Criminal – Sentencing

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Where a defendant has challenged a 19-month upward variance, the defendant’s two concurrent 60-month prison sentences should be upheld based on the large amount of ammunition and number of magazines in his possession.

“Defendant-Appellant Christian Del-Valle-Camacho appeals from the district court’s judgment imposing two concurrent sixty-month prison sentences for escaping from a judicially mandated re-entry program and being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. Mr. Del-Valle-Camacho argues that his sentence is procedurally and substantively unreasonable because the district court imposed a nineteen-month upward variance without providing an adequate explanation based on a plausible sentencing rationale. After careful consideration, we conclude that the district court provided sufficient reason to justify its upward variance — namely, the large amount of ammunition and number of magazines in Mr. Del-Valle-Camacho’s possession — and therefore affirm. …

“The district court did not err, plainly or otherwise, in explaining its nineteen-month upward variance. …

“The district court’s explanation of its sentence here, considered in the context of the entire sentencing record, adequately elucidates the facts that motivated its sentence. Both the court and the government emphasized the large amount of contraband possessed by Mr. Del-Valle-Camacho, including ‘seven magazines, five of which were high capacity, and 152 rounds of 9-millimeter ammunition.’ And the court did not just identify these facts; it explained that they distinguished Mr. Del-Valle-Camacho’s case from the ‘average’ firearm-possession case where U.S.S.G. §2K2.1 is the primary sentencing guideline. For these reasons, the court concluded that a sentence within the guideline range would not sufficiently promote the Section 3553(a) sentencing factors of respect for the law, protection of the public, and deterrence of future crime. Even if the court could have said more immediately before imposing its sentence, there is more than ‘enough information in the record’ based on the statements made throughout the sentencing hearing ‘for us to evaluate [its] reasoning.’ …

“We have affirmed upward variances in firearm-possession cases involving less ammunition. … In light of this precedent, the district court properly based its upward variance on the 152 rounds of ammunition and seven magazines (five of which were high capacity) that Mr. Del-Valle-Camacho possessed at the time of his arrest.”

United States v. Del-Valle-Camacho (Lawyers Weekly No. 01-008-26) (16 pages) (Dunlap, J.) Appealed from the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico (Docket Nos. 24-2076 and 24-2077) (Jan. 14, 2026).

Click here to read the full text of the opinion.