U.S. v. Alfaro, 89-5634

• Citation: 919 F.2d 962
• Decision Date: 13 December 1990
• Docket Number: No. 89-5634,89-5634
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Richard Young ALFARO, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (5th Circuit)

Page 962

919 F.2d 962

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Richard Young ALFARO, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 89-5634.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Dec. 13, 1990.

Nancy B. Barohn, San Antonio, Tex., for defendant-appellant.

Michael W. McCrum, LeRoy Morgan Jahn, Asst. U.S. Attys., Helen M. Eversberg, U.S. Atty., San Antonio, Tex., for plaintiff-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas.

Before WISDOM, GEE, and HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judges.

WISDOM, Circuit Judge:

Richard Young Alfaro, the defendant, pleaded guilty to distributing 250 grams of heroin in violation of 21 U.S.C. Sec. 841(a)(1). In this appeal, he challenges the decision of the trial court to increase his sentence level by three for his leadership role, and its finding that he did not accept personal responsibility for his criminal conduct. We affirm.

I

On March 21, 1988, Alfaro met with a confidential informant to whom he said that he had ten pounds of methamphetamine to sell and could supply all the cocaine and marijuana one could handle. On March 24th, he again met with the informant. This time he sold the informant one ounce of methamphetamine, and he said that he had nine pounds of methamphetamine left and would continue to have a large supply in the future.

On April 1st, Alfaro met again with the informant, sold the informant two ounces of methamphetamine, and "fronted" ¹ him two additional ounces of the drug. On May 13th, he met with the informant and an undercover officer. Alfaro sold the undercover officer four ounces of methamphetamine and fronted the officer another ounce.

On June 10th, Alfaro talked with the undercover officer several times on the telephone. He told the officer that he did not have any methamphetamine available but had something else if the officer would come over to his bail bonds company. The officer met with Alfaro at his bail bonds office, where he told the officer that he had twenty-one ounces of "pure Peruvian heroin" for sale at $1,000 per ounce. Alfaro took the officer into a back room in the business where the officer saw four other individuals, at least two of whom were cutting and packaging the heroin. Alfaro and the officer returned to the front of the building and there the officer purchased five ounces (125 grams) of heroin for $5,000 and was fronted another five ounces of heroin. Alfaro also told the officer that he could obtain kilogram amounts of cocaine and large amounts of marijuana.

On June 18th, the officer returned to the location of the bail bond business to pay the $5,000 owed for the five ounces of heroin fronted to the officer on June 10th. The undercover officer also arranged to purchase fifty pounds of heroin for $44,000. The transaction was to take place later the same day. Alfaro sent his "Number 2" man to pick up the heroin, and the undercover officer left, supposedly to obtain the money. When the "Number 2" man returned, the police were waiting, search warrant in hand. The police recovered approximately 131 grams of heroin, and arrested Alfaro as he was fleeing the scene. During his flight he tossed a pistol to the ground and packets of heroin onto various roof tops.

Based on this evidence, a grand jury indicted Alfaro on six counts. ² He agreed to plead guilty to the fourth count, which was based on the June 10th sale. In return, the government agreed to drop the other five charges.

The district court accepted the plea agreement. The presentence report states that the defendant was an organizer or leader of a criminal activity involving five or more persons, under Sentencing Guidelines Sec. 3B1.1, and that the defendant had failed to accept responsibility for his actions under Sentencing Guidelines Sec. 3E1.1(a). Alfaro objected to this part of the report. After considering the defendant's objections, the trial court found that the defendant was a manager or supervisor, rather than an organizer or leader, of the operation, and that there were four other people involved. The trial court also found that the defendant did not accept personal responsibility for his actions. Alfaro argues that the trial court erred on these two issues.

