Court Opinion

ID: 9911834
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-12-20 21:01:34.115343+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:54:57.841659
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 23-10190    Document: 32-1     Date Filed: 12/20/2023   Page: 1 of 7

                                                  [DO NOT PUBLISH]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

                          ____________________

                                No. 23-10190
                          Non-Argument Calendar
                          ____________________

       UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                      Plaintiﬀ-Appellee,
       versus
       DELON JOSEPH ADAMS,

                                                  Defendant-Appellant.

                          ____________________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Middle District of Florida
                 D.C. Docket No. 8:20-cr-00326-VMC-MRM-1
                          ____________________
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       2                     Opinion of the Court                 23-10190

       Before NEWSOM, ANDERSON, and HULL, Circuit Judges
       PER CURIAM:
             In 2020, defendant Delon Adams robbed four different cell
       phone stores on four different days. During each robbery, Adams
       brandished a firearm at store employees.
              A jury convicted Adams of eleven offenses, including four
       counts of Hobbs Act robbery and four counts (Counts 2, 4, 6, and
       8) of brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence, in violation
       of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(ii). Because Adams had a prior § 924(c)
       firearm conviction in 2002, the mandatory minimum for each
       § 924(c) conviction was 25 years. See 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(C)(i).
               At sentencing, the district court, over Adams’s objection,
       concluded that § 924(c) required that Adams’s four 25-year
       sentences be served consecutive to each other and to any other
       sentence. As a consequence, the district court imposed 121-month
       prison terms on Counts 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11 and a 6-month term on
       Count 10, all to be served concurrently, followed by four
       consecutive 300-month (25 year) terms on Counts 2, 4, 6, and 8, for
       a total sentence of 110 years and one month.
             On appeal, Adams does not challenge his eleven convictions.
       Adams also does not challenge his sentences on Counts 1, 3, 5, 7, 9,
       10 and 11. Adams argues only that his 25-year consecutive
       sentences on Counts 2, 4, 6, and 8 are procedurally unreasonable.
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       23-10190                   Opinion of the Court                                3

             Specifically, Adams contends that the district court
       procedurally erred when it determined § 924(c) mandated
       consecutive sentences and that the text of § 924(c) permits partially
       concurrent sentences. And, because the statutory mandatory
       minimum sentence for his § 924(c) offenses governs his Guidelines
       sentence, Adams claims the district court also miscalculated his
       advisory guidelines range. After review, we find no merit to
       Adams’s arguments and affirm his consecutive § 924(c) sentences
       on Counts 2, 4, 6, and 8.
                             I. GENERAL PRINCIPLES
               When reviewing a sentence for reasonableness, we ﬁrst must
       ensure the district court committed no signiﬁcant procedural error,
       such as failing to properly calculate the advisory guidelines range.
       Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 51 (2007). “We normally review
       the procedural reasonableness of a sentence under an abuse-of-
       discretion standard.” United States v. Waters, 937 F.3d 1344, 1358
       (11th Cir. 2019). 1 We review questions of statutory interpretation
       de novo. United States v. Segarra, 582 F.3d 1269, 1271 (11th Cir. 2009).
             Under § 924(c), a defendant who previously was convicted
       of a § 924(c) ﬁrearm oﬀense must “be sentenced to a term of

       1 The parties dispute whether Adams’s objection to his consecutive sentences

       in the district court—that the four § 924(c) offenses were part of one criminal
       episode—preserved the issue he now raises on appeal and thus whether our
       review is for plain error. We need not resolve this question because the district
       court did not commit any procedural error, and therefore Adams cannot
       prevail under either standard of review.
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       4                      Opinion of the Court                23-10190

