Court Opinion

ID: 9914297
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-12-29 22:00:47.832543+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:11:04.916970
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-12534    Document: 35-1     Date Filed: 12/29/2023   Page: 1 of 3

                                                  [DO NOT PUBLISH]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

                          ____________________

                                No. 22-12534
                          Non-Argument Calendar
                          ____________________

       UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                      Plaintiﬀ-Appellee,
       versus
       LAHANS FITZGERALD COOPER,

                                                  Defendant-Appellant.

                          ____________________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                    for the Northern District of Alabama
                 D.C. Docket No. 2:20-cr-00367-AMM-SGC-1
                          ____________________
USCA11 Case: 22-12534     Document: 35-1     Date Filed: 12/29/2023    Page: 2 of 3

       2                     Opinion of the Court                 22-12534

       Before JORDAN, ROSENBAUM, and LAGOA, Circuit Judges.
       PER CURIAM:
               Lahans Cooper appeals his total sentence of 180 months’ im-
       prisonment for drug trafficking and gun crimes. Cooper argues
       that the district court erred in failing to pronounce at sentencing
       certain discretionary conditions of his supervised release that were
       included in the written judgment. The government agrees and
       states that remand is warranted for a limited resentencing.
              Generally, challenges to the conditions of a defendant’s su-
       pervised release raised for the first time on appeal are subject to
       plain-error review. United States v. Zinn, 321 F.3d 1084, 1087 (11th
       Cir. 2003). But we review de novo where the defendant “had no
       opportunity to object at sentencing to the discretionary conditions
       of supervised release because they were included for the first time
       in the written judgment.” United States v. Rodriguez, 75 F.4th 1231,
       1246 n.5 (11th Cir. 2023).
             Section 3583 of Title 18 of the U.S. Code imposes several
       mandatory conditions of supervised release and provides that the
       court may order further conditions. 18 U.S.C. § 3583(d). The Sen-
       tencing Guidelines provide for thirteen standard conditions that
       are generally recommended, as well as several special conditions.
       U.S.S.G. § 5D1.3(c), (d).
              In Rodriguez, we concluded that “due process principles gen-
       erally require district courts to pronounce at the sentencing hear-
       ing discretionary, but not mandatory, conditions of supervised
USCA11 Case: 22-12534      Document: 35-1      Date Filed: 12/29/2023     Page: 3 of 3

       22-12534               Opinion of the Court                          3

       release.” 75 F.4th at 1247. A defendant must be given “an oppor-
       tunity to be heard on the discretionary condition[s].” Id. at 1248.
       Courts may satisfy this requirement by referencing a written list of
       supervised-release conditions. Id. at 1247. But a court violates due
       process if it imposes a discretionary condition that was never iden-
       tified at the sentencing hearing, whether by expressly referencing
       an applicable “administrative order or otherwise indicat[ing] that
       the court was adopting conditions of supervised release beyond
       those mandated by statute.” Id. at 1248–49. When a court errs in
       this way, we will “vacate the conditions and remand for resentenc-
       ing,” so that the court “may, after giving [the defendant] an oppor-
       tunity to be heard, reconsider whether to impose each of the dis-
       cretionary conditions.” Id. at 1249.
              Here, the parties agree that the district court erred by failing
       to identify or pronounce at sentencing discretionary conditions of
       supervised release that were imposed in the written judgment. Ac-
       cording to the government, the written judgment included at least
       sixteen discretionary conditions of supervised release that were not
       identified in the presentence investigation report or at sentencing.
       Because the record shows that Cooper lacked a meaningful oppor-
       tunity to be heard on those discretionary conditions, we vacate the
       conditions and remand for resentencing in accordance with Rodri-
       guez. See id. at 1249–50.
              VACATED AND REMANDED.