United States v. Ruben Miguel


Case: 19-20557 Document: 00515591997 Page: 1 Date Filed: 10/06/2020 United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit FILED October 6, 2020 No. 19-20557 Lyle W. Cayce Clerk United States of America, Plaintiff—Appellee, versus Ruben Garcia Miguel, Defendant—Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas USDC No. 4:19-CR-242-1 Before Jolly, Southwick, and Wilson, Circuit Judges. Per Curiam:* After a guilty plea, Ruben Garcia Miguel was sentenced to 36 months in federal prison for illegal reentry after being removed following a felony conviction. The district court also orally announced terms of supervised release at the sentencing hearing. On appeal, Garcia Miguel complains that the district court’s consideration of a misdemeanor conviction at sentencing * Pursuant to 5th Circuit Rule 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5th Circuit Rule 47.5.4. Case: 19-20557 Document: 00515591997 Page: 2 Date Filed: 10/06/2020 No. 19-20557 was plain error and that there was a conflict between the oral pronouncement and written judgment concerning supervised release. We AFFIRM. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND Ruben Garcia Miguel is a citizen of Mexico. He has been deported on three previous occasions and has voluntarily returned to Mexico three additional times. Three years after his most recent removal, Texas immigration authorities discovered that Garcia Miguel had unlawfully returned to the United States. A grand jury in the Southern District of Texas indicted him for his illegal presence in the United States in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326. Garcia Miguel pled guilty without a plea agreement. As a result of this plea, the United States Probation Office prepared a presentence investigation report (“PSR”) to assist in the district court’s sentencing of Garcia Miguel. The PSR computes two numbers: the total offense level and the total criminal-history points. The probation officer uses both to calculate the applicable advisory sentencing range. The 2018 Sentencing Guidelines were used in calculating a sentencing range in this case. The only dispute is whether one of Garcia Miguel’s prior convictions should have been included. He had nine prior adult convictions, and three of them were found to be relevant in determining his criminal- history points. The contested conviction was from 2013 for failure to stop and to give information in violation of Texas traffic law. Its inclusion is what caused Garcia Miguel’s criminal-history points to reach category IV. The result was a recommended sentencing range of 24 to 30 months. The district court orally adopted the PSR and all addenda without objection from either party. Defense counsel argued that 12 months and a day would be an adequate sentence. The Government countered that the 2 Case: 19-20557 Document: 00515591997 Page: 3 Date Filed: 10/06/2020 No. 19-20557 PSR “somewhat underrepresented” Garcia Miguel’s criminal history and sought a sentence of at least 24 months with three years of supervised release. The Government detailed for the court that in addition ...

Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals