U.S. v. Dawson

Dist. Ct. did not err in sentencing defendant to 24-month term of incarceration, after Dist. Ct. determined that defendant had violated five terms of his supervised release, that included defendant’s possession of loaded semi-automatic firearm, possession of altered electronic monitoring device for his home confinement and failure to take required drug tests. While guideline range called for sentence of 6-to-12 months incarceration and statutory maximum was 24-month incarceration, Dist. Ct. could properly look to nature of defendant’s firearm possession violation to support instant sentence. Ct. further rejected defendant’s claim that maximum sentence was imposed as punishment for firearm offense, where sentencing transcript showed that Dist. Ct. properly considered seriousness and dangerousness of firearm violation within breach of trust framework. As such, Dist. Ct. could properly look to serious violation of supervised release as more serious breach of trust. Moreover, instant 24-month sentence was not substantively unreasonable given gravity of defendant’s violations.