In United States v. Rodriguez, No. 20-13534 (Aug. 1, 2023) (William Pryor, Jill Pryor, Grant), the Court affirmed in part and vacated in part Mr. Rodriguez’s sentence, and remanded for a limited resentencing.
Mr. Rodriguez appealed his sentence for possession with intent to distribute 100 grams or more of heroin and 50 grams or more of methamphetamine.
The Court agreed that Mr. Rodriguez was entitled to a limited resentencing because the district court erred by imposing conditions of supervised release in the written judgment that were not orally pronounced at the sentencing hearing. The Court held that a district court must pronounce at the defendant’s sentencing hearing any discretionary conditions of supervised release—that is, any condition of supervised release other than those mandatory conditions set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3583(d). The Court noted that a district court may do so by expressly incorporating a written list detailing the conditions, and does not need to individually pronounce each discretionary condition at sentencing.
The Court rejected Mr. Rodriguez’s other challenges to his sentence, finding no clear error in the district court’s imposition of a two-level enhancement for maintaining a premises for the purpose of manufacturing or distributing a controlled substance, under U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(b)(12); finding the sentence to be procedurally and substantively reasonable; and finding that his 6th Amendment right to counsel during a critical stage was not violated when his attorney experienced technical difficulties during his Zoom sentencing hearing.
https://media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/files/202013534.pdf