United States v. Gomez

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
• Decided: September 9, 2025
• Docket: 24-347
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

24-347-cr United States v. Gomez

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT SUMMARY ORDER RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED BY FEDERAL RULE OF APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT’S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRONIC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION “SUMMARY ORDER”). A PARTY CITING A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL.

At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of New York, on the 9th day of September, two thousand twenty-five. Present: GUIDO CALABRESI, BARRINGTON D. PARKER, JR., WILLIAM J. NARDINI, Circuit Judges. _____________________________________ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Appellee, v. 24-347-cr ANTHONY GOMEZ, Defendant-Appellant. _____________________________________

For Appellee: CHELSEA L. SCISM (Jacob R. Fiddelman, on the brief), Assistant United States Attorneys, for Edward Y. Kim, Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, New York, NY.

For Defendant-Appellant: DANIEL M. PEREZ, Law Offices of Daniel M. Perez, Newton, NJ.

Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of

New York (Jesse M. Furman, District Judge).

1 UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND

DECREED that the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.

Defendant-Appellant Anthony Gomez appeals from a judgment of the United States

District Court for the Southern District of New York (Jesse M. Furman, District Judge) entered on

January 26, 2024, following his guilty plea to one count of possessing ammunition after a felony

conviction. The offense occurred while Gomez was serving the final portion of a prior federal

prison sentence at a halfway house in the Bronx, New York, which permitted inmates to leave the

facility for limited time periods for specific purposes. While away from the facility on an approved

day pass in June 2023, Gomez obtained a gun and was carrying it in his sweatshirt on a Bronx

street when he encountered New York City Police Department officers patrolling the area. After

initially trying to hide the gun in the wheel well of a car, Gomez grabbed the gun, ignored the

officers’ orders to put it down, and ran down the street, prompting the officers to give chase. As

the officers closed in, Gomez fired a shot in their direction; although several officers and

bystanders, including a family with young children, were in the vicinity, no one was hit. Gomez

evaded the officers and hid in a nearby building, but he was apprehended several hours later.

The district court sentenced Gomez to 120 months in prison—more than double the high

end of the advisory sentencing range under the United States Sentencing Guidelines—followed by

three years of supervised release. On appeal, Gomez argues that the court erred in imposing a

search condition as a special condition of supervised release without orally pronouncing the entire

condition and articulating an adequate justification for it, and that his sentence is substantively

unreasonable. 1 We assume the parties’ familiarity with the case.

1 The search condition reads: “You shall submit your person, and any property, residence, vehicle, papers,

computer, other electronic communication, data storage devices, cloud storage or media, and effects to a search by

2 I. Oral Pronouncement of the Search Condition

Gomez urges us to strike the search condition as a special condition of supervised release

because the district court did not orally recite its full terms at sentencing, which he argues violated

Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 43(a). But we have recently held that “a sentencing court need

not read the full text of every condition on the record.” United States v. Maiorana, No. 22-1115-

CR, 2025 WL 2471027, at *6 (2d Cir. Aug. 28, 2025) (en banc). Rather, the court may “as part of

the pronouncement of the sentence in the presence of the defendant during the sentencing

proceeding, expressly adopt or specifically incorporate by reference particular conditions that have

been set forth in writing and made available to defendant in the [Presentence Report], the

Guidelines, or a notice adopted by the court.” Id. That is precisely what happened here. The

search condition was contained verbatim in the Presentence Report, which Gomez confirmed he

had read and discussed with his lawyer prior to sentencing. And when the district court

pronounced the sentence, it expressly cross-referenced the Presentence Report, stating that Gomez

“must meet the special conditions that are set forth on page 34 [of the Presentence Report],

including the search condition.” App’x 114. Accordingly, Gomez’s challenge to his condition of

supervised release fails.

II. Reasonableness of the Sentence

Gomez also argues that his sentence was procedurally and substantively unreasonable. We

review the procedural and substantive reasonableness of a sentence “under a deferential abuse-of-

discretion standard.” United States v. Yilmaz, 910 F.3d 686, 688 (2d Cir. 2018).

any United States Probation Officer, and if needed, with the assistance of any law enforcement. The search is to be conducted when there is reasonable suspicion concerning violation of a condition of supervision or unlawful conduct by the person being supervised. Failure to submit to a search may be grounds for revocation of release. You shall warn any other occupants that the premises may be subject to searches pursuant to this condition. Any search shall be conducted at a reasonable time and in a reasonable manner.” App’x 122.

3 A. Procedural Reasonableness

Gomez contends that the search condition was procedurally unreasonable because the

district court “failed to make particularized findings explaining why it was necessary.”

Appellant’s Br. 38. He also argues that the search condition is overbroad because it authorizes the

search of electronic devices. “A district court is required to make an individualized assessment

when determining whether to impose a special condition of supervised release, and to state on the

record the reason for imposing it; the failure to do so is error.” United States v. Betts, 886 F.3d

198, 202 (2d Cir. 2018). Absent such an explanation, we will affirm only if “the district court’s

reasoning is self-evident in the record.” Id. Moreover, the district court “generally need not

articulate separate reasons for imposing every single special condition where it has already

explained the overall reasons for its sentencing decision.” United States v. Thompson, 143 F.4th

169, 178 (2d Cir. 2025). Because Gomez did not raise this argument at sentencing, we review for

plain error. See United States v. Smith, 949 F.3d 60, 66 (2d Cir. 2020).

