Opinion ID: 588141
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Alberto.

Text: 196 Q. Do you know who arranged for the communications that were necessary between your group and the people you were supposed to meet out there? Who communicated with them? 197 A. Once we arrived at the island, Albert was contacted by the people waiting there for us. 198 Q. How was he contacted? 199 A. Once we came in this little boat kind of came behind us. They knew what boat we were coming in, and knew who we were I guess by the vessel. 200 Q. Now, was the second trip successful as far as bringing back-- 201 A. Yes, it was. 202 Q. How much were you to be paid the second trip? 203 A. The second trip I was promised to get paid anywhere from twenty-five to forty thousand dollars, around there. 204 Q. This was just the two of you? 205 A. Just the two of us. I was promised more money. 206 Q. Did you ever get paid? 207 A. I got paid but not the whole amount. 208 Q. How much did you get paid? 209 A. I was partially paid, I must have received around another $17,000. 210 Q. After that episode, were you involved with Alberto Gessa again at all? 211 A. No. 212 Trial Tr. Vol. III at 27-32. 213 Testimony from Kohler indicated that, in addition to money, Fleitas also received three kilos of cocaine for his participation in the last boat-lift operation. 214 Eli Palmer, another co-defendant, testified that defendant was capable of executing large importations of cocaine: 215 Q. Now, Mr. Palmer, do you have any knowledge from your own observation or involvement with a plan to import twenty-five hundred kilos into Florida by boat, this plan being participated in by Alberto and Alex Gessa? 216 A. No, sir, I don't. 217 Q. Do you have any knowledge from your own observations or experience as to whether Alberto Gessa would be capable of engaging in such endeavor? 218 A. Yes, sir. 219 Q. What is the basis of your knowledge concerning that? 220 A. I was involved in an operation that we imported--we smuggled cocaine into Miami. 221 Q. When did it happen? 222 A. In June of '88. 223 Q. Who else was involved? 224 A. Jay, with me. 225 Q. Do you know his last name? 226 A. Fleitas. 227 Q. Who approached you about this plan? 228 A. Mr. Gessa. 229 Q. Which one. 230 A. Albert. 231 Q. What did he tell you was supposed to happen? 232 A. We were just to go out on the water and pick up the cocaine. 233 Q. Where were you supposed to go? 234 A. I wasn't sure at the time, but after I got there it was-- 235 Q. Where did you end up going? 236 A. In the Bahamas. 237 Q. Do you remember the name of the particular place? 238 A. Green Turtle Cay. 239 Q. How many of these trips did you make? 240 A. Just one. 241 Q. How much were you supposed to get paid for that? 242 A. Well, I ended up getting $10,000. 243 Q. How much were you supposed to get? 244 A. More. 245 Q. Was this trip successful? 246 A. Yes, it was. 247 Q. How much cocaine did you bring back? 248 A. TO MY KNOWLEDGE IT WAS TWO-HUNDRED AND FIFTY KI'S. 249 Q. How many boats were involved in this trip? 250 A. How many boats? Just ours. 251 Q. Did you put up any money in this venture for the purchase of the cocaine? 252 A. No, sir. 253 Q. Who did that, who handled that? 254 A. I guess the people that he was involved with. 255 Q. You don't know for sure? 256 A. No. 257 Q. How about obtaining the boat that you used, who made the arrangements for that? 258 A. Albert. 259 Q. Who determined which route you were going to follow? 260 A. Albert. I had never been on the water before. 261       262 Q. Were you ever approached again by Alberto Gessa to make drug trips? 263 A. Yes, I was. 264 Q. And you turned him down? 265 A. Yes, sir. Once was enough. 266 Id. at 62-65 (emphasis added). 267 The significance of the Kohler, Fleitas and Palmer testimony is the defendant's demonstrated access to a mega source of cocaine whether situated in Colombia or the Grand Bahamas, his capability to purchase and finance quantities of 250 or more kilograms 7 , and his demonstrated skill and experience in successfully evading interdiction by the United States and Bahamian authorities and landing those cargos in the United States. 268 If the defendant had a Colombian drug connection as related in the credited testimony of Kohler, or whether 250/probably 500 or more kilos of cocaine he purchased during June/August of 1988 were air-dropped or on-loaded from another vessel on the open sea, or acquired from land installations on Green Turtle Cay is totally without significance. The bottom line in judging the defendant's capability of producing and reasonably smuggling 250 or more kilos of cocaine into the United States was his demonstrated ability to do so. He did it on two separate known occasions between June and August of 1988. That evidence is uncontroverted and beyond equivocation. 