UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 10-5084
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
JEROME R. HAMILTON,
Defendant – Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
South Carolina, at Charleston. Patrick Michael Duffy, Senior
District Judge. (2:09-cr-01094-PMD-1)
Submitted: May 26, 2011 Decided: May 31, 2011
Before KING, SHEDD, and DIAZ, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Cameron J. Blazer, Assistant Federal Public Defender,
Charleston, South Carolina, for Appellant. William N. Nettles,
United States Attorney, Columbia, South Carolina; Matthew J.
Modica, Assistant United States Attorney, Charleston, South
Carolina, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Jerome R. Hamilton pled guilty to three counts of
possession with intent to distribute cocaine in violation of 21
U.S.C.A. § 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(C) (West 2006 & Supp. 2010). The
district court sentenced him to 200 months on each of the
convictions, to be served concurrently. Hamilton appeals,
contending that the district court erred in applying the
sentencing enhancement for possession of a deadly weapon in
connection with a drug trafficking crime and that his sentence
is unreasonable. Finding no reversible error, we affirm.
We have reviewed Hamilton’s sentence and determined
that it was properly calculated and that the sentence imposed
was reasonable. See Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 51
(2007); United States v. Llamas, 599 F.3d 381, 387 (4th Cir.
2010). Specifically, the district court did not err in applying
the sentencing enhancement for possession of a dangerous weapon. *
See United States v. Harris, 128 F.3d 850, 852 (4th Cir. 1997)
(considering proximity of gun to drugs); U.S. Sentencing
Guidelines Manual § 2D1.1(b)(1) cmt. n.3 (2009) (applying the
dangerous weapon enhancement “unless it is clearly improbable
that the weapon was connected with the offense”).
*
As conceded by the parties, in light of Hamilton’s career
offender status, this enhancement had no effect on the
applicable Guidelines range.
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The district court followed the necessary procedural
steps in sentencing Hamilton, appropriately treated the
sentencing Guidelines as advisory, properly calculated and
considered the applicable Guidelines range, and weighed the
relevant 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) (2006) factors as related to
Hamilton’s individual circumstances. See United States v.
Carter, 564 F.3d 325, 328 (4th Cir. 2009); United States v.
Johnson, 445 F.3d 339, 345 (4th Cir. 2006) (holding that
district court is not required to “robotically tick through
§ 3553(a)’s every subsection”).
We have also determined that Hamilton’s sentence is
substantively reasonable. Although Hamilton requested that his
sentence not be enhanced under the Career Offender provisions,
the district court reviewed Hamilton’s criminal history and
properly sentenced him as a career offender, noting his
extensive prior criminal conduct. The court also determined
that prison was the appropriate place for Hamilton to serve his
term of imprisonment and therefore rejected Hamilton’s request
for a sentence in which he would serve part of the term in
prison and part of his sentence in community confinement. We
conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in
imposing the chosen sentence. See Gall, 552 U.S. at 41; United
States v. Allen, 491 F.3d 178, 193 (4th Cir. 2007) (applying
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appellate presumption of reasonableness to within Guidelines
sentence).
Accordingly, we affirm Hamilton’s sentence. We
dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the
court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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