United States v. Willi Mendez

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
• Decided: September 25, 2025
• Docket: 22-11601
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 1 of 14

NOT FOR PUBLICATION

In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 22-11601 ____________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus

WILLI ARIEL MENDEZ, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida D.C. Docket No. 1:21-cr-20579-BB-1 ____________________ ____________________ No. 22-11605 ____________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 2 of 14

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JOSE FELIX VASQUEZ, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida D.C. Docket No. 1:21-cr-20579-BB-3 ____________________ ____________________ No. 22-11633 ____________________

ADALBERTO MARMOLEJOS, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida D.C. Docket No. 1:21-cr-20579-BB-2 ____________________

Before JILL PRYOR and LUCK, Circuit Judges, and COVINGTON, * Dis- trict Judge.

* Honorable Virginia Covington, United States District Judge for the Middle

District of Florida, sitting by designation. USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 3 of 14

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PER CURIAM: Appellants Willi Ariel Mendez, Jose Felix Vasquez, and Adal- berto Marmolejos pleaded guilty to conspiring to possess with in- tent to distribute cocaine on a vessel subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. On appeal, they raise constitutional challenges to their convictions. In addition, Marmolejos appeals his 75-month sentence. After careful consideration, we affirm. I. The criminal charges in this case arise from an incident when the United States Coast Guard spotted a boat, which bore no indicia of nationality, in the Caribbean Sea about 95 nautical miles off the coast of Aruba. The Coast Guard dispatched two of its ves- sels to investigate further. The two Coast Guard vessels ap- proached the boat, which did not stop. Instead, the boat remained underway while individuals on board threw packages overboard. One Coast Guard vessel recovered the jettisoned packages, which contained 226 kilograms of cocaine. The second Coast Guard ves- sel followed the boat, which stopped eventually. When a Coast Guard team boarded the boat, they found three individuals on board: Mendez, Vasquez, and Marmolejos. When the Coast Guard asked about the vessel’s nationality, Men- dez identified the Dominican Republic. The Coast Guard con- tacted the Dominican Republic, which could neither confirm nor deny the vessel’s nationality. Based on this response, the Coast Guard treated the boat as one without nationality and concluded that it was subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 4 of 14

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A grand jury in the Southern District of Florida returned an indictment charging Mendez, Vasquez, and Marmolejos with con- spiracy to possess with intent to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine while on board a vessel subject to the jurisdiction of the United States (Count One) and possession with intent to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine while on board a vessel subject to the jurisdiction of the United States (Count Two). Each defend- ant entered into a written plea agreement in which he agreed to plead guilty to Count One in exchange for the government’s dis- missal of Count Two. After pleading guilty but before sentencing, Mendez, Vasquez, and Marmolejos moved to dismiss the indictment for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. They acknowledged that they had been arrested and charged under the Maritime Drug Law Enforce- ment Act (“MDLEA”), 46 U.S.C. §§ 70501–08. They argued that the MDLEA was unconstitutional on its face and as applied to them. The district court denied the motions to dismiss. The district court sentenced each defendant to 75 months’ imprisonment. Because Marmolejos challenges his sentence as well as his conviction on appeal, we now discuss his sentencing in more detail. Before Marmolejos’s sentencing hearing, a probation officer prepared a presentence investigation report (“PSR”). The PSR in- cluded details about the offense based on statements Mendez, Vasquez, and Marmolejos made in post-arrest interviews. USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 5 of 14

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The PSR explained that before his arrest Marmolejos worked as a fisherman in the Dominican Republic. Mendez, who was a taxi driver, was his neighbor. Mendez was approached by a man known as Fermin about a job transporting cocaine from Co- lombia to the Dominican Republic. Fermin offered Mendez and Marmolejos $60,000 in total to transport the cocaine. Mendez and Marmolejos agreed to take the job. A few days later, Marmolejos received an initial payment of approximately $350. He then traveled with Mendez to a house in Barahona, Dominican Republic, owned by a man named Ezequiel. At the house, they were introduced to “El Botti,” who appeared to be Ezequiel and Fermin’s boss and traveled with two armed guards. From Barahona, Mendez and Marmolejos were taken by boat to a house in La Guajira, Colombia. They traveled there on a 23-foot boat with a single engine; the trip took two to three days. For several weeks, they stayed at the house in La Guajira, which belonged to a man named Fabian. On the day they were to depart Colombia and bring the drugs to the Dominican Republic, Mendez and Marmolejos met Vasquez for the first time. They reported that Vasquez’s family owned the cocaine they were transporting and Vasquez’s job was to keep the drugs secure. Vasquez, by contrast, did not say that his family owned the cocaine; instead, he said that a man named Mi- guel from Colombia recruited him to transport cocaine. USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 6 of 14

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On the evening of their departure, Mendez, Marmolejos, and Vasquez boarded the same boat in which Mendez and Mar- molejos had traveled to Colombia. For the journey to the Domin- ican Republic, the boat had been loaded with gasoline, food, water, a compass, and bales of cocaine. During the trip, Mendez and Mar- molejos, but not Vasquez, took shifts driving the boat. About 21 hours into the trip, the three men encountered the Coast Guard. Mendez reported that when they saw the Coast Guard, Vasquez ordered him and Marmolejos to throw the cocaine overboard. Vasquez said that all three men tossed the drugs off the boat. At Marmolejos’s sentencing hearing, the district court calcu- lated his total offense level as 31. Marmolejos sought a two-level reduction to his offense level, arguing that he played a minor role in the offense because his involvement was limited to transporting the drugs. He pointed out that he did not participate in preparing the boat, had no knowledge of the drug operation, did not own the boat or anything on it, did not recruit anyone to join the conspir- acy, and did not supervise anyone. The government opposed Marmolejos’s request for a mi- nor-role reduction. It argued that Marmolejos played more than a minor role given the amount of cocaine recovered from the boat. The district court refused to apply a minor-role reduction. It acknowledged that Marmolejos didn’t own the drugs, but it never- theless found that he played a critical role in the offense by trans- porting such a large quantity of drugs. The court then calculated Marmolejos’s guidelines range as 108 to 135 months’ USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 7 of 14

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imprisonment. It determined that a downward variance was appro- priate and imposed a sentence of 75 months. Mendez, Vasquez, and Marmolejos appeal. II. “A district court’s subject-matter jurisdiction is a question of law that we review de novo.” United States v. Canario-Vilomar, 128 F.4th 1374, 1378 (11th Cir. 2025). “Likewise, we review de novo the constitutionality of a criminal statute.” Id. “Although a guilty plea generally waives a defendant’s right to appeal his conviction, it does not waive the right to challenge the constitutionality of the statute underlying the conviction.” Id. We review a district court’s denial of a minor-role reduction at sentencing for clear error. United States v. Cruickshank, 837 F.3d 1182, 1192 (11th Cir. 2016). “Clear error review is deferential, and we will not disturb a district court’s findings unless we are left with a definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed.” Id. (citation modified). We have explained that a “district court’s choice between two permissible views of the evidence as to the de- fendant’s role in the offense will rarely constitute clear error so long as the basis of the trial court’s decision is supported by the record and does not involve a misapplication of a rule of law.” Id. (citation modified). USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 8 of 14

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III. We begin by addressing Mendez, Vasquez, and Mar- molejos’s challenge to their convictions. We then consider Mar- molejos’s sentencing challenge. A. The MDLEA makes it a crime to “knowingly or intention- ally . . . possess with intent to . . . distribute, a controlled sub- stance” on board “a vessel subject to the jurisdiction of the United States,” and to conspire to do the same. 46 U.S.C. §§ 70503(a)(1), (e)(1); 70506(b). The MDLEA defines “vessel subject to the jurisdic- tion of the United States” to include “a vessel without nationality.” Id. § 70502(c)(1)(A). A “vessel without nationality,” in turn, is de- fined to include “a vessel aboard which the master or individual in charge makes a claim of registry and for which the claimed nation of registry does not affirmatively and unequivocally assert that the vessel is of its nationality.” Id. § 70502(d)(1)(C). The MDLEA’s pro- hibitions apply even when the criminal conduct is “committed out- side the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.” Id. § 70503(b). The appellants raise three constitutional challenges to their MDLEA convictions. Each challenge is based, in whole or in part, on the Felonies Clause of the Constitution, which authorizes Con- gress to punish certain offenses committed on the high seas. See U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 10 (granting Congress the authority “[t]o define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas”). USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 9 of 14

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In their first challenge, the appellants argue that the Felonies Clause did not authorize their prosecutions because the waters where they were arrested are part of the exclusive economic zone of Venezuela.1 Relying on customary international law, they assert that waters that are part of another nation’s exclusive economic zone are not part of the high seas and thus the United States lacks jurisdiction to enforce the MDLEA over a vessel located on those waters. The appellants’ second challenge focuses on the MDLEA’s definition of a “vessel without nationality,” which includes a vessel for which the vessel’s master made a claim of nationality but the claimed nation did not affirmatively and unequivocally verify its nationality. See 46 U.S.C. § 70502(d)(1)(C). They argue that the power granted to Congress under the Felonies Clause is subject to customary international law, which does not permit a nation to deem a vessel stateless (and subject to its jurisdiction) when the vessel’s master makes a claim of nationality but the claimed nation neither confirms nor denies the vessel’s nationality. In their third challenge, the appellants argue that their pros- ecutions violated due process and exceeded Congress’s power

1 A nation’s exclusive economic zone sits just beyond its territorial waters but

within 200 nautical miles of the coastal baseline. United States v. Alfonso, 104 F.4th 815, 821 (11th Cir. 2024). We have described the concept of an ex- clusive economic zone as of “relatively modern vintage.” Canario-Vilomar, 128 F.4th at 1382; see also Alfonso, 104 F.4th at 823 (explaining that at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, the concept of an exclusive economic zone “did not exist”). USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 10 of 14

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under the Felonies Clause because their offenses had no connec- tion or nexus to the United States. Each of these challenges is foreclosed by precedent. First, we have held that other countries’ exclusive economic zones are “part of the ‘high seas’ for purposes of the Felonies Clause” and thus “en- forcement of the MDLEA in [exclusive economic zones] is proper.” United States v. Alfonso, 104 F.4th 815, 823, 827 (11th Cir. 2024). In reaching this conclusion, we rejected the same argument the ap- pellants make here: that “Congress’s authority under the Felonies Clause to define and punish felonies committed on the ‘high seas’ is limited by customary international law.” Id. at 825. Second, we have held that Congress did not exceed its au- thority under the Felonies Clause when it defined “vessel without nationality” in the MDLEA to include vessels for which a claimed nation neither confirmed nor denied registration. See Canario-Vi- lomar, 128 F.4th at 1381. We held that “international law cannot limit Congress’s authority to define ‘stateless vessel’ for purposes of the MDLEA.” Id. Third, we have rejected a constitutional challenge to the MDLEA when a defendant asserted that his vessel lacked a suffi- cient nexus to the United States. See United States v. Campbell, 743 F.3d 802, 810–12 (11th Cir. 2014). “[W]e have long upheld the authority of Congress to extend the criminal jurisdiction of this country to any stateless vessel in international waters engaged in the distribution of controlled substances.” Id. (citation modified). We have recognized that the prosecution of a noncitizen “captured USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 11 of 14

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on the high seas while drug trafficking” does not offend due process because the MDLEA “provides clear notice that all nations prohibit and condemn drug trafficking aboard stateless vessels on the high seas.” Id. at 812; see also Canario-Vilomar, 128 F.4th at 1382–83 (hold- ing that nexus challenge was foreclosed by precedent). As we explained, binding precedent forecloses the constitu- tional challenges that Mendez, Vasquez, and Marmolejos raise. Our earlier decisions bind us because they have not been over- turned or undermined to the point of abrogation by the Supreme Court or this Court sitting en banc. See United States v. Archer, 531 F.3d 1347, 1352 (11th Cir. 2008). Accordingly, we affirm the de- fendants’ convictions. B. That leaves us with Marmolejos’s challenge to the denial of a minor-role adjustment at sentencing. Under the Sentencing Guidelines, a defendant is entitled to a two-level decrease in his of- fense level if he was a “minor participant” in the criminal activity. U.S. Sent’g Guidelines Manual § 3B1.2(b). A “minor participant” is someone “who is less culpable than most other participants in the criminal activity, but whose role could not be described as mini- mal.” Id. § 3B1.2 cmt. n.5. The decision whether to apply a minor- role adjustment is “based on the totality of the circumstances and involves a determination that is heavily dependent upon the facts of the particular case.” Id. § 3B1.2 cmt. n.3(C); see United States v. Rodriguez De Varon, 175 F.3d 930, 934 (11th Cir. 1999) (en banc) (dis- cussing a district court’s discretion in determining the defendant’s USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 12 of 14

