United States v. Chagoya-Morales

859 F.3d 411, 2017 WL 2486022, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 10277
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedJune 9, 2017
DocketNo. 16-1198
StatusPublished
Cited by36 cases

This text of 859 F.3d 411 (United States v. Chagoya-Morales) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Chagoya-Morales, 859 F.3d 411, 2017 WL 2486022, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 10277 (7th Cir. 2017).

Opinion

RIPPLE, Circuit Judge.

Jose Chagoya-Morales was charged with illegally reentering the United States after deportation, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a) and 6 U.S.C. § 202(4). He entered a conditional plea of guilty; the district court sentenced him to forty-eight months’ imprisonment. He now contends that the district court should have conducted an evidentiary hearing before denying his motion to suppress information related to his identity and his status as an illegal [414]*414resident of the United States. Mr. Chago-ya-Morales also challenges two aspects of his sentence: (1) whether the district court correctly increased his offense level by sixteen levels under the “crime of violence” enhancement in U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b)(l)(A)(ii); and (2) whether his forty-eight month sentence was procedurally sound and substantively reasonable.

We affirm the judgment of the district court in all respects. The court correctly denied the motion to suppress; under these circumstances, the Fourth Amendment does not prohibit a police officer from requiring a person to identify him-self, nor does it guarantee a defendant the right to conceal who he is during a criminal prosecution. The district court also correctly applied the career offender enhancement because Mr. Chagoya-Morales’s prior Illinois aggravated robbery conviction is a crime of violence under U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b). Finally, the imposed sentence is procedurally sound and substantively reasonable. The district court correctly calculated Mr. Chagoya-Morales’s guidelines range and appropriately justified a downward variance based on the relevant factors under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).

I

BACKGROUND

A.

Mr. Chagoya-Morales, a native and citizen of Mexico, illegally entered the United States sometime prior to April 2008. On April 9 of that year, the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois, convicted him of aggravated robbery and imposed a sentence of six years’ imprisonment. Several months later, however, in August 2009, the federal government deported him to Mexico. After his removal, Mr. Chagoya-Morales did not obtain permission to reenter the United States.

On January 16, 2015, officers with the Chicago Police Department (“CPD”) conducted a traffic stop on a vehicle in which Mr. Chagoya-Morales was a passenger. Police reports indicate that the driver of the car, Cynthia Deantes, was stopped because the officers allegedly observed her using her cell phone while driving. As the officers approached Deantes’s car, they smelled a strong odor of cannabis emanating from the vehicle, conducted a pat down search of Mr. Chagoya-Morales, and recovered a small plastic bag containing a small amount of marijuana from his sock. The officers then arrested Mr. Chagoya-Mor-ales.

At the police station, officers advised Mr. Chagoya-Morales of his Miranda rights and continued to question him. When the officers learned that Mr. Chago-ya-Morales was in the country illegally and that he previously had been deported due to a past felony conviction, they contacted Immigration and Customs Enforcement. On March 11, 2015, a federal grand jury returned a one-count indictment, charging Mr. Chagoya-Morales with illegal reentry into the United States, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a) and 6 U.S.C. § 202(C).1 The record before us contains no indication that he was prosecuted for marijuana possession. .

B.

Mr. Chagoya-Morales filed a motion to suppress. He contended that the traffic stop was illegal and that therefore the Government’s knowledge of his name and his immigration status should be suppressed as “fruit of the poisonous tree.”2 [415]*415To support his motion, Mr. Chagoya-Mor-ales attached an affidavit of Deantes, the driver of the vehicle. Deantes and Mr. Chagoya-Morales maintained that the police officers had no reason to stop the vehicle: Deantes was not using her cell phone while driving; she was not accused of committing any other offenses; and there was no outstanding warrant for Mr. Chagoya-Morales.

After considering the parties’ briefs, the district court denied the motion to suppress. Basing its decision on United States v. Garcia-Garcia, 633 F.3d 608, 616 (7th Cir. 2011), the court explained:

The Seventh Circuit has already rejected such a legal argument, explaining that “[t]he body or identity of a defendant or respondent in a criminal or civil proceeding is never itself suppressible as a fruit of an unlawful arrest, even if it is conceded that an unlawful arrest, search, or interrogation occurred.” United States v. Garcia-Garcia, 633 F.3d 608, 616 (7th Cir. 2011) (internal quotations omitted) (quoting INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. 1032, 1039-40 [104 S.Ct. 3479, 82 L.Ed.2d 778] (1984)). The Seventh Circuit has made clear that a person “having previously been deported, and not having obtained the consent of the Attorney General” or Secretary of Homeland Security “to return, is a person whose presence in this country, without more, constitutes a crime,” and that “[h]is identity may not be suppressed.” [3]

Since the evidence at issue could not be suppressed, the court saw no reason to hold an evidentiary hearing on the motion to suppress. It was irrelevant whether the traffic stop was legal.

Mr. Chagoya-Morales entered a conditional plea of guilty in which he admitted that he illegally had reentered the United States after a previous removal. The plea agreement specifically preserved his right to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress. -

C.

Mr. Chagoya-Morales’s plea agreement contained a preliminary calculation of his sentencing guidelines range. The agreement outlined that, pursuant to § 2L1.2(b)(l)(A)(ii) of the Guidelines, Mr. Chagoya-Morales’s base offense level of eight would be increased by sixteen levels because he previously was removed after being convicted of a felony that constituted a crime of violence. The plea agreement also preserved Mr. Chagoya-Morales’s right to appeal any issues related to sentencing.

In the Presentence Investigation Report (“PSR”), the probation officer agreed with the preliminary determination in the plea agreement. The report concluded that Mr. Chagoya-Morales qualified for the sixteen-level enhancement under § 2L1.2(b)(l)(A)(ii) of the Guidelines because he had a felony conviction under Illinois law for aggravated robbery. Mr. Chagoya-Morales objected to this enhancement. He argued that, because aggravated robbery “is not specifically listed as a ‘crime of violence’ in FSG § 2L1.2, application note l(B)(iii), it must satisfy the definition in the ‘force clause’ of § 2L1.2.”4

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
859 F.3d 411, 2017 WL 2486022, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 10277, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-chagoya-morales-ca7-2017.