United States v. Goklu

24-767
United States v. Goklu
United States Court of Appeals
for the Second Circuit
August Term 2025
Argued: February 9, 2026
Decided: April 7, 2026
No. 24-767
UNITED S TATES OF AMERICA,
Appellee,
v.
MUSTAFA GOKLU, AKA MUSTANGY ,
Defendant-Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of New York
No. 19-cr-00386
Pamela K. Chen, Judge.
Before: PARK and MERRIAM, Circuit Judges, and
MATSUMOTO, District Judge.*
* Judge Kiyo A. Matsumoto, of the United States District Court for
the Eastern District of New York, sitting by designation.

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A jury convicted Mustafa Goklu of money laundering and
operating an unlicensed money transmitting business based on a
series of bitcoin-for-cash exchanges with an undercover officer.
Goklu raises three challenges to his conviction: (1) The district court
violated his right to an impartial jury by empaneling a juror who
expressed a positive view toward law enforcement and a negative
view toward financial crimes; (2) The evidence was insufficient to
convict him of operating an unlicensed money transmitting business
because a payment of cash for bitcoin is not “money transmitting”;
and (3) The district court violated Rule 30 of the Federal Rules of
Criminal Procedure by instructing the jury after Goklu’s closing
argument that exchanging bitcoin for cash can constitute
“transferring funds.” We reject all three challenges. The district court
acted within its broad discretion to empanel a juror who said he
would try his best to consider the evidence impartially. Moreover,
Goklu’s exchanges of bitcoin for cash constituted “money
transmitting,” so the district court did not abuse its discretion in
giving this legally correct jury instruction.
Goklu also challenges his sentence. But he has finished serving
his term of imprisonment, and he raises no challenge to his term or
conditions of supervised release, so his sentencing challenges are
moot. Accordingly, we DISMISS Goklu’s appeal as moot in part and
otherwise AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.
MATTHEW B RISSENDEN, Matthew W. Brissenden, P.C., Garden
City, NY, for Defendant-Appellant.
FRANCISCO J. N AVARRO, Assistant United States Attorney
(Dylan A. Stern, Assistant United States Attorney, on the brief), for

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Joseph Nocella, Jr., United States Attorney for the Eastern District of
New York, Brooklyn, NY, for Appellee.
PARK, Circuit Judge:
A jury convicted Mustafa Goklu of money laundering and
operating an unlicensed money transmitting business based on a
series of bitcoin-for-cash exchanges with an undercover officer.
Goklu raises three challenges to his conviction: (1) The district court
violated his right to an impartial jury by empaneling a juror who
expressed a positive view toward law enforcement and a negative
view toward financial crimes; (2) The evidence was insufficient to
convict him of operating an unlicensed money transmitting business
because a payment of cash for bitcoin is not “money transmitting”;
and (3) The district court violated Rule 30 of the Federal Rules of
Criminal Procedure by instructing the jury after Goklu’s closing
argument that exchanging bitcoin for cash can constitute
“transferring funds.” We reject all three challenges. The district court
acted within its broad discretion to empanel a juror who said he
would try his best to consider the evidence impartially. Moreover,
Goklu’s exchanges of bitcoin for cash constituted “money
transmitting,” so the district court did not abuse its discretion in
giving this legally correct jury instruction.
Goklu also challenges his sentence. But he has finished serving
his term of imprisonment, and he raises no challenge to his term or
conditions of supervised release, so his sentencing challenges are
moot. Accordingly, we dismiss Goklu’s appeal as moot in part and
otherwise affirm the judgment of the district court.

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I. BACKGROUND
A. Factual Background
In 2018 and 2019, Goklu ran a business charging commission
fees to exchange bitcoin for cash. He advertised his business on
localbitcoins.com, a website connecting bitcoin buyers and sellers. In
July 2018, the DEA began investigating Goklu after seeing his ads,
which offered to exchange significantly larger amounts of bitcoin than
others in the same area.
Over the next eight months, undercover DEA agents arranged
several exchanges with Goklu. Special Agent Patrick O’Kain
messaged Goklu on Signal—an encrypted chat application for
smartphones—to set up a meeting to exchange O’Kain’s bitcoin for
cash. They met in Manhattan and got into Goklu’s car, where Goklu
told the agent to “close the door, man, the cops, we’re not drug
dealers. We’re buying Bitcoin.” App’x at 354. O’Kain understood
that to mean that Goklu “was concerned about being identified by the
cops.” Id. O’Kain transferred about $5,000 worth of bitcoin from his
cryptocurrency wallet to Goklu’s, and Goklu then handed $4,620 in
cash over to O’Kain, reflecting an 8% commission.
Agent O’Kain met Goklu repeatedly in the following months.
Each time, O’Kain transferred bitcoin to Goklu, who exchanged the
value of the bitcoin in cash, minus his commission. O’Kain initially
told Goklu that the bitcoin came from an online business, but during
their fourth meeting, O’Kain told him that it was from selling drugs.
Goklu continued meeting with O’Kain to exchange bitcoin for cash.
Although Goklu’s transactions with O’Kain involved the agent
transferring his bitcoin for cash, Goklu also conducted some
transactions in which he sold his bitcoin to customers instead. Goklu

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obtained some of the cash that he exchanged with O’Kain from selling
bitcoin to another customer.
Between August 2018 and January 2019, Goklu and O’Kain met
six times, exchanging roughly $130,000 worth of bitcoin for cash. In
April 2019, Goklu agreed to meet with O’Kain for a seventh time to
exchange about $50,000 worth of bitcoin. But before they made the
exchange, the monitoring DEA team arrested Goklu.
B. Procedural History
In October 2020, the government filed a two-count superseding
indictment against Goklu. Count One charged him with money
laundering, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1956, and Count Two charged
him with operating an unlicensed money transmitting business, in
violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1960. Goklu entered pleas of not guilty and
proceeded to trial.
1. Voir Dire
During voir dire, the district court asked prospective jurors if
they had any positive or negative feelings toward law enforcement.
After excusing multiple jurors for cause, the court held a sidebar with
a prospective juror (“Juror 30”).
Juror 30 explained that he works for New York City Parks, so
he interacts with the Parks Police on a daily basis and has a “positive
outlook towards police.” App’x at 120. The court asked if he could
be fair and objective despite his positive feelings about law
enforcement. After saying he was not sure, Juror 30 agreed to “try
[his] best.” Id. at 121. When asked again whether he could evaluate
law enforcement officer testimony impartially, he said that he could
“[i]f it’s presented in a neutral manner.” Id. at 122.

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Juror 30 also expressed some reluctance to serve on a jury in a
case involving financial crimes because he has a friend who had been
affected by Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The court said that “[t]his
is obviously not a Madoff scheme” and asked if he could put that out
of his mind, to which Juror 30 said, “I believe so,” and again said that
he would “try [his] best.” Id. at 122-23.
Goklu moved to dismiss Juror 30 for cause. But the district
court denied the motion because the juror “said he would try his best
and seems sincere about that.” Id. at 123. So it concluded that “he can
be objective at the end of the day.” Id. Juror 30 was subsequently
empaneled and served on the jury.
2. Jury Instructions
At the charge conference, the district court adopted the
government’s instruction defining a “money transmitting business”:
A “money transmitting business” is a business which, for
a fee, accepts currency, funds, or value that substitutes
for currency for transfer within or outside the United
States. I instruct you that Bitcoin qualifies as “funds”
under the statute. The term “money transmitting”
includes transferring funds on behalf of the public by any
and all means including but not limited to transfers
within this country or to locations abroad by wire, check,
draft, facsimile, or courier.
App’x at 707; see id. at 570-75.
In his closing argument, defense counsel emphasized that “[a]
money transmitting business is a business which for a fee accepts
currency for transfer,” and asked the jury to conclude “that the
evidence does not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that [Goklu
accepted] currency for transfer.” Id. at 646. After this argument, the
district court called for a sidebar before the government’s rebuttal.

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The court understood Goklu to be arguing, for the first time, that a
defendant does not run a “money transmitting business” unless he
accepts money for transfer to a third party. Over Goklu’s objection, the
district court added an additional instruction that “exchanging
Bitcoin for U.S. currency can qualify as a transfer within the meaning
of the statute.” Id. at 655.
The jury found Goklu guilty on both counts.
3. Sentencing
At sentencing, the parties disputed which transactions the
district court should use for purposes of determining the base offense
level under the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines. Goklu argued that only
the transactions that took place after O’Kain told Goklu he got bitcoin
from selling drugs involved “laundered funds” for purposes of
U.S.S.C. § 2S1.1(a)(2). But the district court accepted the
government’s argument that the value of the laundered funds
included all transactions between Goklu and O’Kain, including the
transactions before this disclosure. After calculating the Guidelines
range to be 41 to 51 months, the district court varied downward and
sentenced Goklu principally to 16 months of imprisonment, to be
followed by two years of supervised release.
This appeal followed.
II. DISCUSSION
A. Impartial Jury
The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right to trial “by an
impartial jury.” U.S. Const. amend. VI. “An impartial jury is one
capable and willing to decide the case solely on the evidence before
it, or one comprising people who will conscientiously apply the law
and find the facts.” United States v. Perez, 387 F.3d 201, 204 (2d Cir.

