Opinion ID: 1442440
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The district court's drug-quantity findings

Text: We review the district court's determination of drug quantity for clear error. United States v. Artley, 489 F.3d 813, 821 (7th Cir.2007). This is a highly deferential standard of review and we refuse to `second-guess the sentencing judge.' United States v. Hankton, 432 F.3d 779, 789 (7th Cir.2005) (quoting United States v. Cleggett, 179 F.3d 1051, 1055 (7th Cir. 1999)). The government had the burden of proving drug quantity to the court by a preponderance of the evidence, United States v. McGowan, 478 F.3d 800, 802 (7th Cir.2007); United States v. White, 360 F.3d 718, 720 (7th Cir.2004), but the evidence supporting the drug-quantity determination need not have been limited to evidence admissible at trial. White, 360 F.3d at 720; United States v. Galbraith, 200 F.3d 1006, 1011-12 (7th Cir.2000). Clark argues that the district court should not have relied on the testimony of Juan Corral because Corral was an admitted perjurer and drug user who had lied previously to protect his own interests. This argument fails because the district court specifically found Corral to be a truthful witness, despite his inability to remember specific details about his deals with Clark. A district court's determination of witness credibility is entitled to great deference and `can virtually never be clear error.' White, 360 F.3d 718, 720 (7th Cir.2004) (quoting United States v. Blalock, 321 F.3d 686, 690 (7th Cir.2003)). Further, a sentencing court may credit testimony that is `totally uncorroborated and comes from an admitted liar, convicted felon, or large scale drug-dealing, paid government informant.' Id. (quoting Blalock, 321 F.3d at 690); see also Galbraith, 200 F.3d at 1012; United States v. Rodgers, 245 F.3d 961, 968 (7th Cir.2001) ([T]he district judge was free to credit Dexter. That Dexter was a convicted felon who stood to gain from his testimony against Rodgers is by no means a remarkable circumstance.). Furthermore, it is clear from the record that Corral's testimony about his sales to Clark never wavered. He maintained throughout the 17-kilogram estimate, and consistently explained that Clark usually purchased five kilograms, sometimes purchased three, and at least once purchased eight. Unlike the situation in United States v. Beler, 20 F.3d 1428, 1433-34 (7th Cir.1994), where the witness wavered in his testimony about drug quantity, Corral's testimony remained constant. To compute his estimate of cocaine sales, Corral multiplied the minimum number of kilograms he sold to Clark during a transaction (three kilograms) by the number of months he dealt with Clark (five months)15 kilograms. Because he remembered selling Clark more than three kilograms at times, he added an additional two kilograms to his total calculation of 17 kilograms, which Corral stated was conservative. This method of computation, assuming credibility and reliability of the witness, is permissible. A district court may calculate drug quantity by taking a witness's estimate of the amount of drugs she usually purchased and multiplying it by the number of times she bought drugs from the defendant. White, 360 F.3d at 720; see also United States v. Durham, 211 F.3d 437, 444 (7th Cir.2000). Granted, Corral could not recall the specific details of his deals with Clark, the exact number of occasions he sold cocaine to Clark, or the amount of cocaine involved in each sale. Clark argues that because Corral could not remember details, his testimony lacked the required indicia of reliability that would allow the district court to rely on his statements. See Beler, 20 F.3d at 1433. Indeed, the district court agreed that Corral's recollections were vague and not specific enough in themselves to support a drug-quantity finding of over 15 kilograms. However, the district court decided that the summaries of the wiretapped phone conversationscontained in the original complaint affidavit that was submitted to a magistrate judgecorroborated Corral's testimony. The two phone calls from May and June corroborated Corral's testimony that Corral dealt with Clark about once per month and that Corral sold Clark kilogram quantities of cocaine. The transcripts of those conversations were not admitted into evidence, nor were the actual recordingsso Clark objects to the district court's reliance on the complaint affidavit that summarized the conversations. The district court explained that because the standard was only a preponderance of the evidence, and the rules of evidence did not apply, it could rely on the government's assertion in an official court document that the complaint [was] based on surveillance. Section 6A1.3(a) of the Guidelines allows sentencing courts to consider information without regard to its admissibility under the rules of evidence applicable at trial, provided that the information has sufficient indicia of reliability to support its probable accuracy. The complaint affidavit was a document presented to a magistrate judge and attested to by the drug trafficking agent. The district court was entitled to credit the complaint as an accurate summary of the government's evidence about Clark. There was nothing suggesting that the complaint was unreliable or that it contained inconsistencies, which was the case in Beler, in which two sworn affidavits contradicted one another. 20 F.3d at 1433-36; see also Hankton, 432 F.3d at 790 (stating that the defendant did not show how agent's testimony about wiretapped conversations was unreliable, other than the fact that testimony was inadmissible hearsay). The summaries of the wiretapped conversations supported Corral's testimony, which never wavered with respect to how much cocaine Corral estimated he sold to Clark. We agree with the district court that the complaint affidavit contained the requisite indicia of reliability for the district court to factor its contents into the drug-quantity determination. Between Corral's testimony and the corroborating summaries of the wiretapped conversation, the district court did not clearly err in finding by a preponderance of the evidence that Clark's § 841 offense involved more than 15 kilograms of cocaine.