The justification for the search condition is self-evident in the record. As the district court

recognized at sentencing, Gomez has now been convicted of four firearms offenses, and this

offense was “extraordinarily serious.” App’x 110. Within hours of leaving his halfway house,

Gomez was able to acquire a loaded firearm and shortly thereafter used that gun to shoot toward

police officers “in broad daylight on a crowded street with a family with small children in the

vicinity.” Id. Gomez’s three prior firearms convictions arose from four incidents in which he

engaged in violent conduct that created a substantial risk of injuring others: in the first, he struck

one victim on the head with a gun and threatened another while pointing a gun at her in the second,

he discharged a gun several times; and in the third and fourth, he pistol-whipped victims in two

separate armed robberies. Gomez’s repeated possession of firearms alone provides a sufficient

4 basis for the search condition. Several additional factors support the district court’s decision,

including that Gomez admitted to possessing a dangerous weapon while serving his prior federal

prison sentence, and that he attempted to bring drugs (or what appeared to be drugs) into jail on

multiple occasions. In short, the record leaves no doubt that the imposition of the search condition

was an appropriate exercise of the district court’s broad discretion.

And contrary to Gomez’s argument that the electronics component of the condition is

unsupported, we have explained that it is unnecessary for a district court to “limit a search

condition to the contours of a defendant’s prior misconduct—and parse through whether those

violations entailed the discovery of particular evidence in, say, his home versus his phone versus

his car or other property . . . given that the search condition as written already requires reasonable

suspicion that evidence of a current violation will be found in one of those areas.” Thompson, 143

F.4th at 181. And in any event, the record shows that while Gomez was hiding from the police,

he used his cell phone to call his halfway house to lie about being unable to make curfew.

Accordingly, even if there were a requirement that the electronic portion of a search condition

must be justified by reference to the defendant’s prior misconduct, such a requirement would have

been self-evidently satisfied in this case.

B. Substantive Reasonableness

Gomez also argues that his 120-month sentence, which far exceeded the Guidelines range

of 46 to 57 months, was substantively unreasonable. A sentence is substantively unreasonable

“when it is manifestly unjust or when it shocks the conscience.” United States v. Mumuni, 946

F.3d 97, 107 (2d Cir. 2019). When reviewing for substantive reasonableness, “we take into

account the totality of the circumstances, giving due deference to the sentencing judge’s exercise

of discretion, and bearing in mind the institutional advantages of district courts.” United States v.

5 Cavera, 550 F.3d 180, 190 (2d Cir. 2008) (en banc).

The district court thoroughly explained its reasons for imposing a 120-month sentence. It

first acknowledged that it considered the sentencing factors set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), as

required, and that it had an obligation to “impose a sentence that is sufficient, but no greater than

necessary, to serve the purposes of sentencing.” App’x 109. Turning to its decision, the court

agreed with defense counsel that the statutory maximum sentence of 180 months would be

excessive but concluded that an above-Guidelines sentence was warranted. The court determined

that “the seriousness of this offense is . . . not adequately reflected in the [G]uideline[s] in the sense

that it’s not simply possession of ammunition by someone previously convicted of a felony.” Id.

at 110. The offense “also involved [Gomez] firing a gun in broad daylight on a crowded street

with a family with small children in the vicinity and in the direction of police officers,” and he did

this while he was already “in federal custody, serving the end of a lengthy sentence [imposed] in

this Court.” Id. Although the court took Gomez at his word that he did not “actually intend to hit

anyone” when he fired the shot, it emphasized that his conduct was “extraordinarily risky” and

“easily could have resulted in serious injury, if not death.” Id. at 110–11. The court also placed

substantial weight on Gomez’s criminal record. “He may not be an armed career criminal in the

legal sense of the word, but he certainly is in the lay sense of the word,” the court observed, noting

that this was Gomez’s seventh conviction overall, his second federal conviction, and his fourth for

a firearm offense. Id. at 111. Further, the court noted that Gomez has “had repeated parole

violations and repeated disciplinary violations in prison.” Id. In short, the court concluded,

Gomez’s “record demonstrates . . . repeated violations of the law with respect to firearms,

escalating violence; and a complete[] inability to conform behavior to the law and peaceful

behavior.” Id.

6 Although Gomez’s 120-month sentence constitutes a substantial upward variance from the

Guidelines range, the district court’s decision was not substantively unreasonable. Gomez argues

that the court did not adequately consider mitigating factors, and that there is “more to [him] than

simply his offense of conviction.” Appellant’s Br. 51. But the court did consider various

mitigating factors, including that Gomez did not intend to hit anyone when he fired toward the

officers, and the difficult conditions of confinement that he experienced during the COVID-19

pandemic. At bottom, this argument amounts to a disagreement with the court’s decision to

prioritize certain of the § 3553(a) factors, but that alone does not provide a basis for invalidating

the sentence. See United States v. Pope, 554 F.3d 240, 246 (2d Cir. 2009) (“[W]e have never held

that a district court’s particular reliance on one factor to justify departing from the Guidelines is

suggestive of unreasonableness; we have only said that unjustified reliance upon any one factor

suggests unreasonableness.”). Considering all the reasons set forth by the district court, and

affording its decision due deference, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion

in imposing a sentence of 120 months.

* * *

We have considered Gomez’s remaining arguments and find them to be unpersuasive.

Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

FOR THE COURT:

Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk