[00:00:01] Speaker 01:
The suspense is killing us.

[00:00:03] Speaker 01:
We're ready.

[00:00:11] Speaker 03:
Good morning, Your Honors.

[00:00:12] Speaker 03:
May it please the Court.

[00:00:14] Speaker 03:
My name is Doug Sprague, and I represent the Appellant Leonard Francis in this matter.

[00:00:20] Speaker 03:
I would like to reserve three minutes for rebuttal.

[00:00:24] Speaker 03:
The district court committed procedural, substantive, and constitutional error when it sentenced Mr. Francis.

[00:00:31] Speaker 03:
And that resulted in a substantively unreasonable sentence of 40 months more than even the government had recommended.

[00:00:39] Speaker 03:
Almost 30% more than even the government had recommended.

[00:00:45] Speaker 03:
In explaining its sentence as a procedural matter,

[00:00:48] Speaker 03:
the district court failed to mention critical arguments Mr. Francis had raised in briefing and its sentencing.

[00:00:54] Speaker 03:
And as a substantive matter, the district court did not explain how or in some cases whether it had considered or weighed key sentencing factors.

[00:01:07] Speaker 04:
And then in the district court... Let me ask you this, counsel.

[00:01:11] Speaker 04:
I take your

[00:01:12] Speaker 04:
point to be that the district court was required to explicitly address each argument you raised in connection with the sentence reductions.

[00:01:22] Speaker 04:
What's your best case for that proposition?

[00:01:25] Speaker 04:
I know people make that argument, but I've never seen any case to back it up.

[00:01:28] Speaker 04:
What's your best case?

[00:01:30] Speaker 03:
And Judge Smith, I don't have a case for that, and that is not my argument, Judge Smith.

[00:01:36] Speaker 04:
Ben, what is your argument?

[00:01:38] Speaker 03:
We do not believe the district court has to explicitly mention or deal with in its oral pronouncement of sentence every factor that we raised at sentencing.

[00:01:49] Speaker 03:
However, we do believe that the court has to address, should at least mention and explain from a procedural standpoint, the key arguments we made.

[00:02:01] Speaker 03:
The two key arguments we made were unwarranted sentencing disparity,

[00:02:07] Speaker 03:
and his cooperation credit being not substantive.

[00:02:10] Speaker 04:
But that's just picking, that's cherry picking out of a whole bunch of things.

[00:02:15] Speaker 04:
You're just saying, we wish you'd said more about a lot of things, but we're going to narrow these two things.

[00:02:20] Speaker 04:
And my question to you is, to what degree is the district court required to wade into those particular matters as opposed to others?

[00:02:30] Speaker 04:
What's your best case for that?

[00:02:32] Speaker 03:
Your Honor, the best case, the case I would refer you to, Judge Smith, would be the Trujillo case that we cited in our briefs where this court held that the district court did not adequately explain sentencing factors that had been relied upon by Mr. Trujillo at sentencing by way of a, I think it was in that case, a 39-page submission that had addenda with letters from family

[00:03:02] Speaker 03:
and so forth, if I have that right.

[00:03:04] Speaker 03:
But their Chukio case is the case I would refer the court to in response to that question.

[00:03:09] Speaker 01:
One case.

[00:03:10] Speaker 03:
Go ahead.

[00:03:11] Speaker 01:
No, please, Judge Smith.

[00:03:12] Speaker 01:
Go ahead.

[00:03:13] Speaker 04:
No, I was going to say that you picked out a particular point there.

[00:03:17] Speaker 04:
But there's a lot that was being discussed.

[00:03:21] Speaker 04:
And I guess what I'm troubled about is the poor district judges, they do their very best to try to deal with all that's brought to them.

[00:03:31] Speaker 04:
But sometimes it involves literally scores of pages of commentary.

[00:03:36] Speaker 04:
And in this case, you're talking about the family and other issues, his health and so on, all important issues.

[00:03:44] Speaker 04:
But how much is involved?

[00:03:45] Speaker 04:
How much do you have to say?

[00:03:48] Speaker 04:
This is not a monosyllabic judge that said nothing about it.

[00:03:52] Speaker 04:
How much does the judge have to say?

[00:03:56] Speaker 03:
Your Honor, what this court's cases have held is that when a non-frivolous argument is made that's tethered to a 3553A factor, the court should include at least some commentary on that argument.