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role in the offense). The defendant bears the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that he had a minor role. Rodri- guez De Varon, 175 F.3d at 939. We have instructed district courts to follow a two-step framework when deciding whether to grant a minor-role adjust- ment. First, the court considers “the defendant’s role in the rele- vant conduct for which [he] has been held accountable at sentenc- ing.” Id. at 940. This inquiry focuses on whether the defendant “played a relatively minor role in the conduct for which [he] has already been held accountable—not a minor role in any larger criminal conspiracy.” Id. at 944. Second, the court evaluates the de- fendant’s “role as compared to that of other participants in [the] relevant conduct.” Id. at 940. The commentary to § 3B1.2 guides district courts when evaluating minor-role adjustments. It directs them to consider sev- eral factors: “the degree to which the defendant understood the scope and structure of the criminal activity,” “the degree to which [he] participated in planning or organizing the criminal activity,” “the degree to which [he] exercised decision-making authority,” “the nature and extent of [his] participation in the commission of the criminal activity,” and “the degree to which [he] stood to ben- efit from the criminal activity.” U.S.S.G. § 3B1.2 cmt. n.3(C). USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 13 of 14

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We conclude that the district court did not clearly err in find- ing that Marmolejos did not have a minor role. 2 He knowingly par- ticipated in a scheme to smuggle a large quantity of cocaine, 226 kilograms, from Colombia to the Dominican Republic. He was to be paid a substantial sum of money, $30,000, for transporting the drugs. Importantly, his role in driving the boat was critical to this scheme. These facts support an inference that Marmolejos’s role was not minor. See Rodriguez De Varon, 175 F.3d at 946 (holding that district court’s finding that defendant who transported a large quantity of drugs did not play a minor role was not clearly errone- ous because “her participation was central to the importation scheme”). Marmolejos nevertheless argues that he should have re- ceived a minor-role reduction because he was less culpable than others who participated in the conspiracy. He says that Mendez was more culpable because Mendez was the captain of the vessel and introduced Marmolejos to Fermin. And Marmolejos asserts that Vasquez was more culpable because his family owned the drugs and he was responsible for keeping the drugs secure on the trip, while Marmolejos merely drove the boat.

2 The government argues that we should review this issue under a manifest

injustice standard because although Marmolejos argued during the sentencing hearing that he was entitled to a minor-role adjustment, he failed to raise the objection again when the court announced his sentence. We need not decide whether Marmolejos was required to object again after the district court an- nounced his sentence. Even assuming he adequately preserved this issue for appellate review, his challenge fails under clear-error review. USCA11 Case: 22-11601 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 09/25/2025 Page: 14 of 14

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After comparing Marmolejos’s role to the roles of Mendez and Vasquez, we are not left with a definite and firm conviction that the district court made a mistake in finding that Marmolejos’s role was not minor. After all, “it is possible that none [of the partic- ipants] are minor . . . participants.” Rodriguez De Varon, 175 F.3d at 944–45; see United States v. Valois, 915 F.3d 717, 732–33 (11th Cir. 2019) (holding that district court did not clearly err in denying a minor-role reduction to defendants found aboard a stateless vessel even though no one aboard the vessel received a role reduction). Marmolejos further argues that he was entitled to receive a minor-role reduction because his participation was minor when compared to that of other individuals, including Fermin, Ezekiel, El Botti, and Fabian. But the relevant conduct here was limited to smuggling the 226 kilograms that Mendez, Vasquez, and Mar- molejos actually transported on the boat, not a larger conspiracy involving other drug trafficking. Given this focus, we cannot say that the district court clearly erred. See Rodriguez De Varon, 175 F.3d at 944. AFFIRMED.