United States v. Dominic Rimmer, No. 13-1253 (8th Cir. 2013)
Annotate this CaseCourt Description: Criminal case - Sentencing. District court did not abuse its discretion in weighing the 3553(a) factors and imposed a substantively reasonable sentence.
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United States Court of Appeals For the Eighth Circuit ___________________________ No. 13-1253 ___________________________ United States of America lllllllllllllllllllll Plaintiff - Appellee v. Dominic A. Rimmer lllllllllllllllllllll Defendant - Appellant ____________ Appeal from United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri - Kansas City ____________ Submitted: November 18, 2013 Filed: December 23, 2013 [Unpublished] ____________ Before SHEPHERD, BOWMAN, and BEAM, Circuit Judges. ____________ PER CURIAM. After Dominic Rimmer pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm, 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1), 924(a)(2), the District Court1 sentenced him to sixty 1 The Honorable Greg Kays, United States District Judge for the Western District of Missouri. months imprisonment, a fourteen-month upward variance from the top of Rimmer s advisory U.S. Sentencing Guidelines range. Rimmer appeals, and we affirm. Rimmer argues that his sentence is substantively unreasonable because the court gave undue weight to certain 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors and too little weight to other factors, resulting in a sentence that was greater than necessary to satisfy the statutory goals of sentencing. Applying a deferential abuse-of-discretion standard, see United States v. David, 682 F.3d 1074, 1076 (8th Cir. 2012), we disagree. [A] sentencing court has wide latitude to weigh the § 3553(a) factors and assign some factors greater weight than others in determining an appropriate sentence. Id. at 1077. At the sentencing hearing before the District Court, defense counsel cited Rimmer s youth, his single-parent upbringing, his educational goals, and the fact that Rimmer had not previously served significant jail time as mitigating factors weighing in favor of a below-Guidelines-range sentence. The record reveals that the District Court considered counsels arguments, the PSR, and the advisory Guidelines sentencing recommendation; articulated the specific § 3553(a) factors that informed its sentencing decision; and imposed what it determined was an appropriate sentence. The court specifically noted that Rimmer, at age twenty, had three prior felony convictions; that he repeatedly refused to conform his behavior to the law despite prior leniency from state courts; that the felon-in-possession offense was serious; and that Rimmer posed a continuing threat to the community. The court did not impose an unreasonable sentence or abuse its discretion simply because the court s analysis of the facts and the § 3553(a) factors differs from that proposed by Rimmer. See United States v. Mangum, 625 F.3d 466, 469 (8th Cir. 2010) (noting that an upward-variance sentence is reasonable where the court makes an individualized assessment of 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors based on facts presented and considers defendant s proffered mitigating information). -2- We conclude that the District Court properly considered the sentencing factors and that the sentence is not unreasonable, and we affirm the judgment of the District Court. ______________________________ -3-
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