US v. Goodwin, Jr.

Filing

OPINION issued by Juan R. Torruella, Appellate Judge; Sandra L. Lynch, Appellate Judge and William J. Kayatta, Jr., Appellate Judge. Published. [16-1981]

Case: 16-1981

Document: 00117186640

Page: 1

Date Filed: 08/08/2017

Entry ID: 6111356

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 16-1981
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Appellee,
v.
FORREST T. GOODWIN, JR.,
Defendant, Appellant.

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MAINE
[Hon. John A. Woodcock, Jr., U.S. District Judge]

Before
Torruella, Lynch, and Kayatta,
Circuit Judges.

Jeffrey W. Langholtz, by appointment of the court, on brief
for appellant.
Renée M. Bunker, Assistant United States Attorney, and
Richard W. Murphy, Acting United States Attorney, on brief for
appellee.

August 8, 2017

Case: 16-1981

Document: 00117186640

Page: 2

LYNCH, Circuit Judge.

Date Filed: 08/08/2017

Entry ID: 6111356

After his conviction in 2012 for

acting as an accessory after the fact to an armed credit union
robbery,

Forrest

Goodwin

was

sentenced

to

forty-two

months'

imprisonment, to be followed by three years of supervised release
subject to standard and special conditions.

During the period of

supervised release, Goodwin repeatedly violated release conditions
pertaining to substance abuse.

In 2016, he was arrested, and the

U.S. Probation Office filed a petition for revocation of his
supervised release.

At the revocation hearing, the district court

sentenced Goodwin to ten months' imprisonment, to be followed by
two years of supervised release subject to the same previously
imposed conditions.
Goodwin

On appeal from the revocation sentence,

challenges

the

term

and

the

substance-abuse-related

conditions of his supervised release sentence.

We affirm.

I.
In June 2012, Goodwin was found guilty of acting as an
accessory after the fact to an armed credit union robbery.

There

was trial evidence that Goodwin used the robbery proceeds to
purchase

drugs.

Goodwin's

presentence

investigation

report

("PSR") for the robbery offense disclosed a history of substance
abuse and drug-related prior convictions.

Adopting the PSR's

guidelines sentencing range of thirty-seven to forty-six months,
the

district

court

sentenced

Goodwin

to

forty-two

months'

imprisonment, to be followed by three years of supervision.

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Among

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Entry ID: 6111356

other conditions for release, the court mandated that Goodwin not
use

or

possess

any

controlled

substance,

alcohol,

or

other

intoxicant; that he participate in a substance-abuse treatment
program; and that he report to his probation officer for testing.
Goodwin was released from prison in December 2014, but
arrested again in May 2016 following his repeated violations of
supervised-release conditions.

The Revocation Report carefully

described the many instances of Goodwin's continued drug use,
failure to report for testing, and refusal to submit to further
testing.

The report also noted that Goodwin made statements to

his probation officer denying that he had a drug-addiction problem.
At the revocation hearing, Goodwin admitted to all of these
violations.

Goodwin's counsel explained, there is "no question

that [Goodwin] is addicted to opiate drugs"; "[i]f given [a] second
chance, [Goodwin] understands that he now needs to work with, and
not against, his probation officer"; "[Goodwin] is in agreement
with the 24-month term of supervised release" and "understands
that basically he needs to do all of his supervised release over
again"; and "really what [Goodwin] has is a drug problem and he's
trying to address it."
The district court remembered Goodwin's case "extremely
well," having presided over Goodwin's trial and sentencing hearing
in 2012.

In revoking Goodwin's original supervised release, the

court imposed a ten-month prison term, to be followed by two years

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Entry ID: 6111356

of supervised release subject to the same set of previously imposed
conditions.

The

court

also

imposed

a

ninety-day

period

community confinement as a new special condition of release.

of
The

court described post-revocation supervised release as a final
"opportunity for change" -- Goodwin's last chance to "cooperate
with counseling and treatment" and "conquer [his] drug problem."
Goodwin now challenges this new term of supervision and
the substance-abuse-related requirements.
district

court

committed

plain

error

Goodwin argues that the
because

(1)

supervised

release will likely fail, given Goodwin's ongoing struggles with
substance abuse; and, in any event, (2) the release conditions are
not sufficiently related to Goodwin's original robbery offense.
The government disputes that Goodwin's sentence was in
error, but also argues as a threshold matter that Goodwin waived
his challenges when his counsel stated at the revocation hearing
that

Goodwin

release."

"agree[d]

with

the

24-month

term

of

supervised

Goodwin maintains that he forfeited, but did not waive,

his objections.
II.
We

ordinarily

review

a

district

court's

revocation

sentence, including any conditions of supervised release, for
abuse of discretion.
Cir. 2016).

United States v. Marino, 833 F.3d 1, 10 (1st

If the defendant forfeited his claims, we review only

for plain error.