II

This court will "uphold the district court's sentence so long as it results from a correct application of the guidelines to factual findings which are not clearly erroneous." ³ In making its sentencing decisions, the district court may properly consider any relevant evidence "without regard to its admissibility under the rules of evidence applicable at trial, provided that the information has sufficient indicia of reliability to support its probable accuracy." ⁴ When any factor material to the sentencing determination is reasonably in dispute, then the trial judge:

shall, as to each matter controverted, make (i) a finding as to the allegation, or (ii) a determination that no such finding is necessary because the matter controverted will not be taken into account in sentencing. ⁵

Both parties suggest that our decisions in United States v. Rodriguez ⁶ and United States v. Flores ⁷ require a defendant to show that the information in the presentence report is "materially untrue" to reverse a factual finding, by the trial court, based on the presentence report. We read the cases as an application of the clearly erroneous standard. The Flores and Rodriguez cases appear to require a defendant to show that the information relied upon by the trial court was "materially untrue" to demonstrate that the findings of the trial court were clearly erroneous. ⁸ Because we consider that the words "materially untrue" are not a very helpful description of our task, and, indeed, find them confusing, we review briefly the relevant standards for the trial court and the appellate court in reviewing sentencing determinations.

We have held that the party seeking an adjustment in the sentence level must establish the factual predicate justifying the adjustment. ⁹ We have also held that the appropriate analysis for the district court is whether the party seeking to adjust the sentence level has proved by a preponderance of the relevant and sufficiently reliable evidence the facts necessary to support the adjustment. ¹⁰ Requiring the party seeking an adjustment to prove the necessary facts by the preponderance of the evidence appropriately balances the uniformity established by the base sentence levels with the flexibility introduced by the various factors that adjust that level. ¹¹ On appeal, our task is to ensure that the trial court properly applied the legal standards established by the guidelines to its factual findings. Our review of sentencing decisions follows our usual review standards: determinations of legal principles, we review de novo ; ¹² factual findings, we review for clear error. ¹³

Because the appellant challenges the factual findings of the trial court, we review for clear error. The Court, in Anderson v. City of Bessemer City, ¹⁴ described our task as follows:

If the district court's account of the evidence is plausible in light of the record viewed in its entirety, the court of appeals may not reverse it even though convinced that had it been sitting as the trier of fact, it would have weighed the evidence differently. ¹⁵

Using this standard, we consider whether the district court's findings, (1) that Alfaro was a supervisor or manager of the criminal activity and that the criminal activity involved five or more participants, and (2) that he did not accept responsibility for his actions, are plausible in the light of the record as a whole.

III

In making its factual findings, the trial court had before it the presentence report and the affidavit of the undercover officer who prepared it in support of the search warrant. Despite the defendant's objections to the finding of the presentence report that four other individuals had participated in the sale on June 10th, he did not request an evidentiary hearing on the issue, nor did he submit affidavits or other sworn testimony to rebut the evidence contained in the officer's affidavit and the presentence report.

To the extent that the defendant's objections to the presentence report and the trial transcript reflect unsworn assertions, we are reluctant to consider them as evidence in our review of the findings of the trial court. ¹⁶ Unsworn assertions do not bear "sufficient indicia of reliability to support [their] probable accuracy", ¹⁷ and, therefore, should not generally be considered by the trial court in making its factual findings. ¹⁸

We have held that a presentence report generally bears sufficient indicia of reliability to be considered as evidence by the trial judge in making the factual determinations required by the sentencing guidelines. ¹⁹ An affidavit prepared and submitted in support of a search warrant also bears sufficient indicia of reliability to be considered by the trial judge in making sentencing decisions.

A. The Three Level Increase for the Defendant's Role

Section 3B1.1 of the Sentencing Guidelines provides Based on the defendant's role in the offense, increase the offense level as follows: ...

(b) If the defendant was a manager or supervisor (but not an organizer or leader) and the criminal activity involved five or more participants or was otherwise extensive, increase by 3 levels.... ²⁰

We have interpreted this section to apply only if four other individuals are involved in the specific offense to which the defendant pleaded guilty. ²¹ We do not require each "participant" to have committed each element of the offense; rather, we require each of the participants to play some role in bringing about the specific offense charged. ²²

Alfaro does not deny that he managed or supervised the drug sale, but denies that there were four other people involved in the sale. The presentence report described the events on the day of the offense as follows:

On June 10, 1988, the same undercover officer...