[00:04:14] Speaker 04:
And here... Forgive me, Counsel.

[00:04:16] Speaker 04:
3553A, we have scores of cases that indicate that district judges are not required to just punch down the six

[00:04:25] Speaker 04:
factors and talk about them.

[00:04:28] Speaker 04:
What case are you talking about that backs up your point?

[00:04:31] Speaker 03:
Your Honor, again, the Trujillo case would be one of those.

[00:04:35] Speaker 04:
Oh, you're back to Trujillo.

[00:04:37] Speaker 03:
And I completely agree with you, Judge Smith, that there are many cases that say the district court absolutely does not have to rotely go through each of the 3553.

[00:04:47] Speaker 03:
But why in this case and not the others?

[00:04:50] Speaker 03:
In this case, Judge Smith, the need to avoid unwanted sentencing disparities was a major argument raised below.

[00:05:00] Speaker 03:
As even the district court said at sentencing, she had seen 30-plus defendants in this case, and she had sentenced them.

[00:05:11] Speaker 03:
And as she said in some of their sentencing, these other defendants, and we mention this in our sentencing papers,

[00:05:20] Speaker 03:
she said that some of their conduct was even quote-unquote more aggravated.

[00:05:26] Speaker 01:
But did any of them cut off their ankle monitor and abscond to Venezuela?

[00:05:30] Speaker 03:
No, Your Honor.

[00:05:31] Speaker 01:
I don't think so.

[00:05:32] Speaker 01:
And the other thing about this case that strikes me is it doesn't leave me a lot of doubt about the district court's familiarity with it.

[00:05:40] Speaker 01:
It's a very protected period of time.

[00:05:43] Speaker 01:
Many, many defendants, the scheme and the response, the government's response to it went on for how many years?

[00:05:50] Speaker 03:
over 10.

[00:05:51] Speaker 03:
Your honor, Mr. Francis was arrested in September of 2013 and his sentencing was in November of 2024.

[00:05:56] Speaker 01:
And appeared several times before the court.

[00:05:59] Speaker 01:
There was a bail hearing.

[00:06:00] Speaker 01:
He was released on his own recognizance with the income model.

[00:06:03] Speaker 01:
She had hearings about that.

[00:06:04] Speaker 01:
She's very familiar with this case and she's acknowledged the very, very serious consequences and acknowledged that he was in a class by himself, I think because of absconding.

[00:06:16] Speaker 01:
And then I think he wanted credit for the fact that then the year spent in Venezuela was a very difficult time.

[00:06:23] Speaker 01:
I think she's aware of all of that.

[00:06:25] Speaker 03:
The district court was aware of that, of those factors.

[00:06:30] Speaker 03:
Absolutely.

[00:06:30] Speaker 03:
And as the government points out, we had submitted a roughly 50-page sentencing memorandum and the court said, I've read it.

[00:06:39] Speaker 01:
Well, she had.

[00:06:42] Speaker 01:
I think your advocacy was admirable.

[00:06:44] Speaker 01:
I don't think you left any stone unturned here.

[00:06:46] Speaker 01:
It's just that I'm trying to look at, sometimes when we look at a 355A argument of the type that you're making, we can see that there's an important consideration that really wasn't considered by the court and really wasn't factored in.

[00:06:58] Speaker 01:
And I'm trying to figure out where is it, what is it you think that I should decide she didn't consider.

[00:07:06] Speaker 01:
Yes, Your Honor.

[00:07:07] Speaker 01:
And you keep saying sentencing disparities.

[00:07:09] Speaker 01:
And that is one.

[00:07:10] Speaker 01:
She tried those cases.

[00:07:11] Speaker 01:
She sentenced those other defendants.

[00:07:12] Speaker 01:
She's very well aware, right, of what punishments they received.

[00:07:17] Speaker 03:
Yes, Your Honor.

[00:07:19] Speaker 03:
But from both a procedural and substantive standpoint, one from the procedural standpoint, she did not, the district court did not mention that at sentencing.

[00:07:27] Speaker 03:
At one point she says.

[00:07:28] Speaker 01:
That being disparity?

[00:07:29] Speaker 03:
That being, yes, the need to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities.

[00:07:34] Speaker 03:
All right.

[00:07:34] Speaker 03:
At one point she said, well, Mr. Francis, you were a leader.

[00:07:37] Speaker 03:
You were an organizer.

