Court Opinion

ID: 996155
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2013-07-04 00:47:00.797099+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:39:14.871353
License: Public Domain

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.                                                                    No. 97-4967

CURTIS LEE STYLES,
Defendant-Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of North Carolina, at Winston-Salem.
N. Carlton Tilley, Jr., District Judge.
(CR-90-277-WS)

Submitted: May 19, 1998

Decided: September 2, 1998

Before WILKINS and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges, and HALL,
Senior Circuit Judge.

_________________________________________________________________

Affirmed and remanded by unpublished per curiam opinion.

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COUNSEL

Thomas N. Cochran, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Greensboro,
North Carolina, for Appellant. Walter C. Holton, Jr., United States
Attorney, Paul A. Weinman, Assistant United States Attorney,
Michael Chandler, Third Year Law Student, Winston-Salem, North
Carolina, for Appellee.

_________________________________________________________________
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. See
Local Rule 36(c).

_________________________________________________________________

OPINION

PER CURIAM:

Curtis Styles pled guilty in 1991 to conspiring to possess with
intent to distribute cocaine and heroin in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 846
(1994), and was sentenced to a term of seventy months imprisonment
and five years supervised release. He began serving his term of super-
vised release in 1996 and was subsequently convicted in North Caro-
lina state court of possessing with intent to sell and deliver cocaine.
Because the new criminal conduct was a violation of the conditions
of Styles' supervised release, the district court revoked his supervised
release and sentenced him to a term of fifty-one months imprisonment
consecutive to his state sentence. Styles appeals claiming that the
court's acceptance of the sentencing guidelines recommendation,
when the court was under no obligation to do so, constitutes an abdi-
cation of discretion. We disagree.

At the revocation hearing, Styles asserted that the court had broad
discretion in fashioning a sentence because Styles' original conviction
occurred in 1990 when no revocation table existed. 1 Styles also
requested that his sentence be concurrent with the state sentence he
was currently serving.2 The government opposed a concurrent sen-
tence. The court considered Styles' argument, but the court found the
sentence recommended in the guidelines revocation table to be appro-
priate and reasonable.3 Our review of the record indicates that the
court was aware that it did not have to sentence Styles within the
_________________________________________________________________
1 See United States v. Morrow, 925 F.2d 779, 782 (4th Cir. 1991) (not-
ing that a defendant is to be sentenced under guideline in effect on date
of sentencing).
2 See United States v. Davis, 53 F.3d 638, 641 n.9 (4th Cir. 1995) (stat-
ing that Guidelines policy statements are not binding in revocation pro-
ceedings).
3 See U.S. SENTENCING GUIDELINES MANUAL, § 7B1.4, p.5. (1997).

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guideline range of the revocation table or impose a consecutive sen-
tence; however, it found such a sentence appropriate and sentenced
Styles accordingly. Thus, the district court exercised its discretion in
sentencing Styles to a consecutive fifty-one month sentence of
incarceration.4

Finally, Styles appeals a discrepancy between the district court's
oral sentence given in his presence and its written order of judgment.
When there is a conflict between a written order of sentence and an
oral sentence, the latter is controlling, and the proper remedy is for
the district court to correct its written judgment so that it conforms to
its oral pronouncement.5 Because the written order is incorrect, we
must remand the case to the district court so that it can correct its
written order to reflect the oral sentence.

We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal conten-
tions are adequately presented in the materials before the court and
argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED AND REMANDED
_________________________________________________________________
4 See 18 U.S.C. § 3584(a) (1994); U.S.S.G. § 7B1.3(f), p.s.
5 See United States v. Morse, 344 F.2d 27, 30 (4th Cir. 1965); Rakes
v. United States, 309 F.2d 686, 687-88 (4th Cir. 1962).

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