United States v. York, 357 F.3d 14, 19 (1st Cir.

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2004).

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Date Filed: 08/08/2017

Entry ID: 6111356

If the defendant instead affirmatively assented to parts

of his sentence, any objections thereto are waived and cannot be
resurrected on appeal.

United States v. Rodriguez, 311 F.3d 435,

437 (1st Cir. 2002).

Goodwin has conceded forfeiture but he

contests the government's assertion of waiver. We need not address
the

waiver

dispute,

however,

because

the

record

clearly

establishes that the supervised-release component of Goodwin's
revocation sentence was not in error.
"When a judge revokes a defendant's supervised-release
term, the new sentence may include an additional supervisedrelease stint . . . ." Marino, 833 F.3d at 10 (citing 18 U.S.C.
§ 3583(h)).

Here, the district court did not abuse its discretion

in sentencing Goodwin to a new two-year period of supervision.
During his initial term of supervised release, Goodwin flouted his
release conditions. In addition, he flatly denied to his probation
officer that he had any drug addiction. At the revocation hearing,
however,

Goodwin

requested

a

"fresh

start,"

and

his

counsel

emphasized that Goodwin was ready to "work with, and not against,
his

probation

officer."

After

recounting

Goodwin's

original

offense and sentence, as well as the uncontroverted evidence of
Goodwin's ongoing struggles with substance abuse, the district
court decided to give Goodwin a second chance.

In setting the

term of supervision for the post-revocation sentence, the court
warned that if Goodwin did not seize this opportunity he would

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find himself in jail "for a long time."

Entry ID: 6111356

The district court's

sentence was eminently reasonable in light of Goodwin's record of
recurrent non-compliance and his professed motivation to overcome
his drug addiction.
Undermining his own representations to the district
court at the revocation hearing, Goodwin now argues that his
ongoing substance-abuse problem warrants foregoing any further
supervision.

His rationale runs counter to the rehabilitative and

deterrent ends of supervised release.

As the government puts it,

"[i]t would seem odd to reward Goodwin for his repeated acts of
intransigence, flouting of release conditions and non-compliance
with drug-treatment opportunities with a free pass on supervised
release altogether."
The cases on which Goodwin relies in seeking to avoid
post-revocation supervision are inapposite.

United States v. Mora

involved reversal of a lifetime term of supervised release (TSR),
an unreasonable upward departure that had been imposed on the sole
basis of recidivism.

See 22 F.3d 409, 413-14 (2d Cir. 1994).

Here, the district court imposed a TSR of just two years after
taking into account Goodwin's representations at his revocation
hearing.

United States v. Tsosie generally discusses how district

courts have the authority to terminate, revoke, or extend terms of
supervision,

but

nowhere

does

it

suggest

warrants foregoing a post-revocation TSR.

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that

non-compliance

See 376 F.3d 1210, 1215

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(10th Cir. 2004), abrogated in part by Tapia v. United States, 564
U.S. 319 (2011).

As for United States v. Thornhill, it involved

a fact-specific assessment that does not have any bearing on
Goodwin's case.
the

district

See 759 F.3d 299 (3d Cir. 2014).

court

opted,

at

a

third

round

In Thornhill,
of

revocation

proceedings, to impose extended incarceration but no new TSR.
id. at 305-06.

See

By contrast, Goodwin acknowledged his substance-

abuse problem at his first revocation hearing and professed his
motivation and readiness to overcome it.
Goodwin separately argues that the supervised-release
conditions relating to drug rehabilitation are "insufficiently
correlated" to his offense of acting as an accessory after the
fact to an armed credit union robbery.

This argument also fails.

As the district court recalled at the revocation hearing, Goodwin's
initial offense did bear a connection to his drug addiction:
Goodwin immediately used the robbery proceeds to purchase drugs.
Regardless,

the

Sentencing

Guidelines

"do

not

limit

district

courts to consideration only of the facts of the crime charged."
York, 357 F.3d at 19-20.

Rather, the district court should

consider the defendant's history "regardless of the nature of the
crime of conviction," and can impose release conditions that are
"reasonably related to" any of the permissible goals of supervised
release:

"(1)

the

defendant's

offense,

history,

and

characteristics; (2) the need to deter the defendant from further

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Document: 00117186640

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Entry ID: 6111356

criminal conduct; (3) the need to protect the public from further
crimes

by

the

vocational,

defendant;

medical,

defendant."

or

Id. at 20.

and
other

(4)

the

effective

correctional

educational,

treatment

of

the

The substance-abuse treatment mandated

here by the district court serves the correctional purpose of
helping Goodwin "conquer [his] drug problem" and avoid criminal
conduct that would land him back in jail for a much longer period
of time.
III.
The
otherwise.

district

court

committed

no

error,

Accordingly, we affirm Goodwin's sentence.

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plain

or