Court Opinion

ID: 9410678
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-07-24 05:00:45.396982+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:59.337560
License: Public Domain

In the

    United States Court of Appeals
                 For the Seventh Circuit
                     ____________________
No. 22-2146
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                  Plaintiff-Appellee,
                                 v.

SAMUEL RUBEN CARAWAY,
                                              Defendant-Appellant.
                     ____________________

         Appeal from the United States District Court for the
                     Southern District of Illinois.
    No. 3:16-cr-30024-NJR-9 — Nancy J. Rosenstengel, Chief Judge.
                     ____________________

    ARGUED FEBRUARY 23, 2023 — DECIDED JULY 18, 2023
                ____________________

   Before SYKES, Chief Judge, and ROVNER and LEE, Circuit
Judges.
   ROVNER, Circuit Judge. Samuel Ruben Caraway was a key
player in a major cocaine trafficking operation. In 2016, DEA
agents arrested eight of the couriers in the operation, all of
whom were indicted, and all of whom identified Caraway as
the supplier of the cocaine and leader of the operation. By
April 2017, the government communicated to Caraway’s at-
torney (who also represented another co-defendant), that
2                                                  No. 22-2146

Caraway would soon be indicted. The next month, Caraway
voluntarily traveled from his home in Houston, Texas to the
Southern District of Illinois to participate in a proffer inter-
view. Due to his cooperation at the time, Caraway was not
arrested and was allowed to return to Houston. In September
2017, the government learned that Caraway committed a vio-
lent robbery in Houston and notified Caraway’s attorney by
telephone and email that prosecutors intended to indict him
imminently and that he was required to turn himself in to law
enforcement no later than December 15, 2017. Caraway never
responded. On January 4, 2018, the government charged Car-
away with one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine. The
United States Marshals Service began searching for Caraway
approximately eleven months later by surveilling the places
he had lived and frequented, interviewing family members,
and through regular checks of databases for records of com-
mercial transactions. On July 15, 2021, a Texas state trooper
stopped Caraway for speeding, and after initially supplying
a fake name and denying having identification, Caraway
eventually provided his real name and was arrested.
    In the face of the superseding indictment, Caraway
pleaded guilty, stipulating that he was responsible for distrib-
uting between 50 and 150 kilograms of cocaine from August
1, 2014, through December 3, 2015. The probation office’s
presentence investigation report determined that Caraway
was responsible for, very conservatively, another 125 kilo-
grams of cocaine that could be considered as relevant con-
duct. The presentence investigation report recommended
sentencing enhancements for being the leader and organizer
of the conspiracy, and most importantly for our purposes, it
advised the judge that Caraway’s offense level should be en-
hanced by two points for obstruction of justice, based on the
No. 22-2146                                                  3

fact that he had evaded arrest for approximately 42 months
following his indictment. The report also recommended a
two-level reduction in his offense level for acceptance of re-
sponsibility.
   The government argued that Caraway should not receive
any adjustment for acceptance of responsibility, as he had en-
gaged in willful obstruction of justice by evading arrest. On
the flip side of that coin, Caraway objected to the enhance-
ment for obstruction of justice, arguing that the fact that the
government could not find him was not evidence that he was
evading arrest.
    After overruling all of the enhancement objections, the
district court properly calculated Caraway’s sentence range
under the United States Sentencing Guidelines to be 292 to
365 months, noting that had it ruled that Caraway did not ob-
struct justice by evading arrest, the Guidelines range would
have been 235 to 293 months. After discussing the factors re-
quired under 18 U.S.C. § 3553, the district court judge noted
that she would have imposed the same sentence even if she
had erred in her rulings on the objections to the enhance-
ments. She then imposed a sentence of 360 months, explaining
that it was the appropriate sentence given the extensive na-
ture of the drug trafficking organization, and anything less
would not meet the goals of 18 U.S.C. § 3553.
    Caraway appeals only the application of the enhancement
for obstruction of justice. Caraway argues that the govern-
ment had no evidence that he evaded arrest as nothing in the
record indicated that he was ever informed by his former law-
yer that he was about to be indicted or had to turn himself in,
he had not yet appeared in court, he had not fled the Houston
area where he had lived all of his life, and he had not changed
4                                                     No. 22-2146

