Opinion
No. 10-50424 D.C. No. 8:09-cr-00178-SVW
01-05-2012
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. ERIC MUKASA, a.k.a. Elijah Mukasa, a.k.a. Moses Mukasa, Defendant - Appellant.
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
MEMORANDUM
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
Stephen V. Wilson, District Judge, Presiding
Before: GOODWIN, WALLACE, and McKEOWN, Circuit Judges.
Eric Mukasa appeals from the 48-month sentence imposed following his guilty-plea conviction for encouraging aliens to enter or reside in the United States illegally, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1324(a)(l)(A)(iv) and (B)(1). We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.
Mukasa contends that the district court committed procedural error by sentencing him to an above-Guidelines sentence under the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors without prior notice, by failing to undertake an individualized analysis, and by failing to explain why it rejected his request for a downward variance based on post-offense rehabilitation. The record belies these contentions. See United States v. Orlando, 553 F.3d 1235, 1238 (9th Cir. 2009) ("Garden variety considerations of culpability, criminal history, likelihood of re-offense, seriousness of the crime, should not generally come as a surprise to trial lawyers who have prepared for sentencing.") (quotation marks, citation and alterations omitted); United States v. Perez-Perez, 512 F.3d 514, 516 (9th Cir. 2008) (finding no error where it was clear from the transcript that the sentencing judge had considered the defendant's mitigation arguments, even though he did not explicitly reference them in imposing sentence).
AFFIRMED.