Opinion ID: 782497
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Hamilton's Challenge to His Sentence

Text: 116 For a defendant convicted of aiding and abetting, [t]he offense level is the same level as that for the underlying offense. Guidelines § 2X2.1. The guideline applicable to a defendant convicted of violating 21 U.S.C. § 856 is Guidelines § 2D1.8, which covers the offense of knowingly ... maintaining... any building, room, or enclosure for the purpose of ... distributing[]... or using a controlled substance contrary to law ( e.g., a `crack house'). Guidelines § 2D1.8 Background. 117 Section 2D1.8, provides, in part, that such a defendant's offense level is [t]he offense level from § 2D1.1 applicable to the underlying substantive offense. Guidelines § 2D1.8(a)(1). Section 2D1.1 links a defendant's base offense level to the quantity of narcotics involved in his relevant conduct. A defendant's relevant conduct includes 118 (1)(A) all acts ... committed, aided, [or] abetted ... by the defendant; and (B) in the case of a jointly undertaken criminal activity (a criminal plan, scheme, endeavor, or enterprise undertaken by the defendant in concert with others, whether or not charged as a conspiracy), all reasonably foreseeable acts and omissions of others in furtherance of the jointly undertaken criminal activity, 119 that occurred during the commission of the offense of conviction.... 120 Guidelines § 1B1.3(a)(1). 121 In sentencing Hamilton under these sections, the district court found by a preponderance of the evidence that Hamilton knew that 1213 First Avenue was a crack house in which numerous illegal crack cocaine transactions had occurred (Sentencing Transcript, May 16, 2002 (S.Tr.), at 13), and that when Hamilton talked to Wharry on March 8, 2000, and warned her about the police surveillance, he believed, based on his observation of the surveillance and on the circumstances and his experience as a police officer, ... that a drug transaction was or was about to take place in the crack house (S.Tr.13-14). The court found that Hamilton was accountable for the 9.5 grams of crack sold to the confidential informant in the controlled buy on that date because, based on his knowledge and experience as a police officer, the participants and the entire circumstances by a preponderance of the evidence the quantity of drugs was reasonably foreseeable by him. (S.Tr.14-15.) Based on that drug quantity, Hamilton's base offense level was 26; after a two-step upward adjustment under Guidelines § 3B1.3 for abuse of a public trust, his total offense level was 28. Given his criminal history category of I, the Guidelines-recommended range of imprisonment was 78-96 months. The district court departed downward from that range and sentenced Hamilton to a prison term of 54 months on Count Three, and a 48-month term on count Five, to be served concurrently. 122 Hamilton challenges his sentence, arguing principally (1) that the 9.5-gram quantity of crack sold on March 8 was not reasonably foreseeable to him, and (2) that under subsection (a)(2) of Guidelines § 2D1.8, which provides that 123 [i]f the defendant had no participation in the underlying controlled substance offense other than allowing use of the premises, the offense level shall be 4 levels less than the offense level from § 2D1.1 applicable to the underlying substantive offense, 124 Guidelines § 2D1.8(a)(2), his total offense level should have been no more than 24. We reject both contentions. 125 In reviewing a sentence imposed under the Guidelines, we may not overturn the district court's findings of fact unless they are clearly erroneous, and we must give due deference to the district court's application of the guidelines to the facts. 18 U.S.C. § 3742(e). We will not overturn the court's application of the Guidelines to the facts before it unless we conclude that there has been an abuse of discretion. See, e.g., United States v. Santiago, 906 F.2d 867, 871 (2d Cir.1990). 126 We see no error, much less clear error, in the district court's findings that Hamilton knew that 1213 First Avenue was being used as a crack house, that he recognized that there was police surveillance of that house on March 8, and that he warned Wharry of that surveillance. Indeed, these facts were elements of or integral to the crack-house-maintenance offense that the jury permissibly found proven beyond a reasonable doubt. In addition, the court's finding that Hamilton, based on his police experience, believed that a controlled transaction was to take place and that a transaction of 9.5 grams of crack was reasonably foreseeable to him is not clearly erroneous. We see no abuse of discretion in the court's application to Hamilton of the base offense level set by Guidelines § 2D1.1 for the quantity of crack that was sold on the premises on one of the very days on which Hamilton was shown to be acting to protect Wharry's maintenance of the premises as a crack house. 127 Nor is there merit in Hamilton's contention that he was entitled to a four-step reduction in offense level under § 2D1.8(a)(2) on the ground that he had no participation in the underlying controlled substance offense other than allowing use of the premises. The commentary to § 2D1.8 states, inter alia, that 128 subsection (a)(2) does not apply unless the defendant initially leased, rented, purchased, or otherwise acquired a possessory interest in the premises for a legitimate purpose. 129 Guidelines § 2D1.8 Application Note 1. Nothing in the record suggests that Hamilton leased, rented, purchased, or otherwise acquired a possessory interest in 1213 First Avenue at all, and at oral argument of this appeal his attorney confirmed to this Court that Hamilton had no such ownership or proprietary interest. Accordingly, the subsection (a)(2) reduction was not available to Hamilton.