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2004) (cleaned up). When conducting voir dire, the district court
must, “at a minimum, ‘remove prospective jurors who will not be able
impartially to follow the court’s instructions and evaluate the
evidence.’” United States v. Kelly, 128 F.4th 387, 421 (2d Cir. 2025)
(quoting Rosales-Lopez v. United States, 451 U.S. 182, 188 (1981)). A
juror should be removed if the district court concludes that he has
“actual bias,” that is, “the existence of a state of mind that leads to an
inference that the person will not act with entire impartiality.” United
States v. Torres, 128 F.3d 38, 43 (2d Cir. 1997). A district court can find
actual bias if “the juror admits partiality” or if “the judge finds actual
partiality based upon the juror’s voir dire answers.” Id.
In assessing impartiality, the trial court makes “determinations
of demeanor and credibility that are peculiarly within a trial judge’s
province.” Id. at 44. An “appellate court cannot easily second-guess
the conclusions of the decisionmaker who heard and observed the
[juror].” Id. (cleaned up). So we reverse a decision to empanel a juror
“only if there is clear abuse of the district court’s discretion.” United
States v. Mensah, 110 F.4th 510, 524 (2d Cir. 2024) (quotation marks
omitted). “There are few aspects of a jury trial where we would be
less inclined to disturb a trial judge’s exercise of discretion, absent
clear abuse, than in ruling on challenges for cause in the empanel[]ing
of a jury.” United States v. Ploof, 464 F.2d 116, 118 n.4 (2d Cir. 1972).
Goklu argues that we should vacate his conviction because
Juror 30 expressed doubts about his ability to be impartial and failed
to state unequivocally that he could put aside those doubts. To be
sure, Juror 30 initially said that he “honestly” did not know if he could
be impartial because of his positive feelings about the Park Police and
his negative feelings about financial crimes. App’x at 121. But after
the district court reminded him of his oath, Juror 30 twice said that he
would try his best. After their colloquy, the district court concluded

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that Juror 30 could be impartial because “he said he would try his best
and seems sincere about that.” Id. at 123. The district court’s
assessment of the juror’s sincerity is precisely the type of credibility
determination to which we must defer absent a clear abuse of
discretion. See Torres, 128 F.3d at 44.
Goklu points to our decision in United States v. Nelson, 277 F.3d
164 (2d Cir. 2002), which he claims supports his argument that
probable impartiality “is not good enough.” Appellant’s Br. at 26
(quoting Nelson, 277 F.3d at 202). But the facts of Nelson are very
different. In Nelson, the district court empaneled a juror who knew
that defendant Nelson had been prosecuted and acquitted in state
court for the same alleged conduct underlying the federal charges and
explicitly “voiced his dissatisfaction with the State proceedings that
resulted in defendant Nelson’s acquittal.” Nelson, 277 F.3d at 201. The
juror in Nelson “never even asserted that he could probably be
impartial.” Id. at 203. And there, “the potential bias [did] not
represent only a general state of mind but also a predisposition to
believe in the guilt of one of the very defendants who [was] being
tried.” Id. at 202. We thus concluded that the juror should have been
excused. By contrast, we have found no abuse of discretion when a
district court empanels a juror who promises to do his best, as Juror
30 did here. Ploof, 464 F.2d at 118.
We thus conclude that the district court did not abuse its
discretion in determining that Juror 30 “can be objective at the end of
the day” and in declining to strike him for cause. App’x at 123.
B. Unlicensed Money Transmitting Business
1. Legal Standards
Goklu argues that the evidence was insufficient to convict him
of operating an unlicensed money transmitting business because his

