United States v. Bernard Manuel, 73 F.4th 989

Manuel pleaded guilty in 2011 to being a felon in possession of a firearm, received 96 months, and began supervised release in October 2018.
Supervised release was revoked in February 2020 for a domestic-violence incident; Manuel served about a year and began a new one-year term in January 2021.
On April 1, 2021, police tied Manuel to a shooting (10–12 shots; 13 spent casings; one bullet shattered a residence window); officers later found Manuel in a white car with a stolen 9mm Taurus containing eleven live rounds; testing linked the gun to the shooting.
Manuel resisted arrest (spat, kicked, attempted to bite officers); he pleaded guilty to the new felon-in-possession charge and faced supervised-release revocation for his earlier conviction.
At sentencing, the district court applied a 4-level enhancement under USSG §2K2.1(b)(6)(B) for possession in connection with another felony and adopted an advisory Guideline range of 37–46 months for the new offense (unchallenged on appeal).
The court revoked supervised release and imposed 24 months (statutory maximum), then varied upward and imposed 96 months for the new felon-in-possession conviction, consecutive to the 24 months, for a total 120-month sentence; Manuel appealed as substantively unreasonable.

Issue	Manuel's Argument	Government's Argument	Held
Substantive reasonableness of the 120-month total sentence	Total sentence is greater than necessary; substantively unreasonable	District court properly weighed §3553(a) factors (deterrence, public protection, history) and did not abuse discretion	Affirmed — no abuse of discretion; sentence reasonable under deferential review
Whether court improperly double-counted or over-weighted offense seriousness after Guideline enhancement	Court placed too much weight on offense severity despite enhancement for connection to shooting	Court may consider offense seriousness under §3553(a) even if Guidelines addressed it	Consideration was proper; not an abuse of discretion
Consideration of “aged-out” prior convictions in upward variance	Court relied improperly on prior convictions that no longer count in Guidelines	Sentencing courts may consider prior convictions that accrue no Guidelines points	Permissible to consider aged-out convictions given violent record; no abuse
Upward variance based on drug addiction	Varying upward because of addiction was improper	Court acknowledged addiction and recommended RDAP; addiction does not preclude its consideration in context of deterrence and public safety	Consideration appropriate; district court did not abuse its discretion

United States v. Feemster, 572 F.3d 455 (8th Cir. 2009) (en banc) (standard of review for substantive reasonableness: abuse of discretion)
United States v. Johnson, 916 F.3d 701 (8th Cir. 2019) (deterrence and specific deterrence are proper §3553(a) considerations)
United States v. David, 682 F.3d 1074 (8th Cir. 2012) (district court may use prior sentence as a benchmark for deterrence)
United States v. Abrica-Sanchez, 808 F.3d 330 (8th Cir. 2015) (courts may consider convictions that accrue no Guidelines criminal-history points)
United States v. Thorne, 896 F.3d 861 (8th Cir. 2018) (factors used in Guidelines can also justify an upward variance)
United States v. Barrett, 552 F.3d 724 (8th Cir. 2009) (district court may vary based on criminal history already accounted for in Guidelines)