his appearance or altered any identification papers. Accord-
ing to Caraway, the government simply had failed to find
him, which was not, in and of itself, evidence of a calculated
attempt to evade arrest. The government, for its part, argues
that Caraway evaded arrest by purposefully cutting off con-
tact with his attorney and family, avoiding the places he
would usually visit, and avoiding all credit card and other
traceable electronic transactions. The parties also debated
whether his provision of fake names to the state trooper who
pulled him over for speeding was “panicked, instinctive
flight,” which does not warrant an evasion enhancement un-
der Seventh Circuit case law, or was part and parcel of his
larger calculated evasion. See United States v. Porter 145 F.3d
897, 903 (7th Cir. 1998).
     We need not decide whether Caraway’s action amounted
to an obstruction of justice, however, because the district
court stated unequivocally that “[t]his would be my sentence
even if my rulings on the objections are wrong and the guide-
line range would be something else.” R. 548 at 107. Conse-
quently, “whether or not the enhancement should have ap-
plied, the district court’s detailed explanation makes a re-
mand pointless.” United States v. Salgado, 917 F.3d 966, 970
(7th Cir. 2019). Where a district court unambiguously states
that it would have imposed the same sentence regardless of
any potential error, the error is harmless. United States v. Tate,
822 F.3d 370, 377 (7th Cir. 2016). As we explained, district
courts can, in essence, “inoculate their sentences against re-
versal by giving us the information we need to determine, on
appeal, whether an error was harmless without resort to a re-
mand.” United States v. Asbury, 27 F.4th 576, 581 (7th Cir. 2022)
(citing United States v. Abbas, 560 F.3d 660, 667 (7th Cir. 2009)).
Having said that, this Court disfavors conclusory comments
No. 22-2146                                                      5

that would have the effect of nullifying the Guidelines with a
simple assertion that any error would make no difference to
the choice of sentence. Id.; United States v. Baker, 56 F.4th 1128,
1132 (7th Cir. 2023) (noting the court’s reluctance to treat
Guideline errors as harmless when the sentencing judge has
offered only a conclusory comment); United States v. Ingram,
40 F.4th 791, 796 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 143 S. Ct. 341 (2022)
(“[A] bare, boilerplate assertion … will not ordinarily suffice
to hold a Guidelines error harmless.”). Consequently, in order
to be effective, an inoculating statement must meet the follow-
ing two requirements:
       First, the inoculating statement must be “de-
       tailed.” Abbas, 560 F.3d at 667. By that, we mean
       that the judge must give specific (though not
       necessarily lengthy) attention to the contested
       guideline issue in her explanation. A generic
       disclaimer of all possible errors will not do. Sec-
       ond, the inoculating statement must explain the
       “parallel result.” Id. By that, we mean that it
       must be “tied to the decisions the court made”
       and account for why the potential error would
       not “aﬀect the ultimate outcome.” United States
       v. Bravo, 26 F.4th 387, 397 (7th Cir. 2022), cert. de-
       nied sub nom. Luczak v. United States, No. 21-8190,
       2023 WL 4278456 (June 30, 2023).
Id. at 581–82. At the same time, a sentencing judge “need not
belabor the obvious.” Baker, 56 F.4th at 1132 (quoting United
States v. Sainz, 827 F.3d 602, 608 (7th Cir. 2016)).
6                                                     No. 22-2146