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conduct—paying cash for bitcoin in a face-to-face transaction—did
not involve transmitting funds to another person or location. He
frames this as a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence, but the
thrust of his argument is that his conduct was not “money
transmitting” under 18 U.S.C. § 1960. “Whether [Goklu’s] challenge
is construed as a question of statutory interpretation or an attack on
the sufficiency of the evidence, we review de novo.” United States v.
Ho, 984 F.3d 191, 204 (2d Cir. 2020).
2. Statutory Framework
18 U.S.C. § 1960(a) provides that “[w]hoever knowingly
conducts, controls, manages, supervises, directs, or owns all or part
of an unlicensed money transmitting business, shall be fined in
accordance with this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or
both.” The statute defines “money transmitting” to include
“transferring funds on behalf of the public by any and all means.” Id.
§ 1960(b)(2). As relevant here, an “unlicensed money transmitting
business” includes a money transmitting business that “fails to
comply with the money transmitting business registration
requirements” under 31 U.S.C. § 5330 or its implementing
regulations. Id. § 1960(b)(1)(B). Goklu was not federally registered to
operate a money transmitting business. He argues, however, that his
conduct was not “transferring funds” and did not trigger the federal
licensing requirements.1 We thus turn to § 5330 and its implementing
regulations for the relevant registration requirements.
Section 5330 requires any person who owns or controls a
“money transmitting business” to register that business with the
Secretary of the Treasury. 31 U.S.C. § 5330(a)(1-2). This statute
1 Goklu was also charged with operating a money transmitting
business that failed to comply with state licensing requirements, but he
addresses only the federal licensing prong on appeal.

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defines “money transmitting business” to include a business that
provides “check cashing, currency exchange, or money transmitting
or remittance services.” Id. § 5330(d)(1)(A).2 At the time of Goklu’s
conduct, “money transmitting services” included “accepting
currency or funds denominated in the currency of any country and
transmitting the currency or funds, or the value of the currency or
funds, by any means.” Id. § 5330(d)(2).
The government may establish a violation of § 1960 by proving
that a defendant failed to comply with the registration requirement
under § 5330 itself, or by proving that a defendant failed to comply
with the registration requirement in the regulations implementing
§ 5330. See 18 U.S.C. § 1960(b)(1)(B). The Financial Crimes
Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) of the U.S. Treasury Department
has promulgated regulations requiring a “money services business”
to register with it. 31 C.F.R. § 1022.380. This registration requirement
applies to a “money transmitter”—i.e., a “person that provides money
transmission services”—which include the “acceptance of currency,
funds, or other value that substitutes for currency from one person
and the transmission of currency, funds, or other value that
substitutes for currency to another location or person by any means.”
Id. § 1010.100(ff)(5)(i)(A). Although we do not simply import this
definition into § 1960’s definition of “money transmitting,” see United
States v. Mazza-Alaluf, 621 F.3d 205, 210 (2d Cir. 2010), we conclude
that a business providing “money transmission services” as defined
2 Under this statute, a business is a money transmitting business only
if it provides the services described above and is required to file reports
under 31 U.S.C. § 5313. Id. § 5330(d)(1)(A-B). The parties do not raise
§ 5313’s reporting requirements in this appeal, and Goklu’s lawyer said it
was “fine” for the district court to define “money transmitting business”
without reference to § 5313. App’x at 574.

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by the regulations is “transferring funds” and is thus engaged in
“money transmitting” within the meaning of § 1960.
In light of the foregoing, if the evidence was sufficient to show
that Goklu was a money transmitter within the meaning of § 5330’s
implementing regulations, then it was sufficient to satisfy § 1960. Our
inquiry thus turns on whether the evidence showed that Goklu’s
business involved the acceptance of currency, funds, or value from
one person and the transmission of currency, funds, or other value to
another location or person by any means. 31 C.F.R.
§ 1010.100(ff)(5)(i)(A).
3. Application
Under this statutory scheme, a business exchanging virtual
currency for real currency through the purchase or sale of bitcoin
provides money transmission services and is thus a money
transmitting business subject to FinCEN’s registration requirements.3
We base this conclusion on the ordinary meaning of the statutory and
regulatory text, which accords with FinCEN’s interpretive guidance.
To start, bitcoin qualifies as “funds.” Bitcoin is a decentralized
digital currency that can be used for peer-to-peer transactions. It is
stored in a digital wallet and can be transferred to another wallet
without any bank intermediaries. “[B]itcoin can be and is used as a
currency to make sales and purchases and, therefore, nicely fits the
definition of ‘funds.’” United States v. Freeman, 147 F.4th 1, 13 (1st Cir.
2025) (collecting cases). Goklu does not contend otherwise.
Goklu argues that he did not provide money transmission
services because his transactions with Agent O’Kain involved no
transfer or transmittal “to another location or person by any means.”
31 C.F.R. § 1010.100(ff)(5)(i)(A). We disagree.
3 Goklu does not claim to fall under any of the six exemptions from
“money transmitter” in 31 C.F.R. § 1010.100(ff)(5)(ii).

