United States v. Norod McCullough

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
• Decided: June 20, 2025
• Docket: 24-4539
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

USCA4 Appeal: 24-4539 Doc: 19 Filed: 06/20/2025 Pg: 1 of 4

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 24-4539

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

NOROD ARCANE MCCULLOUGH,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at Florence. Joseph Dawson, III, District Judge. (4:16-cr-00876-JD-1)

Submitted: June 17, 2025 Decided: June 20, 2025

Before GREGORY, QUATTLEBAUM, and BERNER, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

ON BRIEF: Emily Deck Harrill, Assistant Federal Public Defender, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellant. Matthew Howard Ellis, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Florence, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. USCA4 Appeal: 24-4539 Doc: 19 Filed: 06/20/2025 Pg: 2 of 4

PER CURIAM:

Norod Arcane McCullough appeals the district court’s judgment revoking his

supervised release and sentencing him to 37 months’ imprisonment, followed by six

months of supervised release. Counsel has filed a brief pursuant to Anders v. California,

386 U.S. 738 (1967), stating that there are no meritorious grounds for appeal. Although

informed of his right to file a pro se supplemental brief, McCullough has not done so. We

affirm.

We “review[] a district court’s decision to revoke a defendant’s supervised release

for abuse of discretion.” United States v. Dennison, 925 F.3d 185, 190 (4th Cir. 2019). A

court may revoke a defendant’s term of supervised release if it “finds by a preponderance

of the evidence that the defendant violated a condition of supervised release.” 18 U.S.C.

§ 3583(e)(3). Because McCullough admitted to or did not contest the alleged violations,

we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in revoking McCullough’s

supervised release.

“A district court has broad discretion when imposing a sentence upon revocation of

supervised release.” United States v. Webb, 738 F.3d 638, 640 (4th Cir. 2013). Thus, we

will “affirm a revocation sentence so long as it is within the prescribed statutory range and

is not plainly unreasonable.” United States v. Coston, 964 F.3d 289, 296 (4th Cir. 2020)

(internal quotation marks omitted). When reviewing whether a revocation sentence is

plainly unreasonable, we first determine “whether the sentence is unreasonable at all.” Id.

(internal quotation marks omitted).

2 USCA4 Appeal: 24-4539 Doc: 19 Filed: 06/20/2025 Pg: 3 of 4

“A revocation sentence is procedurally reasonable if the district court adequately

explains the chosen sentence after considering the Sentencing Guidelines’ nonbinding

Chapter Seven policy statements and the applicable 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors,” id. at 297

(internal quotation marks omitted), and the explanation indicates “that the court considered

any potentially meritorious arguments raised by the parties,” United States v. Patterson,

957 F.3d 426, 436-37 (4th Cir. 2020) (internal quotation marks omitted). “A court need

not be as detailed or specific when imposing a revocation sentence as it must be when

imposing a post-conviction sentence, but it still must provide a statement of reasons for the

sentence imposed.” United States v. Thompson, 595 F.3d 544, 547 (4th Cir. 2010) (internal

quotation marks omitted). “A revocation sentence is substantively reasonable if, in light

of the totality of the circumstances, the court states an appropriate basis for concluding that

the defendant should receive the sentence imposed.” Coston, 964 F.3d at 297 (internal

quotation marks omitted). A revocation sentence falling within the recommended policy

statement range is presumed substantively reasonable. See United States v. Gibbs, 897

F.3d 199, 204 (4th Cir. 2018).

We conclude that McCullough’s revocation sentence is both procedurally and

substantively reasonable. In imposing McCullough’s sentence, the district court correctly

calculated the policy statement range, considered the relevant statutory factors, imposed a

sentence within the statutory maximum, and gave sufficiently detailed reasons for its

decision. We also conclude that McCullough fails to rebut the presumption of substantive

reasonableness accorded to his within-policy-statement-range sentence. See id.

3 USCA4 Appeal: 24-4539 Doc: 19 Filed: 06/20/2025 Pg: 4 of 4

In accordance with Anders, we have reviewed the entire record in this case and have

found no meritorious grounds for appeal. We therefore affirm the district court’s judgment.

This court requires that counsel inform McCullough, in writing, of the right to petition the

Supreme Court of the United States for further review. If McCullough requests that a

petition be filed, but counsel believes that such a petition would be frivolous, then counsel

may move in this court for leave to withdraw from representation. Counsel’s motion must

state that a copy thereof was served on McCullough.

We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are

adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the

decisional process.

AFFIRMED