FILED
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
JAN 10 2017
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, No. 14-10417
Plaintiff - Appellee, D.C. No. 2:11-cr-00101-WBS-1
v.
MEMORANDUM*
DIONISIO ROBLES PADILLA,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of California
William B. Shubb, Senior District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted March 18, 2016
San Francisco, California
Before: KLEINFELD, RAWLINSON, and HURWITZ, Circuit Judges.
Appellant Dionisio Robles Padilla (Padilla) challenges his 120-month
sentence for distribution of methamphetamine in violation of 21 U.S.C. §
841(a)(1). Padilla contends that the district court violated his Fifth Amendment
right against self-incrimination when it questioned him during the sentencing
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
hearing, improperly based its sentence on facts not in evidence, and failed to
adequately explain the basis for the imposed sentence.
Under plain error review, the record does not reflect that the district court
punished Padilla for exercising his Fifth Amendment rights. Rather, the court
imposed a sentence below the Sentencing Guidelines range, premised on the 18
U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors. See United States v. Christensen, 732 F.3d 1094, 1106
(9th Cir. 2013) (“Where the effect of an alleged error is so uncertain, a defendant
cannot meet his burden of showing that the error actually affected his substantial
rights.”) (citation omitted).
The district court may have inaccurately suggested that Padilla implicated an
innocent former co-defendant during his plea colloquy. However, Padilla has
failed to demonstrate that this observation had any bearing on his below-
Guidelines sentence. See id. (“To establish that his due process rights were
violated, [Padilla] must show that materially false or unreliable information was
demonstrably made the basis for the sentence imposed by the district court. Here,
because [Padilla] failed to raise his erroneous facts issue before the district court,
[Padilla] must show not only that the district court committed error under the Due
Process Clause but also that the error affected his substantial rights. . . .”) (citation
and internal quotation marks omitted).
2
The district court adequately explained its imposition of a below-Guidelines
sentence premised on the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors. See United States v.
Hernandez-Arias, 757 F.3d 874, 884 (9th Cir. 2014), as amended (“Although a
district court must explain the sentence sufficiently to permit meaningful review,
an adequate explanation not only derives from the judge’s pronouncement of the
sentence, but may also be inferred from the presentence report or the record as a
whole.”) (citation, alterations, and internal quotation marks omitted).
AFFIRMED.
3