21-2094 United States v. Rascoll
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.
1 At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, held at the 2 Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of New York, on the 3 18th day of July, two thousand twenty-three. 4 5 Present: 6 EUNICE C. LEE, 7 ALISON J. NATHAN, 8 Circuit Judges, 9 JED S. RAKOFF, * 10 District Judge. 11 12 _____________________________________ 13 14 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 15 16 Plaintiff-Appellee, 17 18 v. No. 21-2094 19 20 CHRISTOPHER RASCOLL, 21 22 Defendant-Appellant. 23 _____________________________________ 24 25 26
*
Judge Jed S. Rakoff, United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, sitting by designation.
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1 For Defendant-Appellant: ANDREW GIERING (Tracy Hayes, on the brief), Assistant 2 Federal Defenders, for Terence S. Ward, Federal 3 Defender, New Haven, CT. 4 5 For Plaintiff-Appellee: ROBERT S. RUFF (Amanda S. Oakes and Marc H. 6 Silverman, on the brief), Assistant United States 7 Attorneys, for Leonard C. Boyle, United States 8 Attorney for the District of Connecticut, New Haven, 9 CT. 10 11 Appeal from an order of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut
12 (Dooley, J.). 13 UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND 14 DECREED that the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED. 15 Defendant-Appellant Christopher Rascoll appeals from a sentence entered by the district 16 court after Rascoll pleaded guilty to one count of interference with the right to fair housing in 17 violation of 42 U.S.C. § 3631(a) and one count of sending threatening communications in violation 18 of 18 U.S.C. § 875(c). Rascoll was sentenced principally to an above-Guidelines sentence of 36 19 months’ imprisonment. On appeal, Rascoll argues that the district court committed procedural 20 error by imposing a sentence without properly calculating the Guidelines range, specifically 21 without determining whether he was entitled to a two-point reduction for acceptance of 22 responsibility. Rascoll also argues that the district court’s imposition of the above-Guidelines 23 sentence was substantively unreasonable. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying 24 facts, the procedural history of the case, and the issues on appeal, which we reference here only as 25 necessary to explain our decision. 26 From approximately November 2019 to June 2020, Rascoll repeatedly sent a Jewish 27 woman antisemitic text messages and voicemails in which he threatened her with violence and 28 death. After Rascoll was arrested and charged, psychiatric professionals diagnosed him with
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1 several mental illnesses, including schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, and paranoid 2 personality disorder. Probation calculated Rascoll’s Guidelines range as between 15 and 21 3 months’ imprisonment based on a criminal history category of I and an offense level of 14. As 4 part of his later plea agreement, Rascoll accepted responsibility for the underlying offense conduct 5 and, in exchange, the government, like probation, recommended a sentence within the Guidelines 6 range of 15 to 21 months’ imprisonment—which reflected the two-point offense level reduction 7 for acceptance of responsibility. Without that reduction, the Guidelines range for Rascoll’s 8 conduct was 24 to 30 months’ imprisonment. 9 On August 14, 2021, shortly before his scheduled sentencing, Rascoll sent a letter to the 10 Rockland County District Attorney’s office, which was prosecuting Rascoll for charges related to 11 similar offense conduct. In that letter, Rascoll stated in relevant part: “You will NEVER succeed 12 on any conviction nor will you succeed at putting me in [mental health treatment] . . . Neither will 13 little [victim’s first name], the Aryan, Drug Running Jew who is an active opiate user but claims 14 to be a sober alcoholic. NUTS.” Joint App’x at 56. The letter also threatened the state 15 prosecutor with a violent sexual assault, described in graphic detail. 16 On August 25, 2021, the district court proceeded with sentencing. During the sentencing 17 hearing, the court expressed skepticism regarding whether Rascoll had truly accepted 18 responsibility for his crimes in light of the August 14 letter. See Joint App’x at 105–06 (“It is not 19 entirely clear to me that an adjustment for acceptance of responsibility is appropriate on this 20 record,” because of “the letter he sent to the Assistant District Attorney last week in which more 21 of the same conduct occurred, which would suggest that he has not forsaken his criminal 22 activity . . . .”). Regarding the length of sentence, the district court stated that giving Rascoll 23 “credit for acceptance of responsibility . . . is not going to impact the sentence in this case” because 24 “[w]hether the range is 15 to 21 months or 24 to 30 months . . . the Guideline range does not
