Opinion ID: 799763
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Addressing Disputed Portions of the Presentence Report

Text: Rule 32( i )(3)(B) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure states that a district court, at sentencing, mustfor any disputed portion of the presentence report or other controverted matterrule on the dispute or determine that a ruling is unnecessary either because the matter will not affect sentencing, or because the court will not consider the matter in sentencing. Wagner-Dano argues that the district court failed to comply with Rule 32( i )(3)(B) by neglecting to address several of the objections she made regarding the PSR. Some of Wagner-Dano's objections such as the loss and restitution amounts, the value of the pulling truck, and whether the truck was purchased with stolen moneydirectly disputed the PSR's statement of the facts. These issues were resolved by the district court's decision to adopt as findings the factual information in the PSR. Others of Wagner-Dano's objections, however, did not directly dispute the facts as set forth in the PSR, but rather attempted to clarify Wagner-Dano's motives or provide context for the PSR's facts. These include Wagner-Dano's objections regarding: (1) her motive for writing the October 29, 2009, letter which falsely blamed BFC's account deficits on a computer problem; (2) her motive for making repayments in October and November 2009; (3) her motive for selling her assets; and (4) her motive for transferring her house to her parents. Because the PSR did not directly conflict with Wagner-Dano's explanations on these issues, the district court's adoption of the PSR may not have disposed of these objections. Wagner-Dano presented her factual objections in a memorandum to the district court prior to sentencing. She mentioned them at sentencing only insofar as the district court asked, [D]o counsel have any objections to the facts as stated in the presentence report?, to which Wagner-Dano's counsel replied, Judge, my only objections were summarized in the addendum. The district court then adopted the PSR's statement of factspresumably believing that in so ruling, it had disposed of all of Wagner-Dano's objections. Cf. United States v. Prince, 110 F.3d 921, 924 (2d Cir.1997) (A district court satisfies its obligation to make `findings sufficient to permit appellate review ... if the court indicates, either at the sentencing hearing or in the written judgment, that it is adopting the recommendations in the [PSR].') (omission in original) (quoting United States v. Thompson, 76 F.3d 442, 456 (2d Cir.1996)). When the district court adopted the PSR and pronounced its sentence, Wagner-Dano did not object on the procedural ground that the court had failed to address her objections to the PSR and rule on the matters she disputed. The parties disagree whether, under these circumstances, our review of the district court's compliance with Rule 32( i )(3)(B) is limited to plain error. For the reasons set forth herein, we hold that it is. We review only for plain error where, as here, an appellant asserts that the district court neglected to address an objection to the PSR in violation of Rule 32( i )(3)(B), but that appellant failed to alert the district court of this procedural issue after the district court made its findings or pronounced its sentence. Finding no plain error here, we reject Wagner-Dano's claim that her sentence was procedurally flawed by virtue of the district court's alleged failure to rule on her objections to the PSR.
This Circuit's precedents are unclear regarding what standard of review we apply where a defendant initially makes an objection to the PSR at sentencing, but then fails to object when the district court allegedly violates Rule 32( i )(3)(B) by neglecting to resolve or otherwise address the objection. [6] None of our Rule 32( i )(3) cases directly addresses the applicable standard of review. [7] Nonetheless, our practice with regard to the current Rule 32( i )(3) comports with reviewing unpreserved Rule 32( i )(3) challenges only for plain error, and we believe this is the better reading both of our precedents and of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52(b), which governs on appeal from criminal proceedings, provides a court of appeals a limited power to correct errors that were forfeited because not timely raised in district court. United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 731, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993) (emphasis added). Accordingly, our general rule is that issues not raised in the trial court because of oversight, including sentencing issues, are normally deemed forfeited on appeal unless they meet our standard for plain error. Villafuerte, 502 F.3d at 207. See generally Fed.R.Crim.P. 52; Charles Alan Wright et al., Federal Practice & Procedure § 856 (3d ed.2011) (There would seem to be no error to which plain error review would not apply.... No exception for sentencing errors appears in either the Rule [52(b) ] or the [Supreme] Court's cases interpreting the rule.). This Circuit has recognized exceptions in the sentencing context where an appellant lacked prior notice of the aspect of the sentence challenged on appeal, see Villafuerte, 502 F.3d at 208, in part because noticing unobjected to errors that occur at trial precipitates an entire new trial that could have been avoided by a timely objection, whereas correcting a sentencing error results in, at most, only a remand for resentencing. United States v. Sofsky, 287 F.3d 122, 