UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 18-4016 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. JAMES PATRICK MONDELL, Defendant - Appellant. No. 18-4017 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. JAMES PATRICK MONDELL, Defendant - Appellant. No. 18-4039 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. MICHAEL RUIZ, a/k/a Michael Rizzoa, Defendant - Appellant. No. 18-4044 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. MICHAEL RUIZ, a/k/a Michael Rizzoa, Defendant - Appellant. Appeals from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at Greenville. Henry M. Herlong, Jr., Senior District Judge. (6:09-cr-01078-HMH-1; 6:17- cr-00638-HMH-2; 6:17-cr-00144-HMH-1; 6:17-cr-00638-HMH-1) Submitted: July 31, 2018 Decided: August 28, 2018 Before KEENAN and DIAZ, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge. Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion. Christopher R. Geel, LAW OFFICE OF CHRISTOPHER W. ADAMS, Charleston, South Carolina; Lora C. Blanchard, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER, Greenville, South Carolina, for Appellants. Beth Drake, United States Attorney, David Calhoun Stephens, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES 2 ATTORNEY, Greenville, South Carolina, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. 3 PER CURIAM: James Patrick Mondell and Michael Ruiz (collectively, Defendants) pled guilty to two counts of wire fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2, 1343 (2012). Ruiz also pled guilty to three counts of impersonating an officer or employee of the United States, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 912 (2012). The district court varied upward from Defendants’ advisory Sentencing Guidelines ranges, sentencing Mondell to 40 months’ imprisonment and Ruiz to 160 months’ imprisonment. Due to this new criminal conduct, the court also revoked Defendants’ supervised release and sentenced Mondell to 27 months’ imprisonment and Ruiz to 24 months’ imprisonment. The revocation sentences were within Defendants’ respective policy statement ranges, and the court ordered the revocation sentences to run consecutively to the sentences imposed for Defendants’ new criminal conduct. In these consolidated appeals, Defendants challenge the adequacy of the court’s explanations for their new sentences and their revocation sentences. We affirm. I. We review a criminal sentence, “whether inside, just outside, or significantly outside the Guidelines range” for reasonableness “under a deferential abuse-of-discretion standard.” Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 41 (2007); see United States v. Blue, 877 F.3d 513, 517 (4th Cir. 2017). This review ordinarily requires consideration of both the procedural and substantive reasonableness of the sentence, but Defendants limit their appeals to the procedural reasonableness of their upward variant sentences by challenging the adequacy of the court’s explanations. See Blue, 877 F.3d at 517-18. 4 “[F]or every sentence—whether above, below, or within the Guidelines range—a sentencing court must place on the record an individualized assessment based on the particular facts of the case before it.” United States v. Lynn, 592 F.3d 572, 576 (4th Cir. 2010) (internal quotation marks omitted). The court is obliged to “adequately explain the chosen sentence to allow for meaningful appellate review and to promote the perception of fair sentencing.” Blue, ...
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