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1 adequately capture the seriousness of the offense.” Joint App’x at 140. The court continued 2 that “the Guidelines—again, whether it’s 24 to 30 months or 15 to 21—woefully under[value] the 3 need . . . for this sentence to meet the goals of sentencing: [s]pecific deterrence, incapacitation, 4 and rehabilitation.” Joint App’x at 141. On August 26, 2021, the district court sentenced 5 Rascoll to an above-Guidelines term of 36 months’ imprisonment. 6 “We review a district court’s interpretation and application of the Guidelines de novo, and 7 its factual findings for clear error.” United States v. Solis, 18 F.4th 395, 401 (2d Cir. 2021) 8 (citations omitted). However, “we review sentences only for reasonableness, a deferential 9 standard limited to identifying abuse of discretion regardless of whether a challenged sentence is 10 inside, just outside, or significantly outside the Guidelines range.” United States v. Jones, 531 11 F.3d 163, 170 (2d Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). 12 On appeal, Rascoll argues that the district court did not properly calculate the Guidelines 13 range and thus committed procedural error by imposing a sentence “where there was no 14 complicated question of law or fact that prevented [it] from deciding whether” the offense level 15 reduction for acceptance of responsibility applied. Appellant’s Br. at 11. It is clearly 16 established that “[f]ailure to calculate the correct Guidelines range constitutes procedural error.” 17 Peugh v. United States, 569 U.S. 530, 537 (2013). However, “[i]f we identify procedural error 18 in a sentence, but the record indicates clearly that the district court would have imposed the same 19 sentence in any event, the error may be deemed harmless, avoiding the need to vacate the sentence 20 and to remand the case for resentencing.” Solis, 18 F.4th at 401 (citation omitted); see also 21 United States v. Jass, 569 F.3d 47, 68 (2d Cir. 2009). Here, even assuming arguendo that the 22 district court committed procedural error, that error would have been harmless. During 23 sentencing, the district court repeatedly stated that neither Guidelines range—15 to 21 months with 24 the acceptance of responsibility reduction, or 24 to 30 months without the reduction—reflected the
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1 gravity of Rascoll’s underlying conduct. Thus, the district court clearly indicated that it would 2 have “imposed the same sentence in any event,” Solis, 18 F.4th at 401, rendering any potential 3 error harmless. 4 Rascoll additionally claims that his sentence is substantively unreasonable. We give 5 particular deference to district courts when considering questions of substantive unreasonableness 6 and “[w]e will identify as substantively unreasonable only those sentences that are so shockingly 7 high, shockingly low, or otherwise unsupportable as a matter of law that allowing them to stand 8 would damage the administration of justice.” Solis, 18 F.4th at 401–02 (citation omitted); see 9 also United States v. Richardson, 958 F.3d 151, 153–54 (2d Cir. 2020). Rascoll’s sentence to six 10 months above the upper Guidelines range of 30 months is not “shockingly high.” Solis, 18 F.4th 11 at 401. This is especially true in light of the district court’s explanation for why it believed that 12 a longer sentence was necessary—the seriousness of the offense and the need for deterrence, 13 incapacitation, and rehabilitation. It was not unreasonable for the district court to conclude that, 14 in this instance, neither potential Guidelines range met those stated goals for sentencing. 15 Accordingly, under the circumstances of this case, the district court did not impose a substantively 16 unreasonable sentence. 17 We have considered Rascoll’s remaining arguments and find them to be without merit. 18 Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.
19 FOR THE COURT: 20 Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk