United States of America v. David N. Barnes

United States Court of Appeals
For the Seventh Circuit
Chicago, Illinois 60604
Argued November 18, 2025
Decided December 11, 2025
Before
DAVID F. HAMILTON, Circuit Judge
AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge
THOMAS L. KIRSCH II, Circuit Judge
No. 24-3172
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
DAVID N. BARNES,
Defendant-Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District
Court for the Southern District of
Illinois.
No. 4:24-CR-40022-JPG-2
J. Phil Gilbert,
Judge.
O R D E R
David Barnes pleaded guilty to one count of distributing cocaine and was
sentenced above his guideline range to 72 months in prison. Barnes now argues that his
sentence was (1) procedurally defective on the theory that the district court relied on
supposedly improper considerations such as his juvenile convictions and pending
revocation of supervised release, and (2) substantively unreasonable because the court
did not adequately justify its above-guideline sentence. We affirm because Barnes has
not shown that the district court erred in any way.
NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION
To be cited only in accordance with F ED. R. APP . P. 32.1

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No. 24-3172 Page 2
As part of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Drug
Enforcement Administration, confidential sources made several controlled purchases of
cocaine from Barnes and his co-defendants. In one purchase, in February 2024, Barnes
provided the confidential source with half an ounce of cocaine in exchange for $700,
adding that he could also obtain methamphetamine. Barnes partially funded the
purchase of cocaine for this exchange, contributing $16,000 of the $36,000 worth of
cocaine purchased and later sold.
In May 2024, Barnes and three co-defendants were arrested and charged for their
parts in the drug-trafficking conspiracy. Barnes was charged with only one count
(distributing cocaine), to which he pleaded guilty. At the time of the offense, he was on
federal supervised release for a prior cocaine distribution conviction.
A probation officer prepared a presentence investigation report that initially
calculated a guideline range of 51 to 63 months. The range was lowered to 41 to 51
months after the court sustained Barnes’ objection to the total drug quantity involved.
The district court sentenced Barnes to 72 months in prison to run concurrently
with his prison term in his then-pending revocation of supervised release. The court
discussed several of the sentencing factors in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), including Barnes’
history and characteristics (noting that he was “no stranger to the criminal justice
system” and had been under a criminal sentence of some form “pretty much [his] whole
life”); the seriousness of the offense (emphasizing that this was his second conviction
for distributing cocaine); and the need to protect the public from further crimes (stating
that he was likely to “go back to the same environment” and “get involved with the
same people” upon release). The court concluded that the guideline range did not
adequately account for Barnes’ criminal history, given his commission of crimes while
on supervised release and “the likelihood that you’re gonna commit other crimes
because you have.”
On appeal, Barnes argues that the court erred by basing its sentencing on two
improper considerations. He argues, first, that the judge wrongly relied on his juvenile
convictions rather than § 3553(a) factors. He notes the court’s comments at the
sentencing hearing that it could not “totally ignore” Barnes’s juvenile record, and that
his juvenile offenses were violent. Barnes contends any consideration of his juvenile
offenses was impermissible because they were already accounted for by the PSR, and he
had not been assigned criminal history points for them.
There was no error. It is not improper at sentencing for the court to take a
defendant’s juvenile conduct into account. Juvenile conduct may be considered as part
of the bigger picture of defendant’s history and characteristics—as evidence, for

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No. 24-3172 Page 3
instance, of a pattern of recidivism or criminal violence. See United States v. Johnson, 612
F.3d 889, 896 (7th Cir. 2010). Barnes’ juvenile offenses were both serious: aggravated
discharge of a firearm and armed robbery.1 From the time they were first promulgated,
the Sentencing Guidelines have actually encouraged both upward and downward
departures where the judge determines that the criminal history score under- or over-
states the seriousness of the defendant’s record and the risk that he will commit future
crimes. U.S.S.G. § 4A1.3 (1987) (repealed effective Nov. 1, 2025); United States v. Jones, 56
F.4th 455, 511 (7th Cir. 2022); United States v. Campbell, 37 F.4th 1345, 1353 (7th Cir. 2022).
The judge here was not required to disregard Barnes’ juvenile record even though those
offenses did not add points to his guideline calculation.
Barnes’ second, related sentencing argument is that the court should not have
considered his supervised release in a case before a different district judge. He quotes
Judge Gilbert’s comment at his plea hearing: “In all the years I’ve been doing this,
usually the same judge does both [the immediate and supervised release sentencing].”
Barnes also says it was “no coincidence” that his 72-month sentence falls within the
guideline range if both his immediate and revocation sentences were combined (71 to 88
months).
There was nothing erroneous about the judge’s approach. He explained that
Barnes’ criminal history justified an above-guideline sentence. A sentencing judge may
consider the fact of a supervised release violation as part of the defendant’s history and
characteristics. See United States v. Hayden, 775 F.3d 847, 849 (7th Cir. 2014); 18 U.S.C.
§ 3553(a)(1). Barnes was on supervised release for distributing cocaine—the same
offense as in this case. As Judge Gilbert reasoned, violations of supervised release
indicate a higher chance of recidivism, posing a risk to public safety. See United States v.
Bloch, 825 F.3d 862, 870 (7th Cir. 2016); 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)(2).
At oral argument, Barnes asserted that he was challenging only the substantive
reasonableness of the sentence and that the court gave too much weight to his
commission of the offense while he was on supervised release. But the court grounded
its reasoning in several § 3553(a) factors, including Barnes’ lengthy criminal history and
the threat his potential recidivism posed to the public.
The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.
1 The charge was later reduced, under a plea agreement, to robbery, but the judge
was entitled to consider the actual underlying conduct.

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