[00:07:38] Speaker 03:
That is, of course, the direct words right out of the role adjustment in the sentencing guidelines that had already resulted in a plus four for Mr. Francis.

[00:07:48] Speaker 03:
But the district court did not address the need to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities at sentencing.

[00:07:55] Speaker 03:
She mentioned it in the note factor saying, here's what I need to consider.

[00:07:58] Speaker 03:
And she read parts of 3553A.

[00:08:01] Speaker 03:
But then there was no discussion.

[00:08:03] Speaker 03:
From a substantive standpoint, Your Honor,

[00:08:07] Speaker 03:
The other case, Mr. Francis received a sentence of 180 months.

[00:08:10] Speaker 03:
The next defendant down who was a special agent with NCIS received a sentence of 115 months.

[00:08:17] Speaker 03:
So Mr. Francis got

[00:08:20] Speaker 03:
65 months more five and a half years more than the next level down next was 78 and then we get down to Several people who are less than five years or misdemeanors or had their cases dismissed so and she did not address this issue from a substantive or procedural standpoint the other one that I would refer you to your honor is the exceptionally low risk of recidivism for a defendant who is was at the time of sentencing 60 years old now 61 and

[00:08:48] Speaker 03:
multiple severe undisputed health conditions.

[00:08:54] Speaker 03:
We had a doctor who had written a letter, I think it was in 2022, that said his chances of survival for five years, statistically speaking, someone with his conditions, are 13%.

[00:09:06] Speaker 04:
The district.

[00:09:09] Speaker 04:
You've got lots to say, but I've got a lot on your brief.

[00:09:12] Speaker 04:
One of the things that I want to know about is what relevance

[00:09:17] Speaker 04:
Does how Francis escaped have on his in quotes failure to appear charged?

[00:09:24] Speaker 04:
In other words, how can there be a Fifth Amendment violation if nothing drawn from his silence could bear on the elements of the failure to appear charge?

[00:09:34] Speaker 03:
Yes, Your Honor.

[00:09:35] Speaker 03:
I think how that can be a Fifth Amendment violation is

[00:09:39] Speaker 03:
We submit that if you look at what the district court judge said in this regard in the context in which she said it It seems clear that the district court drew an adverse inference from mr. Francis not having Answered the questions to use the district court's terms or not having explained how it occurred I agree with you on the elements which

[00:10:05] Speaker 03:
which actually I think, Your Honor, makes it worse, because it is wholly irrelevant to the elements about how he, whether he got in an Uber and went to the border and walked across the border and then got on a plane or whether there was something else involved.

[00:10:21] Speaker 03:
It's not relevant.

[00:10:23] Speaker 03:
But you would agree that there's no Fifth Amendment violation involved here, right?

[00:10:27] Speaker 03:
No, Your Honor, I would not agree with that, because I think there is.

[00:10:30] Speaker 03:
If you look at- And why?

[00:10:32] Speaker 03:
Why?

[00:10:32] Speaker 03:
Why?

[00:10:33] Speaker 03:
Here's why, Your Honor, especially in the context.

[00:10:36] Speaker 03:
What the district court says right after mentioning a couple of factors that bear positively on the equities of the matter, the district court says, I must consider your flight from this jurisdiction prior to your first sentencing date.

[00:10:51] Speaker 03:
This represents a significant breach of the court's trust and must be taken into account.

[00:10:57] Speaker 03:
There must be consequences for this action.

[00:11:00] Speaker 03:
Neither you nor the government have explained how this escape occurred.

[00:11:05] Speaker 03:
While the sentencing may be the last of many in this group of cases, numerous questions remain unanswered.

[00:11:13] Speaker 03:
And then in the very next sentence, the district court imposed this sentence of 180 months.

[00:11:19] Speaker 04:
Forgive me, counsel.

[00:11:22] Speaker 04:
I'm missing your point about the Fifth Amendment.

[00:11:25] Speaker 04:
Tell me about that, please.

[00:11:26] Speaker 03:
from the two sentences here, Your Honor, that neither you nor the government have explained how this escape occurred.

[00:11:34] Speaker 03:
I think that is a direct commentary on Mr. Francis's right to remain silent, which of course continues through sentencing.

[00:11:42] Speaker 04:
And the next sentence... That's a stretch.

[00:11:46] Speaker 04:
You got any case law that backs that up?

[00:11:48] Speaker 03:
Well, yes, Your Honor.

