Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

Pursuant to a plea agreement, Defendant pleaded guilty to possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime and possession of controlled substances with intent to distribute. The district court imposed a total prison sentence of 120 months months and five years’ supervised release. Defendant appealed, arguing that the district court committed procedural and substantive errors in calculating his sentence for the firearms count. The Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed, holding that Defendant failed to show that the district court erred either substantively or procedurally. View "United States v. Millan-Roman" on Justia Law

Appellant pled guilty to conspiring to possess with intent to distribute in excess of 280 grams of cocaine base and aiding and abetting in the possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime. The district court sentenced Appellant to a top-of-the-range incarcerative term on count one and the mandatory minimum incarcerative term on count two. The sentences were ordered to run consecutively. On appeal, Appellant challenged his sentence. The First Circuit affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not err in its choice of a criminal history category; and (2) the district court did not misapply the sentencing guidelines in determining that Appellant’s sentence should be imposed consecutively to his undischarged state sentence. View "United States v. Roman-Diaz" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of conspiracy to commit racketeering, conspiracy to commit murder in aid of racketeering, and other charges related to his membership in a crime syndicate. Defendant appealed, raising fifteen claims of error. The First Circuit affirmed, holding, inter alia, (1) Defendant failed to meet his burden of showing grand jury abuse by the government; (2) the government did not improperly join certain charges; (3) the district court did not err in denying Defendant’s motion to suppress; (4) there was no violation of Defendant’s right to conflict-free counsel; (5) the district court did not violate Defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to participate in his own defense; (6) the district court did not violate Defendant’s rights under the Confrontation Clause; (7) there was no evidentiary error; (8) the evidence was sufficient to support the convictions; (9) Defendant failed to show plain error in his claims of prosecutorial misconduct; and (10) the court properly sentenced Defendant. View "United States v. Ponzo" on Justia Law

Defendant entered a conditional guilty plea to being a felon in possession of ammunition. The district court found that Defendant’s prior convictions for resisting arrest and assault and battery of a police officer (ABPO) subjected Defendant to an enhancement of his sentence under the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA). In so finding, the judge stated that he felt bound by First Circuit precedent: United States v. Carrigan, United States v. Weekes, and United States v. Dancy. The First Circuit affirmed in part and remanded in part, holding (1) the district court properly denied Defendant’s motion to suppress ammunition that was obtained pursuant to a search warrant; (2) the district court did not err in denying Defendant’s motion to suppress statements he made to police during a station house interview; and (3) because Carrigan and Weekes have been called into question by the Supreme Court, and because Dancy relied upon a portion of 18 U.S.C. 924(e) that has since been deemed unconstitutionally vague, the questions previously determined by those cases of whether the Massachusetts offenses of resisting arrest and ABPO qualify as violent felonies under the ACCA must be returned. View "United States v. Faust" on Justia Law

Appellant pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and possession with intent to distribute more than twenty-eight grams of cocaine base. Appellant was sentenced to 132 months of imprisonment. On appeal, Appellant challenged his sentence, arguing that the district court improperly applied a two-level enhancement, which applies when “[t]he defendant committed [the relevant] offense as part of a pattern of criminal conduct engaged in as a livelihood.” The First Circuit affirmed Appellant’s sentence, holding that the district court was justified in concluding that the two prongs of the criminal livelihood enhancement were satisfied. View "United States v. Gordon" on Justia Law

Appellant pleaded guilty to a single count of being a felon in possession of a firearm. The sentencing court, ruling on the basis of circumstantial evidence, attributed constructive possession of six Molotov cocktails to Appellant. That finding increased Appellant’s guideline sentencing range and contributed to his eighty-two-month sentence. Appellant appealed, challenging the constructive possession finding. The First Circuit affirmed, holding that although the evidence of constructive possession was circumstantial, it was convincing, and the district court’s inferences from that evidence were plausible. Therefore, the sentencing court did not clearly err in finding that Appellant constructively possessed the six Molotov cocktails. View "United States v. Nunez" on Justia Law

Pursuant to a plea agreement, Appellant pleaded guilty to conspiring to possess with intent to distribute controlled substances within a protected location. The district court sentenced Appellant to a 235-month incarcerative term, a sentence that was within, but at the top of, the guideline sentencing range. The First Circuit affirmed the conviction and sentence, holding (1) Appellant’s guilty plea was knowing and voluntary; (2) the court recited an incorrect statutory maximum at the change-of-plea hearing, but the error did not affect Appellant’s substantial rights; (3) the district court gave proper consideration to the factors enumerated in 18 U.S.C. 3553(a); and (4) Appellant’s sentence was substantively reasonable. View "United States v. Rodriguez-Adorno" on Justia Law

Defendant divorced his wife in order to transfer assets fraudulently and avoid some tax liability. The district court set aside the separation agreement as a fraudulent transfer and proceeded to redivide and reallocate certain assets applying Massachusetts law. The government’s tax liens attached directly to any assets allocated to Defendant, but the government argued that its tax liens also attached indirectly to certain assets allocated to Defendant’s wife. This appeal concerned the district court’s allocation of two assets that the district court divided more or less evenly. The First Circuit vacated in part and affirmed in part, holding (1) with regard to funds that were directly traceable to the tax shelter that Defendant used to reduce his taxable income for several years, it was not clear whether the district court considered fourteen factors required by Massachusetts law in order to arrive at an equitable division of the parties’ assets; and (2) the government was not entitled to Defendant’s wife’s half of the proceeds from the sale of property owned by Defendant and his wife in Massachusetts on a lien-tracing theory. Remanded. View "United States v. Baker" on Justia Law

In 2011, Defendant pled guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute controlled substances. In 2015, the district court determined that Defendant had violated the conditions of his supervised release, revoked supervised release, and sentenced Defendant to thirty-six months’ imprisonment. Defendant challenged his sentence on appeal. The First Circuit affirmed, holding that, in light of the particular details of Defendant’s criminal history and the seriousness of the violations of the conditions of supervised release, the district court did not abuse its discretion in sentencing Defendant, and the sentence was both procedurally and substantively reasonable. View "United States v. Vazquez-Vazquez" on Justia Law

Defendant pled guilty to drug conspiracy and arson charges. Prior to sentencing, Defendant moved to withdraw his plea, arguing that he did not have the opportunity to personally review certain discovery materials. The district court denied the motion. The district court based its sentencing on the finding that Defendant was a career offender under the sentencing guidelines. One of the predicate offenses supporting Defendant’s career offender designation was a Massachusetts conviction for assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, which the court found qualified as a “crime of violence” under the “residual clause” of U.S.S.G. 4B1.2(a)(2). The First Circuit affirmed, holding (1) the district court properly denied Defendant’s motion to withdraw his guilty plea; and (2) Defendant’s sentence was constitutional. View "United States v. Thompson" on Justia Law