Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Wardell Fletcher pleaded guilty in the Eastern District of Louisiana to possessing a firearm after a felony conviction. The district court sentenced him to 180 months in prison.
Fletcher appealed on procedural-reasonableness grounds. He argued that the district court made three errors when assigning criminal-history points, including treating two prior sentences as involving imprisonment even though, he contended, he did not actually serve prison time on them.
The Court’s Holding
The Fifth Circuit affirmed. Because Fletcher had not preserved his claim concerning the two prior sentences, he had to establish a clear or obvious error under plain-error review. The court held that he failed to make that showing.
The panel did not reach the merits of Fletcher’s other criminal-history arguments because the government demonstrated that any error was harmless. The alleged errors did not change Fletcher’s advisory Guidelines range, and the record showed that the upward variance rested independently on the district court’s consideration of his criminal history and dangerousness under the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors.
Key Takeaways
- An unpreserved challenge to criminal-history scoring requires the defendant to show a clear or obvious error.
- An alleged Guidelines-calculation error may be harmless when it does not affect the advisory range.
- The district court’s independent reliance on the defendant’s criminal history and dangerousness supported the upward variance.
Why It Matters
The decision illustrates the difficulty of obtaining resentencing when disputed criminal-history points do not alter the Guidelines range and the sentencing record independently supports the chosen sentence. It also underscores the importance of preserving fact-dependent objections to prior-sentence calculations in the district court.