Opinion ID: 2996363
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Abraham Hernandez’s Acceptance of Responsi-

Text: bility Abraham Hernandez argues that the district court improperly denied his request for a two-level reduction for acceptance of responsibility under § 3E1.1 of the sentencing guidelines. To prevail on this point below, the burden was on Hernandez to “clearly demonstrate” that he was entitled to the reduction by a preponderance of the evidence. United States v. Muhammad, 120 F.3d 688, 701 (7th Cir. 1997) (citing U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1(a)). On appeal, we will reverse a district court’s refusal to grant an acceptanceof-responsibility reduction only if we find that decision to be clearly erroneous. Id. (citations omitted). 15 (...continued) indicted only under 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(C), the trial judge, using the Guidelines and § 5G1.2(d), would have been required to sentence him to 324 months made up of consecutive sentences, each of which would not have exceeded 20 years.”); Angle, 254 F.3d at 518 (“Had the district court been aware when it sentenced [the defendant] that the maximum penalty for his drug trafficking conviction was 20 years, § 5G1.2(d) would have obligated it to . . . order[ ] [the sentences] to be served consecutively.”); Price, 265 F.3d at 1109 (noting that because 5G1.2 is mandatory, the district court would be forced to impose the same sentence already imposed, so there was no prejudice by the Apprendi error); United States v. Smith, 240 F.3d 927, 930 (11th Cir. 2001) (“When the ultimate sentence does not exceed the aggregate statutory maximum for multiple convictions, no effect on substantial rights has occurred that must be remedied.”); Page, 232 F.3d at 545 (holding that there was no prejudice because if § 5G1.2(d) was properly applied then the defendants’ “sentences would have been the same as those which were imposed”). Nos. 99-2299, 99-2505, 99-2514, 99-2570, 37 99-2598, 99-2763, 99-2983, 01-1690 The commentary to guideline § 3E1.1 makes clear that the adjustment for acceptance of responsibility “is not intended to apply to a defendant who puts the government to its burden of proof at trial by denying the essential factual elements of guilt, is convicted, and only then admits guilt and expresses remorse.” U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1 cmt. n.2. Abraham Hernandez did not plead guilty in this case; rather he forced the government to go to trial to establish his guilt. There is some evidence that he entered into plea negotiations with the government about pleading guilty to Count 1—the conspiracy charge—but nothing came of these negotiations because Abraham Hernandez would not accept the government’s conditions on the plea. Thus, they went to trial, where Abraham maintained that he was just “a 20-year-old kid who started hanging around the Lathrop Homes neighborhood, was at the wrong place at the wrong time . . . [and was not] a conspirator.” (Tr. 66.) The government was forced to disprove this claim, and it did so. The commentary to § 3E1.1 also provides that in “rare situations” a defendant may still receive the reduction even though he goes to trial, “for example, where a defendant goes to trial to assert and preserve issues that do not relate to factual guilt.” U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1 cmt. n.2. The problem for Abraham Hernandez is that he went to trial to deny that he was part of the conspiracy on a theory of defense that rested solely on the factual claim that he was just a 20-year old kid in the wrong place at the wrong time. He has not provided us with any reason to believe that he went to trial for any other reason than to deny his factual guilt. His appeal from the district court’s refusal to grant him a two-point reduction is therefore denied. 38 Nos. 99-2299, 99-2505, 99-2514, 99-2570, 99-2598, 99-2763, 99-2983, 01-1690