125 (2d Cir.2002). But we have declined to overlook a lack of objection where the sentencing issue was not particularly novel or complex. Villafuerte, 502 F.3d at 208 (internal quotation marks omitted). For example, as discussed in the prior section of this opinion, our decision in United States v. Villafuerte, 502 F.3d 204 (2d Cir.2007), held that plain-error analysis applies where an appellant argues for the first time on appeal that the district court failed to consider the § 3553(a) sentencing factors. Although the defendant in Villafuerte made a substantive argument before the district court for a below-Guidelines sentence based on his personal circumstances, see id. at 206, we held that such a substantive objection did not preserve his procedural challenge that the district court had neglected to consider the sentencing factors, see id. at 207. We explained that [b]ecause we have unambiguously required consideration of the § 3553(a) factors ... in every criminal sentencing proceeding [since 2005], this issue is not particularly novel or complex. Id. at 208; see id. at 211. Accordingly, raising an objection to the failure to do so in order to alert the district court to the problem is neither difficult nor onerous. This requirement alerts the district court to a potential problem at the trial level and facilitates its remediation at little cost to the parties, avoiding the unnecessary expenditure of judicial time and energy in appeal and remand. Id. at 208. Villafuerte's reasoning is equally applicable to Rule 32( i )(3). The requirements of Rule 32( i )(3)(B), like the requirements of § 3553(a), are neither novel nor complex. If the defendant or the Government believes that a particular factual issue is material and the district court neglects to address the issue at sentencing, it is not difficultindeed, it should be intuitiveto bring this procedural error to the district court's attention. Employing a plain error standard in the review of Rule 32( i )(3) arguments raised for the first time on appeal, moreover, is consistent with the practice in those sister circuits that appear to have considered the issue. See United States v. Williamson, 53 F.3d 1500, 1527 (10th Cir.1995) (reviewing only for plain error because although the defendant raised an objection to [a] statement in the presentence report, she candidly concedes she did not make a separate objection to the district court's failure to make an appropriate finding under Rule 32[ ]); see also United States v. Brame, 448 Fed. Appx. 364, 366 (4th Cir.2011) (unpublished decision); United States v. Vonner, 516 F.3d 382, 388 (6th Cir.2008) ( en banc ). But cf. United States v. Williams, 612 F.3d 500, 517 (6th Cir.2010) (distinguishing Vonner as not involving a genuine dispute between the parties, but emphasiz[ing] that [ Williams ] is not an ordinary case). We note that our decision today departs from our practice with regard to Rule 32( i )(3)'s earliest predecessor, Rule 32(c)(3)(D) (1988). [8] But a brief foray into the history of our Rule 32 precedents explains why the plain-error standard applies to the current Rule 32( i )(3) even if our review under its predecessor was more searching. Our cases decided under Rule 32(c)(3)(D), from its adoption in 1983 until the rule was amended in 1994, held that even virtually de minimis  technical violations of Rule 32(c)(3)(D) required remand for clarificationthough we rarely required resentencing. United States v. Bradley, 812 F.2d 774, 782 (2d Cir.1987); see also United States v. Feigenbaum, 962 F.2d 230, 232 (2d Cir.1992); United States v. Williamsburg Check Cashing Corp., 905 F.2d 25, 27 (2d Cir.1990); Dunston v. United States, 878 F.2d 648, 650 (2d Cir. 1989) ( per curiam ); United States v. Arefi, 847 F.2d 1003, 1007-08 (2d Cir.1988); United States v. Ursillo, 786 F.2d 66, 71 (2d Cir. 1986). And although none of our opinions in those cases mentions whether the appellant made a separate procedural objection when the district court allegedly failed to address a factual objection to the PSR, this silence suggests that in most of those cases no such separate objection was made. Our strict review under Rule 32(c)(3)(D) therefore may have been incompatible with the plain-error standard. The exactness we required under that rule stemmed from its explicit purpose of protecting the defendant even after sentencing because the PS[R] is utilized by the Parole Commission in its determination of parole eligibility for a defendant. Dunston, 878 F.2d at 650. The Advisory Committee that drafted Rule 32(c)(3)(D) explained that the Bureau of Prisons and the Parole Commission make substantial use of the presentence investigation report, and thus the purpose of that rule was to ensure that [a clear and accurate] record comes to the attention of the Bureau or Commission when these agencies utilize the presentence investigation report. Fed.R.Crim.P. 32 advisory committee's note, 1983 Amend. (1988). Our strict interpretation of that rule reflected that stated purpose; indeed, our first case to apply the rule strictly involved a motion filed by a prisoner more than a year after sentencing, purportedly pursuant to Rule 32(c)(3)(D), to strike several allegedly erroneous items from the presentence report because they were `extremely prejudicial to petitioner in his application for parole consideration.' Ursillo, 786 F.2d at 68. Since then, the relevant portion of Rule 32 has been materially amended twice, each time to reduce the burdens on the district court and to confine the rule to the more limited purpose of sentencing. The 