Court Opinion

ID: 9950145
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-13 15:01:25.042556+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:35:52.449101
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 23-10638    Document: 36-1     Date Filed: 03/13/2024   Page: 1 of 8

                                               [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                   In the
                United States Court of Appeals
                        For the Eleventh Circuit

                          ____________________

                                No. 23-10638
                          Non-Argument Calendar
                          ____________________

       UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                      Plaintiﬀ-Appellee,
       versus
       JONATHAN GABRIEL DE LOS SANTOS,

                                                  Defendant-Appellant.

                          ____________________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                     for the Southern District of Florida
                   D.C. Docket No. 1:22-cr-20122-CMA-1
                          ____________________
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       2                         Opinion of the Court                  23-10638

       Before JILL PRYOR, BRASHER and ABUDU, Circuit Judges.
       PER CURIAM:
              Jonathan De Los Santos appeals his 120-month sentence,
       which the district court imposed after he pled guilty to conspiracy
       to distribute a controlled substance. On appeal, De Los Santos ar-
       gues that the district court erred in declining to grant him safety-
       valve relief based on its finding that he failed to provide complete
       and truthful information to the government. After careful review,
       we affirm.
                                             I.
              De Los Santos pled guilty pursuant to a plea agreement to
       one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine, in violation of 18
       U.S.C. § 846. The plea agreement provided that the mandatory
       minimum term of imprisonment for his offense was 10 years. The
       agreement further provided that the government would recom-
       mend that the district court impose a sentence below the statutory
       minimum pursuant to the so-called “safety-valve” provision in Sec-
       tion 5C1.2 of the United States Sentencing Guidelines so long as De
       Los Santos “truthfully provided to the United States all information
       and evidence that [he] has concerning the offense or offenses that
       were part of the same course of conduct or of a common scheme
       or plan.” Doc. 24 at 4 1; see U.S. Sent’g Guidelines Manual § 5C1.2(a)
       (explaining that a sentencing court “shall impose a sentence in

       1 “Doc.” numbers are the district court’s docket entries.
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       23-10638               Opinion of the Court                         3

       accordance with the applicable guidelines without regard to any
       statutory minimum sentence, if the court finds that the defendant
       meets [several] criteria,” including that, “not later than the time of
       the sentencing hearing, the defendant has truthfully provided to
       the Government all information and evidence the defendant has
       concerning the offense or offenses that were part of the same
       course of conduct or of a common scheme or plan”).
              Before sentencing, the government advised De Los Santos’s
       probation officer charged with assembling his presentence investi-
       gation report (PSR) that De Los Santos had not provided a com-
       plete and truthful statement regarding his involvement in and
       knowledge of the conspiracy. As a result, the probation officer
       opined that § 5C1.2 was inapplicable and reported De Los Santos
       as being subject to the 10-year statutory mandatory minimum term
       of imprisonment.
              De Los Santos objected to the determination that he did not
       qualify for safety-valve relief under § 5C1.2. He asserted that he
       would satisfy the truthful information requirement by the time of
       sentencing, as contemplated by the Guidelines. See U.S. Sent’g
       Guidelines Manual § 5C1.2(a)(5) (requiring disclosure of requested
       information “not later than the time of the sentencing hearing”).
              At sentencing, the government asserted that De Los Santos
       had failed to satisfy the truthful-information requirement for
       safety-valve relief and recommended that he be sentenced to the
       10-year mandatory minimum term of imprisonment. De Los San-
       tos responded that he had “given a safety valve statement to the
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       4                       Opinion of the Court                  23-10638

       Government as was requested of him” and had “responded to
       some written questions that were posed to him by the . . . Govern-
       ment.” Doc. 52 at 3. He acknowledged, however, that the govern-
       ment had believed him to be untruthful in his responses. To estab-
       lish his truthfulness, De Los Santos called law enforcement agent
       Marcelino Mariabello to testify about the drug distribution conspir-
       acy and the information De Los Santos gave him about the scheme.
       Mariabello testified that De Los Santos had admitted that as part of
       the conspiracy he had received cocaine from other co-conspirators.
       Mariabello testified that De Los Santos admitted distributing the
       cocaine he had received. And, Mariabello testified, De Los Santos
       had given law enforcement the names of some of the people to
       whom he distributed drugs. But, according to Mariabello, De Los
       Santos had not been truthful and complete in his statements to law
       enforcement. De Los Santos, Mariabello testified, had “failed to ad-
       vise of other sources of supply” of the cocaine he distributed, lied
       about the amount of cocaine he received, provided only a partial
       list of his distribution customers, withheld information about other
       unindicted participants in the scheme, and generally “minimized
       his role” in the offense. Id. at 8, 12, 14. Mariabello testified that he
       knew De Los Santos’s statements were not truthful based on law
       enforcement’s investigation of the sprawling conspiracy, including
       information obtained from several cooperating witnesses and from
       physical evidence like transaction ledgers.
             De Los Santos argued that Mariabello’s testimony supported
       the application of § 5C1.2 notwithstanding the agent’s testimony
       about De Los Santos’s lack of truthful or complete information. He
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       23-10638               Opinion of the Court                         5

