Court Opinion

ID: 9951534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-18 14:01:02.716794+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:41:27.001248
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-14020    Document: 52-1      Date Filed: 03/18/2024   Page: 1 of 11

                                                    [DO NOT PUBLISH]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

                           ____________________

                                 No. 22-14020
                           Non-Argument Calendar
                           ____________________

        UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                       Plaintiﬀ-Appellee,
        versus
        VOLTAIRE PETER PIERRE,

                                                    Defendant-Appellant.

                           ____________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                     for the Northern District of Georgia
                     D.C. Docket No. 4:19-cr-00052-SDG-1
                           ____________________
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        2                         Opinion of the Court                     22-14020

        Before ROSENBAUM, JILL PRYOR, and BRANCH, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
                Voltaire Pierre appeals his convictions and 97-month total
        sentence, stemming from a plea agreement he entered into with
        the government. He argues for the first time on appeal that the
        government breached the plea agreement by requesting or endors-
        ing an upward adjustment for abuse of a position of trust, see
        U.S.S.G. § 3B1.3, which was not among the agreed-upon provisions
        in the plea agreement. After careful review, we conclude that
        Pierre has not met his burden of showing that any breach was suf-
        ficiently clear or obvious to warrant relief on plain error review, so
        we affirm his convictions and sentence. We vacate and remand for
        the limited purpose of correcting a clerical error in the judgment.
                                              I.
               From June 2018 to October 2018, while working as a correc-
        tional officer at Hays State Prison, Pierre smuggled drugs and con-
        traband into the prison and distributed these things to inmates in
        exchange for cash. After his arrest, he was charged in a two-count
        information with conspiring to possess with intent to distribute
        methamphetamine and cocaine, see 21 U.S.C. § 846, and possessing
        with intent to distribute methamphetamine on premises where
        children are present or reside, see 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1), 860a. 1

        1 Packages containing drugs, including cocaine base and methamphetamine,

        were delivered to and kept at Pierre’s residence, where a minor child resided.
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        22-14020               Opinion of the Court                        3

               Pierre pled guilty to both counts under a negotiated plea
        agreement with the government. In the agreement, the parties
        agreed to certain guideline and sentencing issues, including that the
        applicable offense guidelines were U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(a)(5) and (c),
        and that Pierre should receive upward adjustments under §
        2D1.1(b)(4) and (14)(B). The government also agreed to recom-
        mend offense level reductions for acceptance of responsibility, §
        3E1.1, and the safety valve, § 2D1.1(b)(18), and to “recommend
        that [Pierre] be sentenced at the low end of the adjusted guideline
        range.” No specific offense levels or guideline ranges were set forth
        in the agreement.
               The parties also agreed “not to request any sentence outside
        of the Guidelines range nor any Guidelines adjustment for any rea-
        son that is not set forth in this Plea Agreement,” and that the “rec-
        ommended sentence set forth in this Plea Agreement is reasonable
        under the factors set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).” Nonetheless,
        they acknowledged that the recommendations and guideline cal-
        culations in the plea agreement were “not binding on the Court,”
        and that the court’s decision not to follow the agreement “will not
        constitute grounds to withdraw [the] guilty plea or to claim a
        breach of [the] Plea Agreement.” Finally, the agreement contained
        a waiver of Pierre’s appellate rights in most circumstances.
              The district court accepted Pierre’s guilty plea at a hearing
        in October 2019. During the plea colloquy, Pierre confirmed his
        understanding that the district court was not bound by the plea
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        4                      Opinion of the Court                 22-14020

        agreement with regard to the calculation of the guideline range or
        the choice of sentence.
               A probation officer prepared a presentence investigation re-
        port (“PSR”) to aid the district court at sentencing. Notably, the
        PSR’s guideline calculations included a two-level upward adjust-
        ment for abusing a position of trust under § 3B1.3. That recom-
        mended enhancement was absent from the plea agreements. Ac-
        cording to the PSR, Pierre abused a position of trust as a correc-
        tional officer “by smuggling drugs into the prison where he was
        entrusted with the care and security of the inmates housed
        therein.” Based in part on that adjustment, the PSR calculated a
        total offense level of 33. Pierre had no criminal history, so the rec-
        ommended guideline range was 135 to 168 months of imprison-
        ment.
               Neither party objected to the PSR. In accordance with the
        plea agreement, the government sought a reduction of five levels
        from the total offense level calculated in the PSR—that is, from
        level 33 to level 28. In an accompanying sentencing memorandum,
        the government summarized the PSR’s guideline calculations, in-
        cluding the § 3B1.3 abuse-of-trust adjustment, and it requested a
        sentence at the low end of the modified guideline range of 78 to 97
        months.
               At sentencing, the district court adopted the government’s
        five-level-reduction recommendation. It also adopted the PSR’s
        factual statements and guideline calculations without objection.
        Thus, the court adopted the PSR’s application of a two-level
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        22-14020               Opinion of the Court                        5

