Court Opinion

ID: 9377617
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-03-08 16:00:51.089514+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:17:15.242265
License: Public Domain

21-2619-cr
United States v. Jackson
                                 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                    FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

                                        SUMMARY ORDER
Rulings by summary order do not have precedential effect. Citation to a summary order
filed on or after January 1, 2007, is permitted and is governed by Federal Rule of Appellate
Procedure 32.1 and this Court’s Local Rule 32.1.1. When citing a summary order in a
document filed with this Court, a party must cite either the Federal Appendix or an
electronic database (with the notation “summary order”). A party citing a summary order
must serve a copy of it on any party not represented by counsel.

       At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, held at
the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of New York,
on the 8th day of March, two thousand twenty-three.

PRESENT:             JOSÉ A. CABRANES,
                     REENA RAGGI,
                     JOSEPH F. BIANCO,
                                   Circuit Judge.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

                            Appellee,                      21-2619-cr

                            v.

DEJON JACKSON, AKA WINGY,

                            Defendant-Appellant.

FOR APPELLEE:                                           Daniel C. Richenthal, Jennifer N. Ong,
                                                        Assistant United States Attorneys, for
                                                        Damian Williams, United States Attorney
                                                        for the Southern District of New York,
                                                        New York, NY.

FOR DEFENDANT-APPELLANT:                                James M. Branden, Law Office of James
                                                        M. Branden, Staten Island, NY.

     Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of
New York (Cathy Seibel, Judge).

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       UPON DUE CONSIDERATION WHEREOF, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED,
ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that the judgment of the District Court entered on October 12,
2021, be and hereby is AFFIRMED.

        Defendant-Appellant Dejon Jackson appeals from a judgment of conviction, in which he
was sentenced principally to a 42-month term of imprisonment for being a felon in possession of a
firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). He argues that the District Court’s sentence was
substantively unreasonable. 1 We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts, the
procedural history of the case, and the issues on appeal.

        We employ the “deferential abuse-of-discretion standard” to review a sentence for
substantive reasonableness, United States v. Singh, 877 F.3d 107, 115 (2d Cir. 2017) (quoting Gall v.
United States, 552 U.S. 38, 41 (2007)), and will vacate only in “exceptional cases where the trial court’s
decision ‘cannot be located within the range of permissible decisions,’” United States v. Cavera, 550
F.3d 180, 189 (2d Cir. 2008) (en banc) (quoting United States v. Rigas, 490 F.3d 208, 238 (2d Cir.
2007)), such as when the sentence is “‘shockingly high, shockingly low, or otherwise[’] . . . would
‘damage the administration of justice,’” United States v. Broxmeyer, 699 F.3d 265, 289 (2d Cir. 2012)
(quoting Rigas, 583 F.3d at 123).

         On appeal, Jackson contends that his 42-month sentence—9 months above the upper end
of the advisory Guidelines range—is substantively unreasonable on several grounds:
(1) “the . . . offense . . . was garden variety with no exacerbating circumstances,” Appellant Br. 12;
(2) his “personal history, . . .among federal offenders, was undistinguished,” id.; (3) “a term of
imprisonment above the minimum but still within the guidelines could have accommodated” the
District Court’s concern about Jackson’s “custodial infractions and supervision violations,” id. at 13;
(4) “it appears that the only reason the court sentenced Mr. Jackson above the guidelines was
because of its mere belief . . . that the firearm guideline (USSG §2K2.1) itself was too lenient,” id. at
13–14.

          Upon review of the record, we cannot conclude that Jackson’s sentence is “‘shockingly
high . . . or otherwise[’] . . . would ‘damage the administration of justice.’” Broxmeyer, 699 F.3d at 289
(quoting Rigas, 583 F.3d at 123). The District Court appropriately considered the full range of
§ 3553(a) factors, including circumstances such as Jackson’s difficult childhood, App’x 81–82,
Jackson’s remorse, id. at 84, and his harder-than-usual COVID-19 conditions of confinement, id. at
85, as well as the need to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities, id. At the same time, Judge
Seibel noted that Jackson’s offense was “incredibly dangerous to the community,” id. at 78, that he

    1
      Insofar as Jackson seeks to appeal a consecutive 12-month term of imprisonment imposed at
the same time for violating the terms of his supervised release on a previous § 922(g) conviction
based on the same underlying conduct, we lack jurisdiction to review that challenge because Jackson
failed to notice that judgment for review by this court. See Fed. R. App. P. 3(c)(1)(B) (“The notice of
appeal must: . . . designate the judgment—or the appealable order—from which the appeal is
taken.”); see also United States v. Caltabiano, 871 F.3d 210, 215 (2d Cir. 2017) (“[Fed. R. App. P.
3(c)(1)(B)] is ‘jurisdictional in nature’ and not waivable.” (quoting Smith v. Barry, 502 U.S. 244, 248
(1992))).

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had an “awful record,” id. at 79, and that “[t]he sentences the defendant’s gotten so far have not
deterred him,” id. at 84, therefore clearly considering “the need for the sentence imposed to afford
adequate deterrence to criminal conduct” and “to protect the public from further crimes of the
defendant,” § 3553(a)(2)(B), (C). Because the relative weight afforded to aggravating and mitigating
factors is “firmly committed” to a district court’s discretion and our role is limited to assessing if “a
factor ‘can bear the weight assigned it under the totality of the circumstances in the case,’” Broxmeyer,
699 F.3d at 289 (quoting Cavera, 550 F.3d at 191), we reject Jackson’s argument that his sentence was
substantively unreasonable.

         Moreover, contrary to Jackson’s suggestion on appeal, “a district court may vary from the
Guidelines range based solely on a policy disagreement with the Guidelines, even where that
disagreement applies to a wide class of offenders or offenses.” Cavera, 550 F.3d at 191 (emphasis
added) (citing Kimbrough v. United States, 552 U.S. 85, 108–10 (2007)). Thus, the District Court did
not abuse its wide discretion in basing its above-Guidelines sentence in part on such a disagreement,
particularly given its careful analysis of the § 3553(a) factors. See Gall, 552 U.S. at 51 (“When
conducting [a substantive reasonableness] review, the court will, of course, take into account the
totality of the circumstances.”).

                                           CONCLUSION

       We have reviewed the remaining arguments raised by Jackson on appeal and find them to be
without merit. For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the judgment of the District Court.

                                                        FOR THE COURT:
                                                        Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk

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