1994 amendment indicated that a court need not resolve controverted matters which will `not be taken into account in, or will not affect, sentencing,' with the intended purpose of identifying and narrowing the issues to be decided at the sentencing hearing. [9] Fed.R.Crim.P. 32 advisory committee's note, 1994 Amend. (1994) (emphasis added) (quoting Fed. R.Crim.P. 32(c)(1) (1994)). In 2002, the rule was both restyled and amended to its current form. Its substantive changes stemmed from a concern that the rule might be read broadly to require a court to address every unresolved objection[ ] even if uncontroverted and irrelevant to the sentenceand thus place an unreasonable burden on the court without providing any real benefit to the sentencing process. Fed.R.Crim.P. 32 advisory committee's note, 2002 Amend. (2006). Accordingly, [r]evised Rule 32( i )(3) narrows the requirement for court findings to those instances when the objection addresses a `controverted matter.' Id. Our cases decided under the modern Rule 32( i )(3), with its more limited focus on controverted issues relevant to sentencing, have departed from our prior practice. For example, in United States v. Gilmore, 599 F.3d 160 (2d Cir.2010), the district court heard the defendant's objections regarding the applicability of a Sentencing Guidelines enhancement, said Thank you very much, and adjourned the proceeding without making a ruling. Id. at 165. On appeal, we agreed with the appellant that the court's failure to rule on his objection to the court's interpretation of the 2004 Guidelines was at least a technical error in violation of Rule 32( i )(3)(B). Gilmore, 599 F.3d at 168. We nonetheless affirmed the district court's judgment because we concluded that this error was harmless, as it is clear that the inapplicability of the enhancements would not have affected the sentence imposed. Id. Not once since the 2002 amendment to Rule 32 have we remanded a case to a district court for it to remedy a technical violation of Rule 32( i )(3). For the reasons stated here, we conclude that our prior practice under Rule 32( i )(3), although we have not explicitly addressed the standard of review, is wholly compatible with a plain-error standard of review for unpreserved challenges. [10] Accordingly, seeing no reason or justification for carving out an exception to Rule 52(b) in this context, we hold that Wagner-Dano waived her Rule 32( i )(3) argument by failing to alert the district court of her procedural objection that the court had not adequately addressed her disagreements with the PSR. We therefore review for plain error.
As the Supreme Court has recently reiterated, when reviewing for plain error, an appellate court may, in its discretion, correct an error not raised at trial only where the appellant demonstrates that (1) there is an error; (2) the error is clear or obvious, rather than subject to reasonable dispute; (3) the error affected the appellant's substantial rights, which in the ordinary case means it affected the outcome of the district court proceedings; and (4) the error seriously affects the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. United States v. Marcus, ___ U.S. ___, 130 S.Ct. 2159, 2164, 176 L.Ed.2d 1012 (2010) (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted). [T]he burden of establishing entitlement to relief for plain error is on the defendant claiming it.... United States v. Dominguez Benitez, 542 U.S. 74, 82, 124 S.Ct. 2333, 159 L.Ed.2d 157 (2004). Even assuming arguendo that the district court in this case erred by insufficiently addressing Wagner-Dano's objections to the PSR, we cannot say that the error is plain. To be plain, an error must be so obvious that the trial judge and prosecutor were derelict in countenancing it, even absent the defendant's timely assistance in detecting it. United States v. Frady, 456 U.S. 152, 163, 102 S.Ct. 1584, 71 L.Ed.2d 816 (1982). That is clearly not the case here. Most of the objections Wagner-Dano raised that were not disposed of by the district court's adoption of the PSRregarding, for instance, the proper way to characterize the Town of Lewis's loss and Wagner-Dano's motives for sending the letter to the BFC board of directors, for selling her assets, and for transferring her house to her parentswere at least arguably not controverted matters within the meaning of Rule 32( i )(3). The Government did not disagree with her assertions and the PSR did not directly conflict with Wagner-Dano's claims. Moreover, to the extent the PSR did contradict Wagner-Dano's factual assertions, the district court's adoption of the PSR's findings satisfied Rule 32( i )(3)'s requirements. Granted, Wagner-Dano's objection that her $50,000 repayment to the Town of Lewis in October 2009 was intended to make restitution rather than to cover up her theft clearly conflicts with the PSR's statement that, [a]ccording to the Town Supervisor, the defendant deposited this money into the Town bank account because... she did not want her theft to be discovered. The court's adoption of the PSR did not resolve this factual dispute, because the PSR itself took no position with regard to it. We cannot conclude on this record, however, that the district court's failure to address this issue prejudiced Wagner-Dano's sentence. And regardless, we do not believe that the alleged failure by the district court to address this objection so seriously affect[ed] the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings that we should exercise our discretion to correct it. Marcus, 130 S.Ct. at 2164.