269 In commenting upon the capability of the defendant to produce quantities of cocaine in excess of 50 kilograms necessary to invoke a base offense level of 36 pursuant to the mandate of Guidelines section 2D1.1 in effect at the time of this offense, the panel majority erroneously observes that the government has failed to prove the defendant's ability to produce cocaine in the quantities required to support a base offense level of 36. This significant legal misconception further erodes the integrity of the majority's disposition since it should be noted that the government does not have that burden of proof as assigned by the majority. This Circuit and every circuit that has addressed the issue has assigned that burden to the defendant. United States v. Rodriguez, 896 F.2d 1031 (6th Cir.1990). 270 In Rodriguez, this Circuit determined who had the burden of proving factual issues that would decrease a sentence. In arriving at its decision, this Court reasoned that 271 [t]he burden of proof is ordinarily placed upon the party who benefits from the establishment of a fact. Moreover, mitigating circumstances are more likely to be within the defendant's knowledge than the government's. They may require the defendant's testimony which the government may not be able to compel. 272       273 and decided that 274 [w]e now expressly reject Dolan's requirement that the government bear the burden of proof on factual issues that could decrease a potential sentence. 275 Rodriguez, 896 F.2d at 1033. See United States v. Christian, 942 F.2d 363, 368 (6th Cir.1991), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 905, 116 L.Ed.2d 806 (1992); United States v. Monroe, 943 F.2d 1007, 1019 (9th Cir.1991), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 1585, 118 L.Ed.2d 304 (1992); United States v. Williams, 940 F.2d 176, 181 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 666, 116 L.Ed.2d 757 (1991); United States v. Kingston, 922 F.2d 1234, 1240 (6th Cir.1990), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 2054, 114 L.Ed.2d 460 (1991); United States v. Wyckoff, 918 F.2d 925, 928 (11th Cir.1990). 276 In the instant case, the defendant made no effort to rebut the uncontroverted testimony of Kohler, Fleitas, and Palmer, let alone carry his burden to affirmatively prove by a preponderance of the evidence that he was incapable of smuggling 2,500, 250 or even 50 kilograms of cocaine into the United States. 277 Having gone full circle in addressing the panel majority's envisioned but non-existent material inconsistencies, and the non-issues of the defendant Gessa's intent and reasonable capability to successfully plan, finance and execute a venture of the magnitude contemplated by the instant conspiracy, there remains only the consideration and disposition of the single assignment of error charged by the government in its cross-appeal. That single assignment of error, simply stated, challenges the trial court's departure from the mandates imposed by the Sentencing Guidelines solely to harmonize or equalize a defendant's sentence with those of his co-defendants. 278 Here again the resolution of the assigned error is disclosed from a reading of the record of proceedings and the existing legal pronouncements of this Circuit and every other circuit that has considered the issue. 279 Contrary to the suggestions of the majority, the reason for the trial court's departure from the correct guideline sentencing range of 235 to 293 months imprisonment calculated upon a base offense level of 36 in effect at the time of the conspiracy to produce [smuggle into the United States] 50 or more kilos of cocaine--in the instant case either 250 or 2,500 kilos--is again apparent from a reading of the record of the sentencing hearing. 280 The trial court's good faith reservations for imposing what it characterized as a draconian sentence of between 235 and 290 months of imprisonment to be served by the defendant is repeated continuously throughout the sentencing hearings. Those reservations were anchored in the lesser sentences the court had imposed upon the remaining defendants that ranged from ninety-seven months to twelve months depending upon the degree of their respective involvements. Alexander Gessa received a sentence of three hundred and sixty months. 281 The thrust of the trial court's well-intentioned but erroneous reasons may be summarized in the following statements which followed a monologue crediting Kohler's credibility after observing her testify during three previous trials and after finding the existence of a viable conspiracy to import 2,500 kilos of cocaine into the United States: 282 But that again brings us back to the point that while I credit Camille Kohler's testimony, it's a question of whether that should be the basis of punishing this man for an extraordinary amount of cocaine. That's what I call conversational cocaine. And I've got some real problems about punishing people about having conversations about cocaine that hasn't ripened into something more solid, ... what I mean by conversational cocaine. 