United States v. Gregory James, No. 17-1291 (8th Cir. 2017)
Annotate this CaseCourt Description: Per Curiam - Before Wollman, Loken and Colloton, Circuit Judges] Criminal case - Sentencing. Anders case. The court did not err in denying defendant's request for a reduction based on acceptance of responsibility; in any event, any error in denying the reduction was harmless as defendant received a sentence below the guidelines range which would have resulted from an award of the reduction. [ December 18, 2017
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United States Court of Appeals For the Eighth Circuit ___________________________ No. 17-1291 ___________________________ United States of America lllllllllllllllllllll Plaintiff - Appellee v. Gregory M. James lllllllllllllllllllll Defendant - Appellant ____________ Appeal from United States District Court for the District of South Dakota - Sioux Falls ____________ Submitted: December 14, 2017 Filed: December 19, 2017 [Unpublished] ____________ Before WOLLMAN, LOKEN, and COLLOTON, Circuit Judges. ____________ PER CURIAM. In this direct criminal appeal, Gregory James challenges the sentence the district court1 imposed following his guilty plea to a child-support offense. His 1 The Honorable Karen E. Schreier, United States District Judge for the District of South Dakota. counsel has moved to withdraw and submitted a brief under Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967), challenging the denial of acceptance of responsibility points, and a probation condition. We conclude that the district court did not clearly err in denying acceptance-of-responsibility points, see United States v. Bastian, 603 F.3d 460, 465 (8th Cir. 2010) (standard of review), see United States v. Spurlock, 495 F.3d 1011, 1014 (8th Cir. 2007), and, in any event, any error was harmless, as James was sentenced below the Guidelines range that would have applied had he been granted a 3-point reduction for acceptance of responsibility, see United States v. Strong, 773 F.3d 920, 926 (8th Cir. 2014); and that his challenge to the probation condition is unavailing. Finally, we have independently reviewed the record under Penson v. Ohio, 488 U.S. 75 (1988), and have found no non-frivolous issues for appeal. Accordingly, we grant counsel’s motion, and affirm. ______________________________ -2-
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