United States of America v. Justin Kyle Tripp

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 23-4086
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
JUSTIN KYLE TRIPP,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, at
Raleigh. Terrence W. Boyle, District Judge. (5:21-cr-00296-BO-1)
Submitted: February 27, 2024 Decided: February 29, 2024
Before WILKINSON, WYNN, and HARRIS, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
ON BRIEF: G. Wells Dickson, Jr., WELLS DICKSON, PA, Kingstree, South Carolina,
for Appellant. Michael F. Easley, Jr., United States Attorney, David A. Bragdon, Assistant
United States Attorney, John L. Gibbons, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF
THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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PER CURIAM:
Justin Kyle Tripp appeals from his three-year term of supervised release imposed
pursuant to his guilty plea to distribution of heroin and fentanyl, and set to run following
his 160-month prison sentence. On appeal, Tripp asserts that certain conditions of
supervised release were not adequately orally pronounced during his sentencing hearing,
as required by United States v. Rogers, 961 F.3d 291 (4th Cir. 2020). We affirm.*
“[A] district court may satisfy its obligation to orally pronounce discretionary
conditions through incorporation—by incorporating, for instance, all Guidelines ‘standard’
conditions when it pronounces a supervised-release sentence, and then detailing those
conditions in the written judgment.” Id. at 299. Here, the district court announced at
Tripp's sentencing that it was imposing “the standard conditions of supervision in this
district.” (J.A. 111). Tripp argues that the court did not specify whether it was referring
to the standard conditions that are listed in U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual § 5D1.3(c)
or the standard conditions included in the Eastern District of North Carolina’s standing
order. However, by announcing that the standard conditions “in this district” would govern
Tripp's supervised release, the district court sufficiently incorporated by reference the
standard conditions outlined in the standing order. See United States v. Elbaz, 52 F.4th
593, 612 (4th Cir. 2022) (finding that district court’s generic reference to standard
conditions should be given “the most obvious meaning in context”), cert. denied, 144 S.
* The Government alternatively argues that Tripp explicitly waived this claim in his
plea agreement. We assume, without deciding, that Tripp’s claim is properly before us.

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Ct. 278 (2023). Moreover, the standard conditions in the Guidelines and in the standing
order are functionally identical. Tripp does not argue otherwise, and he does not assert that
the court could have been referring to any other standard conditions.
Accordingly, we affirm the district court's judgment. We dispense with oral
argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials
before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED

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