USA v. Terrell Saunders

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
In the
United States Court of Appeals
For the Eleventh Circuit
____________________
No. 22-14021
Non-Argument Calendar
____________________
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
TERRELL SAUNDERS,
a.k.a. Tavaris Williams,
Defendant-Appellant.
____________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Georgia
D.C. Docket No. 1:03-cr-00282-SDG-RGV-1
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2 Opinion of the Court 22-14021
____________________
Before WILLIAM PRYOR , Chief Judge, and ROSENBAUM and G RANT,
Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Terrell Saunders appeals his sentence of 24 months of im-
prisonment imposed upon revocation of his supervised release.
18 U.S.C. § 3583(e). Saunders argues that the district court abused
its discretion by not considering the history of his underlying crim-
inal proceedings to determine a reasonable sentence. We affirm.
In 2003, Saunders was convicted for possessing with intent
to distribute cocaine base, 21 U.S.C. § 841(a), and possessing a fire-
arm during and in relation to a drug-trafficking crime, 18 U.S.C.
§ 924(c)(1), and sentenced as a career offender to a total 228 months
of imprisonment followed by five years of supervised release. We
affirmed his convictions and sentence, and he unsuccessfully
moved to vacate his convictions. See 28 U.S.C. § 2255.
On May 18, 2020, Saunders began his term of supervised re-
lease. A year later, Saunders was charged with violating conditions
of his supervised release by committing crimes of possessing a fire-
arm and using that firearm to complete an aggravated assault, pos-
sessing a firearm, possessing ammunition, committing a state
crime of drinking in public, and failing to follow the instructions of
his probation officer to turn himself in to local authorities, who had
secured a warrant for his arrest based on a May 2021 shooting inci-
dent. The government later withdrew the aggravated-assault
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22-14021 Opinion of the Court 3
portion of the first charge and the drinking-in-public charge, and
Saunders did not contest the remaining charges.
At the final revocation hearing, the district court determined
that Saunders’ advisory guideline range was 21 to 27 months of im-
prisonment, and his statutory maximum sentence was 60 months.
Saunders argued that a downward variance was warranted based
on his underlying criminal proceedings. His counsel, who had rep-
resented him at trial, stated that she had been ineffective in repre-
senting Saunders then because she was incorrectly advised that
Saunders’ prior robbery conviction had been dismissed, so neither
she nor Saunders realized until after trial that Saunders could be
sentenced as a career offender. And Saunders argued that if he had
been sentenced based on current law, he would not have qualified
as a career offender, and his sentence would have been about half
what he received. He argued that his criminal history category
would be lower, and his guideline range for the revocation sen-
tence would be 12 to 18 months instead of 21 to 27 months. Saun-
ders acknowledged that the district court did “not have to give him
credit for that [additional] time” served, but he urged it to vary
downward and “not forget the history of his” unfair sentence.
The district court found that Saunders committed the viola-
tions and sentenced him to 24 months of imprisonment followed
by two years of supervised release. The district court explained that
although Saunders’ counsel should be commended for her hon-
esty, its job was to adjudicate the supervised release violations and
not to revisit the correctness of Saunders’ convictions and
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4 Opinion of the Court 22-14021
sentences after he had exhausted his appeals. The district court
stated that it understood Saunders was asking it to consider those
underlying issues as part of the totality of the circumstances and to
determine a fair and reasonable sentence, but Saunders had not
come to court with clean hands. The district court explained that
Saunders violated “very basic” conditions of his supervised release
by possessing a firearm and ammunition and not following his pro-
bation officer’s instructions to turn himself in based on an outstand-
ing arrest warrant. The district court stated that regardless of the
specific circumstances of the shooting incident, there was “just no
excuse” for failing to self-report as instructed only one year after his
release from a lengthy term of imprisonment. Saunders objected to
the reasonableness of the sentence and the failure to consider his
unfair term of imprisonment for the underlying convictions.
We review the reasonableness of a sentence imposed upon
revocation of supervised release for abuse of discretion. United
States v. Vandergrift, 754 F.3d 1303, 1307 (11th Cir. 2014). The dis-
trict court imposes a procedurally unreasonable sentence when it
miscalculates the advisory guideline range, treats the Sentencing
Guidelines as mandatory, or fails to consider the statutory sentenc-
ing factors. United States v. Trailer, 827 F.3d 933, 936 (11th Cir.
2016). The district court imposes a substantively unreasonable sen-
tence when it fails to afford consideration to relevant factors that
were due significant weight, gives significant weight to an im-
proper or irrelevant factor, or commits a clear error of judgment in
considering the proper factors. United States v. Taylor, 997 F.3d
1348, 1355 (11th Cir. 2021).
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22-14021 Opinion of the Court 5
The district court did not abuse its discretion in sentencing
Saunders to 24 months of imprisonment for committing multiple
violations of his supervised release. The district court heard and
commended his counsel’s presentation regarding the history of his
underlying criminal proceedings and how developments in the law
since his original sentencing would have resulted in a lower origi-
nal sentence. But it reasonably determined that its job was to adju-
dicate and sentence Saunders for the present supervised release vi-
olations, which he committed only one year into his five-year term
and, as the district court noted, involved basic conditions like obey-
ing his probation officer’s instructions and not possessing a firearm
or ammunition. Although Saunders argues that the district court
failed to consider his legal history and counsel’s ineffectiveness at
trial, the record reflects that the district court understood the scope
of his mitigation arguments, and nothing required it to weigh these
circumstances more heavily than the need to provide just punish-
ment for the instant violations and promote respect for the law. See
18 U.S.C. § 3553(a); United States v. Rosales-Bruno, 789 F.3d 1249,
1254 (11th Cir. 2015).
We AFFIRM Saunders’ sentence.
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