       imprisonment of not less than 25 years.” 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(C)(i).
       Additionally, “no term of imprisonment imposed on a person
       under [§ 924(c)] shall run concurrently with any other term of
       imprisonment imposed on the person . . . .” Id. § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii).
       In turn, under the Sentencing Guidelines, a § 924(c) defendant’s
       “guideline sentence is the minimum term of imprisonment
       required by statute.” U.S.S.G. § 2K2.4(b).
              This Court has held that the plain language of
       § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii) requires sentences for multiple § 924(c) ﬁrearm
       oﬀenses to be run consecutively to each other. See United States v.
       Wright, 33 F.3d 1349, 1350 (11th Cir. 1994). In Wright, the defendant
       was convicted of four counts of armed bank robbery and four
       counts of using a ﬁrearm during a crime of violence, in violation
       of § 924(c)(1). Id. at 1349. The sentencing court imposed
       concurrent 70-month sentences for Wright’s bank robbery
       convictions and four separate 240-month terms for his § 924(c)
       ﬁrearm convictions, to run consecutively to each other and to his
       concurrent 70-month sentences, for a total sentence of 1030
       months, or about 86 years. Id. at 1349.
              On appeal, Wright argued that § 924(c) required his
       sentences to run consecutively to his bank robbery sentences but
       did not require them to run consecutively to each other. Id.
       at 1349-50. Wright speciﬁcally argued that the word “other” in
       § 924(c)(1) meant “that the term of imprisonment cannot run
       concurrently with any term of imprisonment ‘other than’ a term
       of imprisonment under section 924(c).” Id. at 1350. This Court
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       23-10190               Opinion of the Court                         5

       rejected Wright’s argument, stating, “The plain language of the
       statute expressly states that a term of imprisonment imposed under
       section 924(c) cannot run concurrently with any other term of
       imprisonment, period. No exceptions are provided.” Id. (emphasis
       in original). This Court aﬃrmed Wright’s total sentence
       “[b]ecause the plain language of [§ 924(c)] requires consecutive
       sentences.” Id. at 1350-51 (emphasis added).
                  II. ADAMS’S CONSECUTIVE SENTENCES
              Here, Adams argues that the text of § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii) does
       not require § 924(c) sentences to run consecutively and its
       prohibition against concurrent sentences does not extend to
       partially concurrent sentences. Adams’s argument that the plain
       language of § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii) does not require consecutive
       sentences is foreclosed by our Wright precedent. Although the
       Court in Wright was focused on the meaning of the word “other”
       in § 924(c) to determine whether the statute required multiple
       sentences under § 924(c) to run consecutively to each other, our
       Court ultimately concluded that “the plain language of the statute
       requires consecutive sentences.” Id. at 1350. The Court’s
       reasoning and holding in Wright indicate that § 924(c)’s bar on
       imposing concurrent § 924(c) sentences also means those sentences
       must run consecutively. See id.
              Adams cites Dean v. United States, 581 U.S. 62 (2017), but Dean
       has no bearing on the consecutive-sentence issue raised here. In
       Dean, the defendant was sentenced for two § 924(c) convictions and
       two robbery convictions that also served as predicates for the
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       6                     Opinion of the Court                 23-10190

       § 924(c) counts. 581 U.S. at 65. The issue in Dean was “whether, in
       calculating the sentence for the predicate [robbery] oﬀense, a judge
       must ignore the fact that the defendant will serve the mandatory
       minimums imposed under § 924(c).” Id. at 64 (emphasis added).
       The Supreme Court concluded that nothing in §924(c) or 18 U.S.C.
       § 3553(a) prevented the sentencing court from considering the
       lengthy mandatory minimum sentence required by § 924(c) “when
       calculating a just sentence for the predicate count.” Id. at 67-71
       (emphasis added).
              In short, Dean was concerned with the district court’s
       discretion in imposing sentences for robbery counts other than the
       § 924(c) ﬁrearm counts. Nothing in Dean suggests a district court
       can impose partially concurrent sentences for multiple § 924(c)
       convictions. To the contrary, the Supreme Court acknowledged in
       Dean that the defendant faced a 30-year mandatory minimum
       sentence for his two § 924(c) counts—ﬁve years for the ﬁrst count
       and 25 years for the second count—because “[a] sentence imposed
       under § 924(c) must run consecutively to ‘any other term of
       imprisonment imposed on the person.’” Id. at 65 (quoting 18
       U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii)). The Supreme Court also agreed with the
       government that § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii)’s “requirement of consecutive
       sentences removes the discretion to run sentences concurrently
       that district courts exercise under [18 U.S.C. §] 3584.” Id. at 70.
              As to Counts 2, 4, 6, and 8, Adams has not shown procedural
       error in the district court’s calculation of his Guidelines sentence
       under U.S.S.G. § 2K2.4(b) or in its imposition of four 25-year
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       23-10190               Opinion of the Court                         7

       sentences, to be served consecutively to each other and to his
       sentences on Counts 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 10 and 11, as required by 18 U.S.C.
       § 924(c)(1)(D)(ii). Accordingly, Adams’s sentences on Counts 2, 4,
       6, and 8 are not procedurally unreasonable.
              AFFIRMED.