283 Now, it's one thing to have the proof for purpose of conspiracy and to obtain conviction, submit it to the jury, and even another thing for the Court to credit it, and I have credited it. As I said, I believe it by a preponderance of the evidence here at the sentencing proceedings. But I simply do not believe that that alone, with nothing more, is sufficient to impose what would be in this case draconian sentence. 284 If the Court were to accept that testimony as it has accepted, but if the Court were to impose sentence on the basis of the proof, it would result in a total adjusted offense level, allowing the two level upward adjustment for obstruction of justice, of thirty-eight, resulting in a guideline range of two hundred and thirty-five to two hundred and ninety-three months. 285       286 Now, if the Court were to find that the appropriate offense level in this case would be calculated by including and crediting this twenty-five hundred kilograms which would require it to credit fifty kilograms, in effect, resulting in a guideline range of two hundred and thirty-five to two hundred and ninety-three months, it would be the grossest sort of disparity and distortion with regard to the co-defendants in this case. They are all members of the same conspiracy. 287 When the main case was tried, the Government didn't advance this business. It wasn't until this defendant was taken into custody, and as the tail end of all the defendants was tried, that this aspect of the matter was advanced, and the Court rejects that. It simply isn't right. 288 What we have here is proof of some two and a half to three or three and a half kilograms of cocaine brought up here from South Florida to the Middle District of Tennessee that this man has been directly, concretely connected with. And I simply find that the rest of this is what I have repeatedly called this afternoon as conversational cocaine [alluding to the substantive count to transport, distribute, and sell 2.5 to 3 kilograms of cocaine within the Middle District of Tennessee]. 289 It's one thing to put it in the record, place his role in bringing about whatever the value the jury attaches to it, resulting in conviction on a Section 846 drug conspiracy count. And then it's a matter of fact, while I thought a large part of all this proceedings this afternoon and on two prior occasions with these objections was very much like we are seeing more, more and more in all of these sentencing proceedings, sort of a mini-trial, we finally at the last got down to the crux of the case, and that is what has this man actually been chargeable with for purposes of imposition of sentence. 290 And I find that it's two and a half, three, three and a half, kilograms of cocaine which under the computations of the guidelines in effect at the time results in an offense level of twenty-eight, and allowing for two level increase for obstruction of justice about which there is no controversy, and it goes to that portion, Paragraph 22 of the pre-sentence report, withdrawn, results in a total offense level of thirty with Criminal History Computation of I, resulting in a guideline range of ninety-seven to a hundred and twenty months, and a fine range of $15,000 to $150,000, and a period of supervised release of at least five years on Count One and at least four years on Count Eleven. 291 The foregoing constitutes the Court's finding as to the guidelines. 292 Exc. from Sent. at 28, 40-44. 293 The trial court knew precisely what it was doing as evidenced by its reflection that 294 I don't have any trouble sustaining a conviction because I think it's credible proof and I accept Camille Kohler's version of it, and that's clear by preponderance of the evidence. But, I'm telling you, Mr. Hester, I'm having some trouble about punishing a man over what I call conversational cocaine. If I'm wrong, you can--I SUPPOSE [IF] EITHER SIDE THINKS I HAVE IMPROPERLY APPLIED THE GUIDELINES, FAILED TO FOLLOW THEM, YOU HAVE CLEAR OPPORTUNITY TO HAVE THE COURT OF APPEALS REVIEW IT. 295 Id. at 33-34 (emphasis added). 296 The government followed the trial court's suggestion and assigned error to the court's imposed sentence in its cross appeal to this Court. 297 The trial court accordingly ignored the mandate of the Sentencing Guidelines and concluded that the applicable 235-293 month guideline range exceeded the sentences received by other members of the conspiracy and resulted in the grossest sort of disparity and distortion with regard to the co-defendants in this case. The court thereupon equalized defendant Gessa's sentence to 96 months which was similar to the sentence imposed upon Manolo Perez, one of Alex Gessa's other lesser suppliers. The sentence was a downward departure not only from 235-293 month applicable range applicable to conspiracies involving 50 ore more kilos of cocaine--250 to 2,500 kilos in the instant case--but also one month below the 97-121 month range otherwise applicable. 