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In each transaction, Agent O’Kain transferred bitcoin to Goklu,
who handed O’Kain cash representing the value of that bitcoin minus
a commission. See supra at 4-5. Goklu accepted funds (bitcoin) from
O’Kain and transmitted currency to him representing the value of the
funds. And both ends of the transaction involved the movement of
funds to another location. When O’Kain transferred bitcoin to Goklu,
he electronically moved funds from his bitcoin wallet to Goklu’s. See
United States v. Gilboe, 684 F.2d 235, 238 (2d Cir. 1982) (recognizing
that often, “[e]lectronic signals . . . are the means by which funds are
transported” (interpreting 18 U.S.C. § 2314)). Goklu then transmitted
the remaining value of O’Kain’s funds back through a physical
transfer of cash. Even though this was not transmission to “another
person,” it was transmission to “another location”: at the start of the
transaction, O’Kain’s funds were in his cryptocurrency wallet, and
afterwards, he held cash. Goklu’s business thus transferred funds,
and satisfies the regulatory definition of a money transmitter. See 31
C.F.R. § 1010.100(ff)(5)(i)(A).
Goklu’s argument that an in-person transfer of cash is not a
transfer or transmission of funds is inconsistent with the statutory
and regulatory text, and in any event misreads the record.
First, physically moving cash is a “means” of transferring or
transmitting funds to another location. Nothing in the statutes or
regulations exempts the physical transfer of cash from the definition
of money transmission. On the contrary, each authority expressly
includes transfers or transmissions of funds by “any means.” 31
U.S.C § 5330(d)(2); 31 C.F.R. § 1010.100(ff)(5); see also 18 U.S.C.
§ 1960(b)(2) (defining money transmitting to include transferring
funds “by any and all means”). And the statutes confirm that a
physical transfer of cash is a “means” by which funds may be
transmitted; for example, § 1960 lists “courier” as one way a business
can engage in money transmitting and § 5330 describes a business
that provides “currency exchange” services as a money transmitting

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business. Couriers and many currency exchanges physically hand
currency to a customer or recipient.
Second, in any event, the jury also heard evidence that Goklu
conducted trades in which he accepted cash and electronically
transmitted bitcoin. In particular, Goklu obtained the cash he
transferred to O’Kain from different customers who bought bitcoin.
Goklu’s profile on localbitcoins.com also shows that he sold bitcoin
for cash. The government argued in closing that “at least some of the
defendant’s customers crossed state lines to meet the defendant to
exchange that Bitcoin for cash or cash for Bitcoin.” App’x at 628. And
Goklu never argued otherwise. Instead, he admitted that he had
customers who “want[ed] to exchange cash and Bitcoin one way or
the other.” Id. at 648. So even if only the outgoing transmission of
bitcoin constitutes transmission to another location, the jury heard
evidence that Goklu’s business involved both incoming and outgoing
transmissions of bitcoin.
Finally, our conclusion that Goklu operated a “money
transmitting business” is consistent with FinCEN’s guidance.
FinCEN treats “a person engaged as a business in the exchange of
virtual currency for real currency, funds, or other virtual currency” as
an “exchanger.” U.S. Dep’t of Treasury, FinCEN, FIN–2013–G001,
Guidance: Application of FinCEN’s Regulations to Persons
Administering, Exchanging, or Using Virtual Currencies 2 (Mar. 18,
2013) [https://perma.cc/4YSK-JJ37]. Goklu, whose business was
exchanging bitcoin and cash, was thus an exchanger. And an
exchanger like Goklu “that buys or sells convertible virtual currency
for any reason is a money transmitter under FinCEN’s regulations,
unless a limitation to or exemption from the definition applies to the
person.” Id. at 3. FinCEN’s guidance thus aligns with the natural
reading of the statutory and regulatory text, and confirms that
Goklu’s conduct constituted money transmission.
Goklu’s business of exchanging bitcoin and cash falls squarely
within the statutory and regulatory definitions of a money

