United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
F I L E D
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT April 12, 2007
Charles R. Fulbruge III
Clerk
No. 06-40732
Summary Calendar
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
LARRY ANDERSON, JR.,
Defendant-Appellee.
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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Texas
No. 7:05-CR-509
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Before DAVIS, BARKSDALE, and BENAVIDES, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
Larry Anderson pled guilty to a single charge of felon in
possession of ammunition. 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1), 924(a)(2). The
district court sentenced Anderson to time served and imposed a
three-year term of supervised release. As part of his supervised
release, Anderson was sentenced to thirty months of in-home
confinement, the first twelve months being electronically
monitored.
The government now appeals, claiming that Anderson’s sentence
*
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 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this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except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 CIR. R. 47.5.4.
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was unreasonable in light of the Sentencing Guidelines. We AFFIRM
Anderson’s sentence.
I. BACKGROUND
Larry Anderson is a convicted felon. In 2005, a gun-store
employee informed Special Agent Daniel Casey that Anderson, who the
employee knew was a convicted felon, was purchasing ammunition.
After he left the store, Agent Casey found Anderson in his truck
with two boxes of .45 caliber ammunition. Anderson claimed he
purchased it for his father as a Father’s Day gift, but knew he was
not supposed to.
Agents then searched Anderson’s house, which he shared with
his wife, a department of safety employee. The agents found two
.357 revolvers and approximately 300 rounds of .357 ammunition.
Anderson’s wife admitted that these weapons belonged to her before
she met him. The agents did not find any weapons compatible with
the .45 ammunition found in Anderson’s truck.
Anderson pled guilty to the offense of felon in possession of
ammunition. At sentencing, the court assessed Anderson three
criminal history points for an aggravated assault with a deadly
weapon conviction and three points for a credit-card abuse
conviction. After a reduction for acceptance of responsibility,
the calculated Sentencing Guidelines range was 30–37 months.1
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After the court noted it was sentencing Anderson below the
Guidelines range, it suggested that the Guidelines range should
have been 24–30 months—to correct for a form of double counting
between his offense level and his history points—but did so only
2
The court then announced it was sentencing Anderson below the
Guidelines range. It sentenced him to eight days of time served
and a three-year term of supervised release, thirty months of which
would be in-home confinement.
In passing its sentence, the court noted that Anderson’s
aggravated assault conviction stemmed from activity fifteen years
earlier, in 1991, when he was only seventeen years old. He and
another individual shot a pistol from a riverbank as a number of
boats passed and one bullet struck a passenger. Anderson has since
had no parole violations and generally reformed his life. He has
kept steady employment as an area manager for an industrial
equipment distributor and received strong letters of support from
“prominent members of [the] community who all spoke very highly of
[him].” The court told Anderson that “you’re a different person
than what you were when you were 17 years old and had your prior
involvement with the law,” and expressed “no doubt” that his
criminal activity would not be repeated.
The government now appeals his sentence.
II. DISCUSSION
We review this sentence for unreasonableness. United States
v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005). The reasonableness standard
derived from Booker is not unbounded; it must be guided by
passingly because its sentence was well below that range as well.
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sentencing considerations set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a). United
States v. Smith, 440 F.3d 704, 707 (5th Cir. 2006). The sentencing
court need not methodically address each factor specifically, but
the “sentence must be supported by the totality of the relevant
statutory factors.” United States v. Duhon, 440 F.3d 711, 715 (5th
Cir. 2006).
With due regard to the Sentencing Guidelines, we find that
Anderson’s sentence was reasonable. The “nature and circumstances
of the offense” reveal that Anderson was buying ammunition for his
father and had no firearm compatible with the ammunition. See 18
U.S.C. § 3553(a)(1). The history and characteristics of the
defendant, who had reintegrated into his community and showed no
signs of repeating his long since past criminal behavior, also
support leniency. Id. The district court carefully articulated
its reasons for this non-Guidelines sentence and had good reason to
believe that Anderson was reformed and posed little risk to repeat
his offense. See United States v. Mares, 402 F.3d 511, 519 (2005).
The government contends that this non-Guideline sentence
“unreasonably fails to reflect the statutory sentencing factors
[because] it (1) does not account for a factor that should have
received significant weight, (2) gives significant weight to an
irrelevant or improper factor, or (3) represents a clear error of
judgment in balancing the sentencing factors.” Smith, 440 F.3d at
707–08.
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It argues that the court did not consider important factors
such as (1) the need to consider the seriousness of the offense,
(2) the need to afford adequate deterrence, and (3) the need to
prevent unwarranted sentencing disparities. As we have already
discussed, the district court explicitly addressed the first two
factors, and we agree that they favor leniency. It also implicitly
considered the third as it gave clear reasons for the non-Guideline
sentence in this peculiar case, which effectively warrants the
resulting sentencing disparities.
Furthermore, the district court did not give substantial
weight to any improper factors. The government complains that too
much emphasis was given to Anderson’s work and family ties, but the
sentencing transcript lends no credence to that argument. The
district court was concerned with Anderson’s personal growth, the
nature of his offense, and the importance of Anderson’s job to his
rehabilitation. See 18 U.S.C. §§ 3553(a)(1), 3553(a)(2)(D). While
the court did note that it received many letters from prominent
members of the community, the content of those letters largely
spoke to the § 3553 factors discussed above, and the court did not
substantially rely on the mere fact that Anderson had strong
community ties.
While Anderson certainly violated the letter of the law, the
circumstances of his offense and of his criminal history provide
rational and legitimate reasons to sentence him below the
Guidelines range. Just as we have upheld sentences more than
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thirty months above the applicable Guidelines range, see Smith, 440
F.3d at 705–06, we will not stop the pendulum from swinging the
other way where the sentence is otherwise reasonable.
We find that Anderson’s sentence was reasonable and AFFIRM.
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