298 This Circuit has consistently refused to endorse a guideline departure to harmonize or equalize one defendant's sentence with the sentences of co-defendants. United States v. LaSalle, 948 F.2d 215 (6th Cir.1991); United States v. Rutana, 932 F.2d 1155, 1159 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 300, 116 L.Ed.2d 243 (1991); United States v. Parker, 912 F.2d 156, 157 (6th Cir.1990). 299 Every other circuit that has considered the issue is in accord with this Circuit's resolution denying upward or downward equalization departures from an appropriate guideline range. See United States v. Jackson, 950 F.2d 633, 637-38 (10th Cir.1991) (citing United States v. Trujillo, 906 F.2d 1456 (10th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 396, 112 L.Ed.2d 405 (1990)); United States v. Wogan, 938 F.2d 1446, 1447 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 441, 116 L.Ed.2d 460 (1991); United States v. Joyner, 924 F.2d 454, 459-61 (2d Cir.1991); United States v. Hendrieth, 922 F.2d 748, 752 (11th Cir.1991); United States v. Cea, 914 F.2d 881, 889 (7th Cir.1990); United States v. Torres, 921 F.2d 196, 197 (8th Cir.1990) (per curiam); United States v. Carpenter, 914 F.2d 1131, 1135 (9th Cir.1990) (citing United States v. Enriquez-Munoz, 906 F.2d 1356, 1358 (9th Cir.1990)); United States v. Boyd, 885 F.2d 246, 248-49 (5th Cir.1989). 8 The District of Columbia and the Third Circuits apparently have not addressed the issue. 300 In United States v. Nelson, 918 F.2d 1268 (6th Cir.1990), decided subsequent to United States v. Parker, 912 F.2d 156 (6th Cir.1990), a panel of this Circuit concluded that it was not improper as a matter of law for a district court to depart downward in an attempt to generally conform [one co-conspirator's] sentence with the sentence of [other co-conspirator's] (emphasis in original). The court proceeded to explain that: 301 we cannot say, as a matter of law ... that there could never be a situation in which strict letter application of the guidelines would result in an unreasoned disparity of sentences among multiple criminal defendants guilty of a single criminal transaction such that a district court would be justified in departing from the guidelines in order that reasonable sentence conformity might be achieved. 302 Nelson, 918 F.2d at 1272 (emphasis added). Upon revisiting Nelson, its reasoning recognizes a reasonable extension of Parker and poses no conflict with the Parker precedent. The Nelson appellate review ultimately disallowed the trial court's departure from the appropriate guideline range applicable in that case as unreasonable. The Nelson decision has received favorable scholarly comment and rest[s] upon a thoughtful analysis of the congressional intent underlying the Sentencing Reform Act. Weich, The Strange Case of the Disappearing Statute, 3 Fed.Sent.Rep. 239, 241 (1991). 303 In the instant case, the defendant's key role and assigned responsibility in furthering the objectives of the conspiracy to smuggle 2,500 kilograms of cocaine into the United States for distribution and sale was second to no one and certainly not comparable to the lesser co-defendants whose sentences served as the standard for the trial court's equalizing departure from the sentencing range mandated by the guidelines. Contrary to the district court's observations, it was the defendant, not his brother Alex, who was the more culpable participant of the instant joint criminal venture. It was the defendant who was the experienced sea captain, the navigator who was intimately familiar with Bahamian and Florida waters, the individual with the alleged Colombian connections, with demonstrated capabilities and know-how to successfully plan, finance and execute coordinated boat-lifts of bulk cocaine exceeding 250 kilograms in a single operation, evade Bahamian and U.S. Customs interdictions and inspections and illegally enter those cargoes of magnitude into the United States. He was the ever present volume pipe-line of cocaine that supplied well-organized distributors such as his brother who operated thirty or more mules, wholesalers, sub-distributors and street peddlers within the Middle District of Tennessee. He was the life's blood of any cocaine distribution system. 