[00:11:51] Speaker 03:
Going back to the Mitchell case that talks about not drawing adverse inferences from a defendant's sentencing.

[00:12:00] Speaker 00:
Well, your problem with Mitchell is that the comment that the court made was much more direct and much more clear that there was a negative inference against whom it was being drawn.

[00:12:09] Speaker 00:
I think part of Judge Smith's questions, and certainly questions that I have here, is how do we construe this

[00:12:15] Speaker 00:
one comment by the district court that references both the defense and the government, how do we know, one, if there is a negative inference being drawn, and if there is, who it's going against?

[00:12:27] Speaker 03:
And Judge Forrest, in this context with the comments, the whole paragraph is negative toward Mr. Francis.

[00:12:35] Speaker 03:
Yes, the district court inserts neither you or the government, but she is, that whole paragraph, there's three or four sentences where she's holding things against Mr. Francis or speaking negatively.

[00:12:47] Speaker 00:
But none of that would be inappropriate, right?

[00:12:48] Speaker 00:
Because it's perfectly appropriate for her to consider flight as part of calculating the sentence.

[00:12:53] Speaker 00:
So negative in the sense that

[00:12:54] Speaker 03:
He's going to have a punishment that's connected to this conduct that he himself admitted was unlawful and wrong But then we submit your honor you she went too far Which is that you haven't answered questions about this you haven't explained how this occurred and that?

[00:13:10] Speaker 00:
In my research on this question.

[00:13:12] Speaker 00:
I was trying to figure out who has the burden To prove that a fifth amendment violation occurred is that your burden?

[00:13:19] Speaker 00:
Yes, and is what's the level of proof is it a preponderance?

[00:13:22] Speaker ?:
I?

[00:13:23] Speaker 03:
It's, I don't know the level on that, your honor, whether it's a ponderance.

[00:13:30] Speaker 00:
OK.

[00:13:30] Speaker 00:
So then coming back to a question that Judge Smith asked, which is, basically, do you have, there's no doubt that there's a comment on the fact that the defendant didn't make a statement or didn't give details about this issue.

[00:13:40] Speaker 00:
There's no doubt that there's a comment.

[00:13:42] Speaker 00:
The question is, does our case law say that any sort of comment on a defendant's silence is enough to trigger a Fifth Amendment violation, or does there have to be more?

[00:13:51] Speaker 00:
Because here, there's a comment.

[00:13:54] Speaker 00:
And I'm struggling with, has there been a showing of more?

[00:14:00] Speaker 03:
Judge Forrest, I do not believe that a comment, I think the context always has to matter.

[00:14:05] Speaker 03:
And in this context, the district court has two or three sentences about how the escape is, she's holding it against him, which is fair in the sense that it already has a two-level enhancement in the sentencing guidelines for the obstruction.

[00:14:22] Speaker 01:
It's also a breach of trust.

[00:14:23] Speaker 01:
It's extraordinary.

[00:14:25] Speaker 03:
It was a breach of trust, and that is why he got a two-level enhancement for obstruction.

[00:14:31] Speaker 03:
And he wanted more.

[00:14:32] Speaker 01:
He wanted credit for the hard time he had to do in Venezuela.

[00:14:35] Speaker 03:
We wanted some consideration of that, not one-for-one.

[00:14:38] Speaker 03:
We also wanted some consideration of the medical furlough time, not one-for-one.

[00:14:41] Speaker 03:
Those were not commented on, Your Honor.

[00:14:44] Speaker 01:
All right.

[00:14:44] Speaker 01:
I interrupted you, and you were answering Judge Forrest's question.

[00:14:46] Speaker 01:
I didn't.

[00:14:47] Speaker 03:
It's the context about the comment on silence here is clearly in an adverse nature in the paragraph that is reflected in the transcript here of the judge's comments.

[00:15:00] Speaker 01:
So you're just about out of time.

[00:15:01] Speaker 01:
Did you want to make any other comments?

[00:15:03] Speaker 03:
No, thank you, Your Honor.

[00:15:04] Speaker 01:
Okay.

[00:15:06] Speaker 01:
We took up a lot of your time.

[00:15:06] Speaker 01:
When you come back, we'll put a minute on the clock.

[00:15:09] Speaker 03:
Thank you, Your Honor.

[00:15:16] Speaker 02:
May it please the court, Daniel Zip, on behalf of the United States.

