Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Francisco Nova-Carrillo pleaded guilty to illegal reentry into the United States in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a) and (b).
The district court calculated an advisory Sentencing Guidelines range of 46 to 57 months. It varied upward and sentenced Nova-Carrillo to 72 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release. Nova-Carrillo appealed, arguing that the prison term was substantively unreasonable.
The Court’s Holding
The Fifth Circuit affirmed the sentence. Applying abuse-of-discretion review, the court concluded that Nova-Carrillo’s arguments did not establish that the district court clearly erred in balancing the sentencing factors under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).
The court also concluded that the above-Guidelines sentence was not otherwise substantively unreasonable. Its unpublished, per curiam opinion therefore left the 72-month prison term and three-year supervised-release term intact.
Key Takeaways
- An above-Guidelines sentence is reviewed for substantive reasonableness under the abuse-of-discretion standard.
- A defendant challenging an upward variance must show a clear error of judgment in the district court’s balancing of the § 3553(a) factors or another basis for finding the sentence substantively unreasonable.
- The Fifth Circuit found no such error in Nova-Carrillo’s 72-month sentence, which exceeded the 46-to-57-month advisory range.
Why It Matters
The decision underscores the deference appellate courts give district judges when reviewing the substantive reasonableness of a sentence, including one that varies upward from the advisory Guidelines range.
For sentencing appeals, disagreement with how the district court weighed the § 3553(a) factors is insufficient unless the defendant can demonstrate a clear error of judgment or another ground rendering the sentence substantively unreasonable.