that her four criminal history points overstated the seriousness of her criminal record, resulting in an unreasonably long sentence. We disagree as to both issues. A. Suppression of Statements Cobb argues that her conviction should be vacated based on the district court’s refusal to suppress statements she made to law enforcement officers. Cobb argues that her statements were involuntary and that she made the statements because she feared that, if she did not do so, she would violate her probation. The district court held an evidentiary hearing and concluded that Cobb’s statements were voluntary and admissible. Cobb’s plea agreement preserved the Fifth Amendment issue for appeal. We find no error. Cobb made the statements in an interview with detectives. Her probation officer, accompanied by a detective, went to Cobb’s home and brought her to the probation office to do a urine test. Cobb completed the urine test – which usually would have been completed in her own home – and was brought to a waiting room. Approximately 40 minutes later, the probation officer told Cobb that “some law enforcement officials [wanted] to talk to her.” Supp. Hearing Tr. 32. The probation officer testified: “I informed her that I wasn’t aware of what the officers were there for. I informed her that I wasn’t aware whether they were intending to arrest her and that they were there for issues that did not concern her parole.” Id. at 33. The probation officer brought Cobb to a room where she was interrogated by two detectives. Nos. 09‐2834, 09‐2854, 09‐2912, 09‐3565, and 09‐3589 Page 11 The detectives testified that, while they did not give Cobb Miranda warnings, they told her that she was free to leave and that they could give her a ride home. The detectives closed the door but did not lock it. They provided a description of their investigation; told Cobb that she was a potential target; and asked for her cooperation in the investigation. Cobb then agreed to cooperate. The interview lasted 60 to 90 minutes, and the district court concluded that it was “conversational and non‐confrontational.” There was no testimony to the contrary. Following the interview, a detective drove Cobb home. Cobb argues that the statements were involuntary because she feared that she would violate her probation if she did not answer the detectives’ questions. As the district court noted, fear of revocation alone is not a sufficient ground for finding that a probationer’s statement deprived her of her Fifth Amendment privilege against self‐incrimination. See Minnesota v. Murphy, 465 U.S. 420, 438 (1984) (defendant’s belief that his probation would be revoked for exercising his Fifth Amendment privilege “would not have been reasonable”); United States v. Cranley, 350 F.3d 617 (7th Cir. 2003) (fear of revocation of probation did not deprive defendant of Fifth Amendment privilege against self‐incrimination). In Cranley, the probation officer alerted the defendant to the reason for the defendant’s visit to the probation office, whereas Cobb was surprised by the real reason for her visit. However, the detectives’ repeated assurances to Cobb that she was free to leave, and the fact that she was familiar with the probation office, support the district court’s finding that the statements were voluntary. We accept the district court’s finding that Cobb’s fear of revocation of her probation was not reasonable given the circumstances of the interview and her familiarity with the probation and criminal justice system. In cases where we have found statements inadmissible because a person’s Fifth Amendment privilege against self‐incrimination was violated, but where the suspect was not on probation, the totality of the circumstances was much more severe than in Cobb’s case. Take the recent case of United States v. Slaight, 620 F.3d 816, 822 (7th Cir. 2010), where we found that the appellant was in custody and entitled to Miranda warnings: The key facts are the show of force at Slaight’s home, the protracted questioning of him in the claustrophobic setting of the police station’s Lilliputian interview room, and the more than likelihood that he would be formally placed under arrest if he tried to leave because the government already had so much evidence against him. These facts are incontrovertible and show that the average person in Slaight’s position would have thought himself in custody. Any other conclusion would leave Miranda in tatters. Nos. 09‐2834, 09‐2854, 09‐2912, 09‐3565, and 09‐3589 Page 12 Id. Here, there was no coercive entry into Cobb’s home – the probation officer and detective arrived and took her to the probation office, with which she was familiar, and detectives assured her she could leave any time and have a ride home. While the fact that her probation officer brought her to the probation office ostensibly for a urine test, but actually for an interview with the detectives, could sound as though the detectives were attempting to use her probation to, as the district court phrased it, “pry cooperation out of Cobb,” we accept the district court’s finding, after it listened to the testimony, that Cobb’s statements to the detectives were voluntary. Given the familiar setting of the probation office, the non‐coercive way in which the probation officer and detective brought Cobb to the probation office, and the statements that the detectives made to Cobb that she was free to leave and would receive a ride home, the district court did not err by finding that she was not in custody nor coerced to make statements and that her statements should not be suppressed as evidence. B. Cobb’s Criminal History Issue Cobb argues that the district court abused its discretion and imposed a substantively unreasonable sentence when it did not depart downward from the advisory sentencing guidelines. She argues that her assigned criminal history category (III) overstated the seriousness of her earlier offenses. The defendant received two criminal history points from a 2002 conviction for possession of a small amount of marijuana. Two additional points were added because the defendant committed the offense for which she is now sentenced, less than two years after her release from jail. Cobb argues that criminal history category III is unnecessarily high, that the district court should have addressed this objection more specifically, and that there was no indication that the district court knew it had the authority to grant a variance on this basis. We are not persuaded. The Guidelines themselves, in § 4A1.3, encourage a district court to depart downward from a recommended sentence if the court finds that “the defendant’s criminal history category substantially over‐represents the seriousness of the defendant’s criminal history.” At the same time, the sentencing court also has the discretion not to depart downward. United States v. Abbott, 30 F.3d 71, 73 (7th Cir. 1994).2 2 Beginning with United States v. Johnson, 427 F.3d 423, 426 (7th Cir. 2005), we have said often that Booker rendered the Guidelines’ concept of departures “obsolete.” In a strict legal sense, that is correct, as was clear in Johnson, for example, which was written in terms of the legal question the appellate court decides when reviewing a sentence. Our label of “obsolete” should not have discouraged district courts from taking genuine guidance from the Guidelines, including their departure provisions, when exercising their discretion under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a). In addition, (continued...) Nos. 09‐2834, 09‐2854, 09‐2912, 09‐3565, and 09‐3589 Page 13 The sentencing court made clear that it simply was not convinced by Cobb’s arguments for a lower sentence. After detailing Cobb’s role in the conspiracy, her criminal record, and some of her personal history – such as her continued involvement in the drug trade after her children were removed from her home – the judge concluded that he found “her request for a sentence which . . . deviate[s] or var[ies] from the applicable sentencing guidelines range [unpersuasive] because the mitigating circumstances that are described by the defendant in my judgment just don’t warrant such a deviation or variance.” Cobb Sent. Tr. 20. The district judge did not need to say more on the subject. Whether a criminal history category over‐represents the seriousness of a record is a “stock argument” that the court is free to reject without explicit discussion. See United States v. Tahzib, 513 F.3d 692, 695 (7th Cir. 2008) (mitigating factors that are “nothing more than stock arguments that sentencing courts see routinely,” for example, family ties, how a criminal history category over‐represents the seriousness of a prior conviction, and the extent to which the defendant accepted responsibility, are the “type of argument that a sentencing court is certainly free to reject without discussion . . . . A court’s discussion need only demonstrate its meaningful consideration of the [18 U.S.C.] § 3553(a) factors”) (internal citations omitted). The judge gave meaningful consideration to the arguments meriting discussion. We find no error in Cobb’s sentence.