        increase for abuse of a position of public trust, ultimately arriving
        at a guideline range of 78 to 97 months.
               The district court then invited argument on recommenda-
        tions for a reasonable sentence. The government argued for a low-
        end 78-month sentence, asserting that the “state trusted Mr. Pierre
        to do the right thing and maintain security,” but he instead “chose
        to smuggle drugs” to incarcerated gang members because he was
        “greedy,” conduct which merited “serious punishment.” Defense
        counsel spoke at length about mitigating factors, including Pierre’s
        background and family and the financial stressors he faced in
        providing for three young children. Pierre allocuted, and the court
        heard testimony from Pierre’s pastor.
               The district court sentenced Pierre to a total of 97 months in
        prison, at the high end of the guideline range. The court discussed
        its consideration of the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors, including the
        seriousness of the offense conduct, the need for general deterrence,
        which it emphasized, and Pierre’s personal history.
               Pierre appeals, arguing for the first time that the govern-
        ment breached the plea agreement by endorsing the two-level
        abuse-of-trust enhancement, U.S.S.G. § 3B1.3, which was not listed
        in the plea agreement. Despite the appeal waiver in Pierre’s plea
        agreement, “an appeal waiver does not bar a defendant’s claim that
        the government breached the plea agreement.” United States v.
        Hunter, 835 F.3d 1320, 1324 (11th Cir. 2016).
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        6                     Opinion of the Court                 22-14020

                                        II.
               Ordinarily, we review de novo the question whether the gov-
        ernment has breached a plea agreement. United States v. Malone, 51
        F.4th 1311, 1318 (11th Cir. 2022). But where “as here, the defend-
        ant did not object before the district court that the government
        breached a plea agreement, we review on direct appeal for plain
        error.” Id. Under plain-error review, we may correct a plain error
        that affected the defendant’s substantial rights and the fairness or
        integrity of the judicial proceedings. Id. at 1319.
               “For an error to be considered plain, the error must be clear
        or obvious, rather than subject to reasonable dispute.” United
        States v. Sosa, 782 F.3d 630, 637 (11th Cir. 2015) (quotation marks
        omitted). It follows that not all breaches of a plea agreement “will
        be clear or obvious, such as when the drafting of an agreement
        leaves the scope of the government’s commitments open to
        doubt.” Id. (quotation marks omitted).
                                        III.
               The government “breaches a plea agreement when it fails to
        perform the promises on which the plea was based.” United States
        v. Hunter, 835 F.3d 1320, 1324 (11th Cir. 2016). We judge the gov-
        ernment’s actions “according to the defendant’s reasonable under-
        standing at the time he entered his plea.” Id. (quotation marks
        omitted). “We apply an objective standard to decide whether the
        government’s actions are inconsistent with the defendant’s under-
        standing of the plea agreement, rather than reading the agreement
        in a hyper-technical or rigidly literal manner. Id. (cleaned up).
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        22-14020                 Opinion of the Court                              7

               In exchange for Pierre’s promise to plead guilty to both
        charges in his indictment, the government agreed to certain guide-
        line application decisions and promised “not to request any sen-
        tence outside of the Guidelines range nor any Guidelines adjust-
        ment for any reason that is not set forth in this Plea Agreement.”
        This language, in Pierre’s view, “amounted to a promise that the
        government would not seek, endorse, or argue for Guideline ad-
        justments other than those specifically listed in the plea agree-
        ment.” Pierre claims that the government violated this agreement
        by “endors[ing],” “recommend[ing,]” or “advocat[ing] for an up-
        ward adjustment (under § 3B1.3) that was not in the plea agree-
        ment.”
                We disagree. The government’s actions were not plainly in-
        consistent with its promises in the plea agreement, such that we
        can grant relief under plain-error review. See Sosa, 782 F.3d at 638
        (“[I]t was not ‘clear under current law’ that the government pa-
        tently breached the plea agreements . . . or that any such breach
        should have been ‘obvious’ to the district court.”). The PSR in-
        cluded the § 3B1.3 abuse-of-trust adjustment without any request
        or advocacy from the government. That adjustment was based on
        facts to which Pierre admitted in pleading guilty—that is, that he
        used his position as a correctional officer to smuggle drugs into the
        prison. 2 And it was applied by the district court, who was not

        2 The PSR offers no reason to believe that the adjustment was based on other,

        allegedly objectionable facts that the government supplied to the probation
        office, as Pierre contends.
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        8                      Opinion of the Court                22-14020