       argued that safety-valve relief was “not meant to be coopera-
       tion”—that is, § 5C1.2 contemplated information about “the com-
       mon plan or scheme that is part of this indictment,” not about pos-
       sible crimes further afield from the indicted offense. Id. at 23, 25.
       He further argued that the fact that cooperating witnesses gave
       Mariabello different information did not mean that his statements
       were untruthful. In response, the government argued that all the
       information De Los Santos was asked to provide, and about which
       Mariabello testified, was related to the conspiracy of which De Los
       Santos was a part. The district court agreed with the government
       and ruled that De Los Santos was ineligible for safety-valve relief.
       The court imposed the mandatory minimum of 10 years’ impris-
       onment.
             This is De Los Santos’s appeal.
                                        II.
               When reviewing the denial of safety-valve relief, we review
       for clear error the district court’s factual ﬁndings, and we review de
       novo the court’s legal interpretation of the Guidelines. United States
       v. Johnson, 375 F.3d 1300, 1301 (11th Cir. 2004). Speciﬁcally, we re-
       view only for clear error the court’s determination as to whether a
       defendant has provided complete and truthful information for
       safety-valve purposes. United States v. Cruz, 106 F.3d 1553, 1557
       (11th Cir. 1997). It is the defendant’s burden to demonstrate that he
       has met all the safety-valve factors. Johnson, 375 F.3d at 1302. We
       will not disturb a district court’s ﬁndings under clear error review
       “unless we are left with a deﬁnite and ﬁrm conviction that a
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       6                      Opinion of the Court                 23-10638

       mistake has been committed.” United States v. Cruickshank, 837 F.3d
       1182, 1192 (11th Cir. 2016) (internal quotation marks omitted).
                                        III.
              On appeal, De Los Santos argues that the district court
       clearly erred in determining that he had not been entirely truthful,
       contending that the information he provided law enforcement was
       simply “deemed to be untrue.” Appellant’s Br. at 16. Acknowledg-
       ing, however, that the court had some evidence upon which to base
       its ﬁnding, he further argues that the court based that ﬁnding solely
       on information law enforcement obtained from cooperating wit-
       nesses. Finally, De Los Santos argues that the district court required
       more of him—full cooperation—than § 5C1.2 contemplates. As we
       explain, we disagree.
              In an oﬀense like the one De Los Santos committed, for
       which a statute provides a mandatory minimum sentence, a de-
       fendant is eligible for a sentence less than the minimum if he meets
       several requirements. U.S. Sent’g Guidelines Manual § 5C1.2. As
       relevant to this appeal, the requirements for safety-valve relief in-
       clude that, “not later than the time of the sentencing hearing, the
       defendant has truthfully provided to the Government all infor-
       mation and evidence the defendant has concerning the oﬀense or
       oﬀenses that were part of the same course of conduct or of a com-
       mon scheme or plan.” Id. § 5C1.2(a)(5); see 18 U.S.C. § 3553(f )(5)
       (same). We have referred to this requirement as “a ‘tell-all’ provi-
       sion: to meet its requirements, the defendant has an aﬃrmative re-
       sponsibility to truthfully disclose to the government all
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       23-10638               Opinion of the Court                        7

       information and evidence that he has about the oﬀense and all rel-
       evant conduct.” Johnson, 375 F.3d at 1302 (internal quotation marks
       omitted).
               The district court did not clearly err in ﬁnding that De Los
       Santos had not been entirely truthful and had provided incomplete
       information to law enforcement. True, in determining whether a
       defendant has been truthful the district court may not simply defer
       to the government but must independently determine the truthful-
       ness of the information the defendant has provided. United States v.
       Espinosa, 172 F.3d 795, 797 (11th Cir. 1999). But, contrary to De Los
       Santos’s assertion, the district court did not merely deem his infor-
       mation to be untrue. Rather, the court expressly relied upon the
       testimony of Mariabello, a law enforcement agent directly involved
       in the investigation of this case.
               And Mariabello’s testimony about De Los Santos’s truthful-
       ness and forthcomingness was not based solely on information co-
       operating witnesses provided. Mariabello testiﬁed that law enforce-
       ment also obtained ledgers describing transactions between co-
       conspirators and seized large quantities of cocaine during searches
       relating to the conspiracy, both of which contributed to law en-
       forcement’s understanding of the scope of the conspiracy. Un-
       doubtedly, Mariabello’s opinion about the reliability De Los San-
       tos’s information was based heavily—though not entirely—on the
       accounts of cooperating witnesses. But even accepting for argu-
       ment’s sake that cooperating witnesses may have had incentives to
       be untruthful about De Los Santos’s involvement in the conspiracy,
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       8                      Opinion of the Court                23-10638

       here the record suggests they were truthful. As Mariabello testiﬁed,
       the cooperating witnesses were interviewed separately from one
       another, and their accounts nonetheless were consistent as to De
       Los Santos’s role in the conspiracy. For these reasons, we are not
       left with a deﬁnite and ﬁrm conviction that the district court made
       a mistake in its factual ﬁndings.
               Lastly, we address De Los Santos’s argument that the district
       court misconstrued the safety-valve provision to require him to co-
       operate in law enforcement’s investigation to the extent that it
       reached beyond the scope of the indictment. We have said that
       where the defendant’s charges include a drug conspiracy, a com-
       plete statement under the safety-valve provision may include infor-
       mation relevant to the involvement of others in the chain of distri-
       bution. Cruz, 106 F.3d at 1557. This chain-of-distribution infor-
       mation was the subject of the government’s inquiries with De Los
       Santos. The information the government sought pertained to the
       scope of the conspiracy, including De Los Santos’s and others’ in-
       volvement in it. The government sought a broad range of infor-
       mation because the conspiracy was extensive, not because the gov-
       ernment was reaching beyond the scope of the conspiracy charged
       in the indictment. We therefore reject De Los Santos’s argument.
                For the foregoing reasons, we aﬃrm De Los Santos’s sen-
       tence.
                AFFIRMED.