[00:15:20] Speaker 02:
Your Honor, the district court did not violate Mr. Francis's Fifth Amendment rights in this case.

[00:15:24] Speaker 02:
In Mitchell, when the Supreme Court recognized a problem, the district court in that case explicitly commented on the defendant's failure to testify.

[00:15:34] Speaker 02:
The court said it was holding it against the defendant, that she did not come forward today and dispute the evidence presented by the United States.

[00:15:42] Speaker 02:
That's a very different case.

[00:15:42] Speaker 02:
Correct.

[00:15:43] Speaker 01:
What about, I think, the biggest

[00:15:46] Speaker 01:
Most prominent argument here is the failure to specifically mention sentencing disparities.

[00:15:51] Speaker 01:
Sure.

[00:15:51] Speaker 01:
Or the need to avoid the same.

[00:15:54] Speaker 01:
What's your response to that?

[00:15:56] Speaker 02:
Several responses.

[00:15:57] Speaker 02:
First, as Judge Smith noted, there's multiple cases in this court's case law that explicitly state that the court does not have to address every argument raised by the defense.

[00:16:07] Speaker 02:
The most direct one is wrangle, where the court says it's often unnecessary to directly address each and every one of defendants' arguments, as long as the record makes clear that the court has considered the party submissions, heard their arguments, and has a reasoned basis for exercising its sentencing discretion.

[00:16:23] Speaker 02:
So the first answer is the court didn't have to address it at all.

[00:16:27] Speaker 02:
The second answer is the court did at least indirectly address the question by commenting on the fact that she had personally sentenced 30 defendants over the course of the last decade in this case.

[00:16:39] Speaker 02:
and then stating that the defendant was the organizer and the mastermind of all of this, sort of implicitly holding that he was differently situated than all those Navy defendants that she had previously sentenced.

[00:16:53] Speaker 01:
Am I correct in understanding, I don't know if I am, in correcting the understanding that she handled all of the related cases?

[00:16:58] Speaker 02:
That's correct.

[00:17:01] Speaker 02:
So again, the court was not required to address that specific argument.

[00:17:07] Speaker 02:
And defense counsel argued that the district court has an obligation to sort of address the defense's key arguments.

[00:17:14] Speaker 02:
But it's not clear from the argument or from the submissions what

[00:17:18] Speaker 02:
their key arguments are.

[00:17:19] Speaker 02:
As Judge Smith noted, they threw a lot of arguments in here under 3553, everything from how the BOP would treat his credits, to the effect on his family, to his health, to his extraordinary cooperation.

[00:17:31] Speaker 02:
There was a lot of arguments presented to the court, and what the court did was explicitly list the 3553 factors at the outset.

[00:17:38] Speaker 02:
pick the equities and the positives that she found the most compelling and outline those, contrast those with the negative aspects of the case, including his flight, and ultimately arrive at a sentence that was below the guidelines.

[00:17:52] Speaker 02:
This court has never held that that level of explanation

[00:17:55] Speaker 02:
Is insufficient and it's certainly not plainly insufficient because the the again the defense counsel did not object to the adequacy of the court's explanation Are you aware if any of the other related?

[00:18:08] Speaker 02:
defendants got the same enhancements for leadership as mr. Francis I Don't believe they did your honor, but I don't know all the details of all the cases Smith did I were you trying to ask a question?

[00:18:24] Speaker ?:
I

[00:18:25] Speaker 02:
I misunderstood your I thought you were leaning forward And I guess just to return briefly to the fifth amendment argument Even if this court were to assume that what the district court meant when it said neither party has presented evidence was a direct comment on the defendant's right to exercise its right to silence

[00:18:45] Speaker 02:
then under Mitchell, that still wouldn't be a Fifth Amendment violation because the Supreme Court in that case and subsequent cases has held that that was a very narrow holding.

[00:18:54] Speaker 02:
And it's only when the court uses a defendant's silence to find the facts of the offense that it violates the Fifth Amendment.

[00:19:01] Speaker 02:
And multiple circuits have distinguished that.

[00:19:03] Speaker 00:
I'm not sure I agree with that.

[00:19:05] Speaker 00:
I mean, I think the Supreme Court is saying that the Fifth Amendment, of course, applies in sentencing because

[00:19:12] Speaker 00:
person should have the right to not incriminate themselves any time either conviction or punishment is on the table for them.

[00:19:20] Speaker 00:
And our cases pick up that theme.