        bound by the plea agreement, without any objection or argument
        from the parties.
               The record does not support Pierre’s contention that the
        government requested, sought, endorsed, or argued for the § 3B1.3
        adjustment in its sentencing memorandum or at sentencing. True,
        the government noted the PSR’s guideline calculations in its mem-
        orandum, which it described as “applicable to” Pierre, and it failed
        to object or point out, either in the memorandum or at sentencing,
        that the § 3B1.3 adjustment was inconsistent with the plea agree-
        ment. But Pierre does not assert that the plea agreement obligated
        the government to object to a new adjustment. Nor does he claim
        that the government breached the agreement by merely “remain-
        ing passive” or failing to object. So these instances of the govern-
        ment’s having “remain[ed] passive” or it failure to object to the PSR
        are not sufficient, without more, to establish a clear breach of the
        plea agreement.
              Pierre also highlights the government’s argument for a sen-
        tence at the low end of the guideline range that the PSR recom-
        mended and the district court adopted at sentencing—that is, the
        range that included the § 3B1.3 adjustment. He casts the govern-
        ment’s argument under the § 3553(a) factors as an adoption or en-
        dorsement of the § 3B1.3 adjustment, actions inconsistent with its
        promise not to request any guideline adjustment not in the plea
        agreement.
               But the government, in its arguments for a reasonable sen-
        tence, did not advocate a position that would have had any effect
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        22-14020               Opinion of the Court                          9

        on Pierre’s guideline range or that would have “requir[ed] a longer
        sentence than it had agreed to recommend.” United States v. Taylor,
        77 F.3d 368, 371 (11th Cir. 1996). Rather, the government cited
        Pierre’s abuse of trust as a reason for imposing a sentence at the
        low end of the adjusted guideline range, consistent with its “Spe-
        cific Sentence Recommendation” promise in the plea agreement to
        “recommend that [Pierre] be sentenced at the low end of the ad-
        justed guideline range.”
                While Pierre believes that the government “should have rec-
        ommended 63 months, the low end of the Guideline range without
        the § 3B1.3 adjustment,” he fails to explain why the plain terms of the
        plea agreement demanded that recommendation. Pierre does not
        contend that he reasonably understood the Recommendation
        promise as requiring a recommendation for a sentence at the low
        end of the guideline range contemplated by the plea agreement, as
        opposed to the range calculated by the district court at sentencing.
        Instead, his argument is that the government violated an unambig-
        uous requirement “to recommend no other Guideline adjustments
        other than those listed in the agreement.” For the reasons already
        explained, though, it is not clear or obvious that the government
        acted inconsistently with that promise.
               None of the cases on which Pierre relies establishes plain er-
        ror in this case. In Boatner, Taylor, and Malone, we held that a
        breach occurred where the government took a position, in re-
        sponse to a defendant’s PSR objection, that was directly at odds
        with a promise in the plea agreement. In United States v. Boatner,
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        10                         Opinion of the Court                        22-14020

        the government stipulated that the defendant was responsible for
        a certain drug quantity, but it then “attempted to bolster” the PSR’s
        higher drug quantity by declaring that its later investigations sup-
        ported the PSR. 966 F.2d 1575, 1579 (11th Cir. 1992). Likewise, in
        Taylor, the government promised to recommend a sentence of ten
        years but then supported the PSR’s position on relevant conduct,
        which required a sentence of at least 151 months under the then-
        mandatory guidelines. 77 F.3d at 370–71. And in Malone, the gov-
        ernment promised to recommend a reduction for acceptance of re-
        sponsibility but then took the opposite position at sentencing. 51
        F.4th at 1317, 1320–21.
               Here, in contrast, Pierre did not object to the PSR, and so
        the government was not asked to provide, nor did it offer, any ar-
        gument or evidence about the application of the § 3B1.3 adjust-
        ment. Had Pierre’s counsel objected to the PSR, this would, in sev-
        eral respects, be a different case. But on the current record, we
        cannot say that any breach of the plea agreement by the govern-
        ment was “clear or obvious, rather than subject to reasonable dis-
        pute.” Sosa, 782 F.3d at 637.
               For these reasons, we conclude that Pierre has not shown
        that any error was sufficiently “plain” to warrant relief on plain-
        error review. Accordingly, we do not consider his remaining argu-
        ments relating to whether the error affected his substantial rights
        or the fairness and integrity of the proceedings. 3

        3 As part of his argument on these points, Pierre contends that the district court

        made several other sentencing errors, including focusing on general
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        22-14020                  Opinion of the Court                              11

               Finally, although we affirm Pierre’s convictions, we vacate
        and remand for the limited purpose of allowing the district court
        to correct a clerical error in the judgment. See United States v. Mas-
        sey, 443 F.3d 814, 822 (11th Cir. 2006) (“We may sua sponte raise the
        issue of clerical errors in the judgment and remand with instruc-
        tions that the district court correct the errors.”). The judgment lists
        the nature of the offense under 21 U.S.C. § 860a as “DISTRIBUTE
        IN OR NEAR SCHOOLS/CONTROLLED SUBSTANCE,” but
        that description pertains to 21 U.S.C. § 860(a), rather than § 860a,
        the statute of conviction. Accordingly, we remand with instruc-
        tions to correct the judgment’s erroneous description of the nature
        of the offense.
               AFFIRMED in part; VACATED and REMANDED in part.

        deterrence to the exclusion of other pertinent § 3553(a) factors. Perhaps due
        to the appeal waiver in his plea agreement, though, Pierre does not raise these
        arguments as independent grounds for vacating the sentence, so we do not
        address them as such.