UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 03-4864
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
versus
DANIEL MEADOWS,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
Maryland, at Baltimore. William D. Quarles, Jr., District Judge.
(CR-03-221)
Submitted: November 30, 2005 Decided: January 3, 2006
Before LUTTIG, WILLIAMS, and MOTZ, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
James Wyda, Federal Public Defender, Beth M. Farber, Assistant
Federal Public Defender, Martin G. Bahl, Staff Attorney, Baltimore,
Maryland, for Appellant. Thomas M. DiBiagio, United States
Attorney, Charles J. Peters, Assistant United States Attorney,
Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
See Local Rule 36(c).
PER CURIAM:
Daniel Meadows pled guilty, pursuant to a plea agreement,
to one count of possession with the intent to distribute cocaine
base in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) (2000). He was
sentenced to 210 months’ imprisonment, followed by four years of
supervised release. He appeals his sentence.
Meadows contends that his North Carolina conviction for
possession with intent to deliver cocaine was not a felony offense
under Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296 (2004), because, without
aggravating factors, the maximum allowable sentence he could have
received under applicable state sentencing guidelines did not
exceed twelve months. It is undisputed, however, that the
statutory maximum for the offense of which Meadows was convicted
exceeded one year. In light of this fact, Meadows’ argument is
foreclosed by our recent decision in United States v. Harp, 406
F.3d 242, 246 (4th Cir. 2005) (holding that United States v. Jones,
195 F.3d 205 (4th Cir. 1999), is still viable after Blakely and
United States v. Booker, 125 S. Ct. 738 (2005), and reaffirming
that “a prior North Carolina conviction was for a crime punishable
by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year if any defendant
charged with that crime could receive a sentence of more than one
year” (internal citation and quotation marks omitted)). We find no
basis to distinguish this case from Harp, and accordingly conclude
the argument is without merit.
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Meadows also claims the district court erred when it
enhanced his sentence using his two prior felony convictions that
were neither charged in his indictment nor admitted in his guilty
plea. In Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U.S. 224, 233-35
(1998), the Supreme Court held that the government need not allege
in its indictment and need not prove beyond reasonable doubt that
a defendant had prior convictions for a district court to use those
convictions for purposes of enhancing a sentence. Although the
opinion in Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466 (2000), expressed
some uncertainty regarding the future vitality of Almendarez-
Torres, we have concluded that Almendarez-Torres was not overruled
by Apprendi or United States v. Booker, 125 S. Ct. 738 (2005), and
remains the law. See United States v. Cheek, 415 F.3d 349 (4th
Cir. 2005); see also United States v. Sterling, 283 F.3d 216, 220
(4th Cir. 2002). This argument is without merit.
Finally, we consider whether the district court erred in
treating the sentencing guidelines as mandatory in determining
Meadows’ sentence. Because Meadows did not raise an objection to
the application of the guidelines as mandatory before the district
court, this court reviews for plain error. United States v. White,
405 F.3d 208, 215 (4th Cir. 2005).
In White, this court held that treating the guidelines as
mandatory was error and that the error was plain. Id. at 216-17.
The court declined to presume prejudice, id. at 217-22, and held
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that the “prejudice inquiry, therefore, is . . . whether after
pondering all that happened without stripping the erroneous action
from the whole, . . . the judgment was . . . substantially swayed
by the error.” Id. at 223 (internal quotation marks and citations
omitted). To make this showing, a defendant must “demonstrate,
based on the record, that the treatment of the guidelines as
mandatory caused the district court to impose a longer sentence
than it otherwise would have imposed.” Id. at 224. Because the
record in White provided no nonspeculative basis suggesting that
the court would have sentenced the defendant to a lower sentence
had the court sentenced under an advisory guideline scheme, this
court concluded that the error did not affect the defendant’s
substantial rights. Id. at 225. Thus, we affirmed the sentence.
Id.
In this case, during the sentencing hearing, the court
made comments suggesting that it considered itself constrained by
the then-mandatory guidelines range. However, the comments were
equivocal, and the court did not explicitly state that it would
have given a lower sentence but for the guidelines. Accordingly,
we find there is no nonspeculative basis for remanding the case to
the district court to determine whether Meadows was prejudiced by
the mandatory application of the guidelines.
Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the district
court. We deny Meadows’ motion to remand. We dispense with oral
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argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately
presented in the material before the court and argument would not
aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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