[00:19:22] Speaker 00:
So at sentencing, punishment is still on the table.

[00:19:26] Speaker 00:
Maybe the formal elements of whether the crime has been committed have been resolved, but still at sentencing, the court is considering the facts and circumstances in the whole totality under 3553A to figure out

[00:19:41] Speaker 00:
which punishment to give.

[00:19:42] Speaker 00:
And so the facts and circumstances surrounding the formal conduct that led to a crime are still factoring into the punishment that's going to give.

[00:19:52] Speaker 00:
So why wouldn't the Fifth Amendment be triggered there?

[00:19:55] Speaker 02:
Your Honor, my point is just that the Supreme Court in that decision explicitly limited itself.

[00:20:01] Speaker 02:
I think the four justice dissent sort of called the majority out for this in that it limited itself to specific facts of the offense when the court is using silence to find the facts of the offense.

[00:20:13] Speaker 02:
And then said that we're not addressing today whether other aspects of sentencing, whether it's acceptance of responsibility or lack of remorse,

[00:20:20] Speaker 02:
whether the court can consider a defendant's silence in that context.

[00:20:24] Speaker 02:
Here, as defense counsel admitted, the questions about the escape had nothing to do with any of the charges to which he pled guilty.

[00:20:33] Speaker 02:
He pled guilty to failure to appear and to the fraud and bribery allegations, but this was simply not a comment on silence going to the facts of this offense.

[00:20:43] Speaker 02:
This was, if it was a comment on silence, it was going to a 3553 factor as to how the court

[00:20:49] Speaker 04:
balance the overall severity of the sentence.

[00:21:00] Speaker 04:
with which he was charged.

[00:21:02] Speaker 02:
Correct.

[00:21:02] Speaker 02:
And that's what Mitchell held.

[00:21:03] Speaker 02:
That's the error that the court recognized in Mitchell.

[00:21:07] Speaker 02:
Other courts, including I think the most directly on point is Ron Kelo in the Fifth Circuit, where they addressed a very similar argument and said that when you're talking about commenting on silence as to a defendant's cooperation, separate from the elements of the offense, that does not implicate the same concerns as Mitchell.

[00:21:25] Speaker 02:
And the Sixth Circuit held the same with respect to the 3553 factors in Kennedy.

[00:21:35] Speaker 01:
George Smith, do you have any other questions?

[00:21:37] Speaker 01:
No.

[00:21:38] Speaker 01:
It doesn't appear that the bound has additional questions.

[00:21:39] Speaker 02:
All right, thank you.

[00:21:40] Speaker 02:
We'd ask that you affirm.

[00:21:49] Speaker 03:
very briefly uh... your honors uh... we disagree on the fifth amendment argument uh... from from the government it it mitchell and this court's opinion in mazes to cases do not say that that's district court commenting on the fifth uh... on the defendant silence needs to be tailored to the

[00:22:08] Speaker 03:
elements of the offense.

[00:22:10] Speaker 03:
In fact, Mises de Jesus, I believe, was a drug weight case, and the drug weight's not elements of the offense.

[00:22:16] Speaker 03:
The Ronquillo case, I think, is wholly distinguishable.

[00:22:19] Speaker 03:
It was also from the Western District of Texas, and it's not even clear the defendant had counsel below, so I don't think that's persuasive authority at all for this court's de novo review of this issue.

[00:22:31] Speaker 03:
And briefly, I know I've got very limited time, but I do want to focus in a few seconds on Mr. Francis' extraordinary cooperation that at the end of the day, despite the criminal chief for the U.S.

[00:22:44] Speaker 03:
Attorney's Office, who had been doing prosecution for 25 years, said it was unprecedented, cannot be overstated, Mr. Francis ended up getting one to two levels below the guideline range when all of that was considered.

[00:22:55] Speaker 03:
We think that's another factor that supports a finding that the sentence was substantively unreasonable.

[00:23:01] Speaker 03:
see him out of time as the court has.

[00:23:05] Speaker 01:
Judge Smith, do you have additional questions for counsel?

[00:23:08] Speaker 03:
No, I don't.

[00:23:10] Speaker 01:
Judge Forrest, I don't think we have additional questions.

[00:23:13] Speaker 04:
Thank you.

[00:23:13] Speaker 01:
Thank you both for your advocacy.

[00:23:14] Speaker 01:
We'll take that case under advisement.