USCA11 Case: 21-14044 Date Filed: 07/18/2022 Page: 1 of 14 [DO NOT PUBLISH] In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 21-14044 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus JOSHUA LEWIS, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida D.C. Docket No. 9:21-cr-80099-AMC-1 ____________________ USCA11 Case: 21-14044 Date Filed: 07/18/2022 Page: 2 of 14 2 Opinion of the Court 21-14044 Before WILSON, ANDERSON and HULL, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: After pleading guilty, Joshua Lewis appeals his 36-month sentence for one count of illegal reentry by a previously removed alien. On appeal, Lewis argues that his sentence, above the advisory guidelines range of 18 to 24 months, is procedurally and substantively unreasonable. After review, we affirm. I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND A. Offense Conduct On June 24, 2021, the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office Marine Unit intercepted a boat without navigational lights two miles off the Florida coast. The boat contained 19 people, including defendant Lewis. Although Lewis is a citizen of the Bahamas, the other 18 people on the boat were citizens of Haiti. Law enforcement was unable to determine who was the captain of the boat. U.S. Customs and Border Patrol also responded and determined that the boat’s occupants had entered the United States illegally without proper documentation. After Lewis was taken into custody, records indicated that: (1) he had not obtained permission to enter the United States; and (2) on November 29, 2019, law enforcement had encountered Lewis on or near a boat at a marina in Riviera Beach, Florida and detained him for smuggling migrants from the Bahamas to the USCA11 Case: 21-14044 Date Filed: 07/18/2022 Page: 3 of 14 21-14044 Opinion of the Court 3 United States. On that occasion, Lewis was processed administratively and removed to the Bahamas on January 14, 2020. Three days later, however, Lewis was again detained in Florida, when immigration authorities responded to a possible landing of a small vessel in Palm Beach, Florida. Lewis admitted he had captained the vessel from the Bahamas to the United States with twelve migrants on board. This time, Lewis was charged in federal court with illegal reentry and alien smuggling. Lewis pled guilty and received a sentence of one year and one day, followed by two years of supervised release. After serving his sentence, Lewis was removed to the Bahamas on May 13, 2021. Yet, here on June 24, 2021, Lewis was once again on a boat off the Florida coast with 18 Haitians on it. B. Indictment and Guilty Plea In July 2021, Lewis was charged by information with one count of illegal reentry, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a) and (b)(2). Lewis entered a guilty plea without the benefit of a plea agreement. Without objection, the district court adopted the magistrate judge’s report recommending that Lewis’s plea be accepted and adjudicated Lewis guilty. C. Presentence Investigation Report Lewis’s presentence investigation report (“PSI”) assigned him a base offense level of …
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