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transmitting business.4 By accepting bitcoin and transmitting cash,
he engaged in the transfer of funds “by any . . . means,” as
contemplated by 18 U.S.C. § 1960. And his conduct was “money
transmission,” which subjected him to FinCEN’s registration
requirements. See 31 C.F.R. § 1010.100(ff)(5). Accordingly, the
evidence was sufficient to sustain his conviction under § 1960.
C. Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 30
Goklu next argues that the district court violated Federal Rule
of Criminal Procedure 30 by instructing the jury, after his closing
argument, that “[e]xchanging Bitcoin for U.S. currency can qualify as
a transfer.” App’x at 707. Rule 30 requires that the court inform the
parties of its ruling on their proposed jury instructions before closing
argument. Fed. R. Crim. P. 30(b). But “[i]f a supplemental charge is
legally correct, the district court enjoys broad discretion in
determining how, and under what circumstances, that charge will be
given.” United States v. Civelli, 883 F.2d 191, 195 (2d Cir. 1989).
In light of our conclusion above that exchanging bitcoin for U.S.
currency can qualify as transferring funds, the district court did not
abuse its “broad discretion” in changing the jury instruction after
4 Our conclusion does not mean, as Goklu suggests, that § 1960
applies “to a person in the business of buying bitcoin to hold in their own
account.” Appellant’s Br. at 31 (emphasis added). Goklu never argued that
he carried out these transactions to obtain bitcoin for his own account. He
made money by providing exchange services to customers in return for a
commission. That Goklu also exchanged his own bitcoin for cash with other
customers underscores the fact that the object of his business was charging
customers for exchanges, not obtaining bitcoin. As applied to him, Goklu
thus cannot show that the statute “fails to provide a person of ordinary
intelligence fair notice of what is prohibited, or is so standardless that it
authorizes or encourages seriously discriminatory enforcement.” United
States v. Concepcion, 139 F.4th 242, 248 (2d Cir. 2025) (quotation omitted).

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Goklu’s closing argument. Goklu suggested for the first time in his
closing remarks that the jury must find a transfer to a third party to
convict him under § 1960. In response, the district court gave the
legally correct curative instruction that “[e]xchanging Bitcoin for U.S.
currency can qualify as a transfer within the meaning of the statute.”
App’x at 707. This was not an abuse of discretion.
D. Sentencing Challenges
Finally, Goklu argues that he was improperly sentenced based
on all of his financial transactions with Agent O’Kain, even though
O’Kain first told Goklu that his bitcoin came from drug dealing
during their fourth transaction. First, Goklu claims that the
indictment was impermissibly duplicitous because it charged
multiple transactions under a single count of money laundering. He
contends that he was prejudiced because “both Probation and the
court treated the early transactions as part of the offense of
conviction” even though the jury did not render a verdict for each
transaction. Appellant’s Br. at 40. Second, he claims that the district
court committed procedural error at sentencing by improperly
including the value of the first three transactions when determining
the “value of the laundered funds” as part of its Guidelines
calculation. Id. at 43-44 (quoting U.S.S.G. § 2S1.1(a)(2)). The remedy
he seeks for both purported errors is a remand for resentencing.
We need not address these arguments because Goklu’s
challenges to his term of imprisonment are moot. “While the
Government has failed to argue that [Goklu’s] appeal should be
dismissed as moot, we have an independent obligation to ensure that
developments in the case have not rendered the appeal moot.” United
States v. Williams, 475 F.3d 468, 479 (2d Cir. 2007). An appeal from a
prison sentence is typically moot when the sentence has been

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completed. See United States v. Simmons, 150 F.4th 126, 134-35 (2d Cir.
2025). “Although a defendant’s release from prison will not
necessarily moot his sentencing challenges if he remains under
supervision at the time of his appeal, such challenges remain live only
if there is more than a remote and speculative possibility that the
district court could or would impose a reduced term of supervised
release were we to remand the matter.” Id. at 134 (quotation marks
omitted).
Goklu has completed his term of imprisonment and is now
serving his two-year term of supervised release. But his sentencing
challenges on appeal address only his prison sentence, not his term or
conditions of supervised release. Goklu does not suggest that the
district court’s calculation of the value of the laundered funds affected
his sentence of supervised release, nor does he ask us to reduce his
term of supervision. “Given the lack of a challenge to [Goklu’s] term
of supervision, it would be quite strange for us to conclude that a live
controversy exists as to that issue.” Id. at 135 (quotation marks
omitted).
III. CONCLUSION
We have considered Goklu’s remaining arguments and find
them to lack merit. For these reasons we dismiss Goklu’s appeal in
part as moot and otherwise affirm the judgment of the district court.

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