9 304 Moreover, his sentencing disparity was self-induced by his fugitive status. Had he been available for his scheduled appearances and trial along with his co-defendants while only Kohler's uncorroborated testimony attested to the conspiracy to smuggle 2,500 kilograms of cocaine into the United States, he too would have benefited from the prosecution's inability to produce corroborating evidence concerning the 2,500 kilogram conspiracy and the then A.U.S.A.'s decision to focus only on the domestic portion of the case. 305 Unfortunately for the defendant, during his nine month fugitive status, the government developed additional evidence that corroborated Kohler's disclosure of the 2,500 kilogram conspiracy and defendant Gessa's intent and capability to plan, finance and execute mega-kilogram importations of cocaine into the United States. Co-defendant Fleitas who became a government witness testified without contradiction to participating in two successful smuggling operations. Eli Palmer was unknown to A.U.S.A. Strianse while he was trying or disposing of the charges against defendant's co-defendants. Palmer also provided uncontradicted testimony of defendant's seamanship, navigational skills and his ability to successfully plan, finance and execute an ocean rendezvous, a boat-lift of at least 250 kilograms of cocaine into the United States. The defendant should not be permitted to seek the exception of Nelson where his own wrongful conduct induced any sentencing disparity. 306 Assuming, arguendo, that the trial court had applied the appropriate guideline, the defendant's sentence would not have been disparate when compared with that of his brother Alex who was the only individual who was similarly situated in the conspiracy. While defendant may argue that he was less culpable, his sentence if correctly calculated in accordance with the appropriate guideline range, i.e., 235 months, would have been only two-thirds as severe as his brother's sentence of imprisonment for 360 months. Under the facts of this case, when compared with the 360 month sentence of imprisonment that Alex received, defendant's sentence was, if anything, too lenient rather than too harsh. 10 Thus, the application of the Nelson exception is unwarranted in the disposition of this action. 307 Having reviewed and responded to the disposition of the en banc majority which seeks to invoke the exceptions of U.S.S.G. § 2D1.4, it would appear as Judge Kennedy notes in her dissent, that Application Note One to section 1B1.3 (Relevant Conduct) (section 1B1.3) rather than section 2D1.4 is the more legally correct sentencing guideline that is applicable to the sentencing of the defendant Gessa who, together with his brother Alex, were the two primary conspirators who planned to illegally smuggle 2,500 kilograms of cocaine into the United States. As Judge Kennedy observes and as logic dictates, given the trial court's credibility assessments of Kohler's testimony that the brothers Gessa planned to smuggle 2,500 kilograms of cocaine into the United States, even the reasonable foreseeability exception of section 1B1.3 is not an issue with respect to Alberto Gessa's own agreement. Accordingly, since the defendant has failed to introduce any evidence or proof, which was his burden, that his conduct was neither within the scope of the defendant's agreement, nor was reasonably foreseeable in connection with the criminal activity the defendant agreed to jointly undertake (section 1B1.3), then his offense level should be the same as if the object of the conspiracy ... had been completed. U.S.S.G. § 2D1.4. 308 Judge Kennedy correctly concludes that section 2D1.4 applies only to uncompleted, attempted sales and is intended to limit the offense level where the defendant was puffing and where the defendant did not intend to produce and was not reasonably capable of producing the negotiated amount. The transcript of the government's uncontroverted testimony in the instant case which has been totally ignored by the en banc majority in arriving at its resolution, precludes the defendant from invoking the exceptions of U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3 for the reasons more fully discussed hereinbefore and in Judge Kennedy's dissent. 309 As noted earlier in this dissent, the government's affirmative proof of defendant's demonstrated intention and capability to illegally smuggle 2,500 kilograms of cocaine into the United States is uncontroverted and the defendant is accordingly foreclosed from invoking the exceptions of section 2D1.4, if that provision is applicable. 310 Accordingly, I would concur in the majority's conclusions that defendant's assignments of error are not well-taken and affirm the district court's evidentiary rulings and dispositions. 311 However, if I were writing for the majority of the en banc court, I would, upon this comprehensive and totally reviewable trial and post-trial record, including the sentencing hearings conducted by the trial court, confront and decide the single simple issue joined by government's cross-appeal and finally dispose of the case with a decision of precedential value that would justify the consideration of an en banc court. 312 I would reaffirm this Circuit's pronouncements in Parker and Nelson as the precedent of this Circuit, declare the government's assignment of error to be well-taken and vacate the sentence of imprisonment imposed upon defendant, and remand the case to the district court with instructions to resentence him in accordance with the appropriate guideline range not inconsistent with this dissent. 313