    In this case, the district court judge stated:
       I think anything more than 360 months would
       be greater than necessary. And anything less,
       even if the Court’s calculation of the guideline
       range is incorrect, would not meet the sentenc-
       ing goals of 18 United States Code Section 3553.
       So I want to be very clear. This would be my
       sentence even if my rulings on the objections are
       wrong and the guideline range would be some-
       thing else. I believe 360 months on a drug crime
       is the most that I have ever imposed, and that’s
       only a time or two. And certainly given the ex-
       tensive nature of this drug traﬃcking organiza-
       tion, that is appropriate.
R. 548 at 107. Clearly the judge understood that she was im-
posing a long sentence, but she was explicit that she had cal-
culated Caraway’s sentence after considering the nature of
the drug trafficking operation as a whole and the sentencing
goals of section 3553. The judge had properly calculated the
“parallel result,” just moments earlier, noting that had she up-
held Caraway’s enhancement objection, the sentence would
have been 235 to 293 months. R. 548 at 103. Ideally the judge
would have specifically named the contested enhancement in
her inoculating statement, stating, “this would be my sen-
tence even if my ruling on the obstruction of justice enhancement
was wrong and the guideline range was 235 to 293 months.”
The district court should then explain, in this specific context,
exactly which § 3553 factors (or other considerations) warrant
the sentence imposed even without the enhancement.
    Although it would have been helpful to have the explana-
tions more closely linked to the possibility of error, the district
No. 22-2146                                                  7

court’s inoculating statement did reference the extensive na-
ture of the operation and the goals of § 3553, thus linking the
inoculating statement back to the judge’s immediately pre-
ceding discussion which elucidated her reasons for the 360-
month sentence. In the breath just before the inoculating par-
agraph, the district court judge explained:
       I think a sentence near the high end of the
       guideline range is needed to reflect the serious-
       ness of this oﬀense, promote respect for the law,
       provide just punishment, and aﬀord specific de-
       terrence to Mr. Caraway. I think this is particu-
       larly true when considering the culpability of
       Mr. Caraway, compared to coconspirators and
       the sentences that they received. A sentence
       near the high end of the guideline range like-
       wise aﬀords general deterrence. The public
       needs to see that this type of drug traﬃcking ac-
       tivity is taken seriously and punished signifi-
       cantly as evidence[d] by Congress alone man-
       dating a sentence between 10 years and life im-
       prisonment.
R. 548 at 106–07.
   The district court further explained that Caraway’s un-
charged but relevant conduct, including the involvement of,
conservatively, 125 kilograms of cocaine with a street value of
$4 million was “the most relevant conduct that I have seen in
my eight years on the bench, certainly both with respect to the
drug weight and the money that is involved.” Id. at 105. The
court expressed further concern that “Mr. Caraway was
charged with a violent armed robbery of another drug dealer,
which occurred only months after he was told he would be
8                                                  No. 22-2146

indicted … .” Id. at 106. Her explanation of his lengthy sen-
tence also included references to his sophistication as a leader
of the operation, and the “most culpable of the codefendants
and others involved in the case.” Id. at 105 (cleaned up). She
also considered unrepresented criminal history and his lack
of productive legitimate employment. Id. at 104. Finally, the
judge considered the fact that any mitigating childhood
trauma would have been far in the past for a man of 47, and
hope for rehabilitation at his age was slimmer than it would
be for a younger man. Id. at 104–05.
    In short, the district court gave specific attention to the
contested enhancement. The judge ruled on Caraway’s objec-
tion to the obstruction enhancement, and explained her rea-
sons for applying it. And she also explained the “parallel re-
sult”— properly calculating the Guidelines range without the
enhancement and then tying the imposed sentence to the de-
cisions the court made about the severity of the crime, Cara-
way’s role in it, relevant conduct, and the need to reduce re-
cidivism, protect the public from crime, and afford specific
deterrence. See Asbury, 27 F. 4th at 581–82. Reading through
the transcript at sentencing, we have no doubt that were we
to remand this case to the district court, the court would im-
pose the same sentence. The judgment and sentence are thus
AFFIRMED.