United States v. Garcia, 946 F.3d 1191

Garcia pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm (April 2017 incident) and the PSR described an earlier April 2016 stop where officers found two loaded handguns on him.
Probation treated the 2016 handgun incident as relevant conduct to the 2017 conviction, which (1) triggered a two-level §2K2.1(b)(1)(A) enhancement for three or more firearms and (2) supported adding two criminal-history points under §4A1.1(d) because the 2016 conduct occurred while a suspended sentence was in effect.
Garcia objected to the criminal-history points but did not specifically preserve an objection to the district court’s finding that the April 2016 incident was relevant conduct.
The district court overruled objections, adopted the PSR, and imposed an upward variance to 96 months’ imprisonment (Guidelines range 46–57 months), citing Garcia’s long, repetitive criminal history, repeated unlawful firearm possession, and mental-health/anger concerns.
On appeal Garcia argued (a) the district court plainly erred in treating the 2016 handgun possession as relevant conduct (same-course-of-conduct under U.S.S.G. §1B1.3) and (b) the 96-month upward variance was substantively unreasonable. The Tenth Circuit affirmed.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the district court plainly erred in finding the April 2016 handgun possession was relevant conduct to the April 2017 conviction under U.S.S.G. §1B1.3 (same-course-of-conduct)	Garcia: incidents were factually dissimilar, only two events ~362 days apart (no regularity), and the temporal gap was too large to show same course	Gov: incidents were similar (both felon-in-possession of loaded guns), girlfriend’s statement supports continuous possession/regularity, <1 year gap not dispositive; Windle supports treating prior possessions as identical	No plain error. Court concluded similarity, regularity (girlfriend’s credible statement supports continuous possession), and temporal proximity (gap <1 year) suffice; relevant-conduct finding upheld
Whether the 96-month upward variance was substantively unreasonable	Garcia: variance relied improperly on remote/juvenile violent convictions and produced an unwarranted national sentencing disparity	Gov: variance was justified by longstanding, repetitive unlawful conduct (esp. repeated firearm possession), mental-health indicators, and public-protection need; Guidelines under‑represent his true risk	Sentence was substantively reasonable. Abuse-of-discretion review (Gall) upheld the upward variance as justified to protect public and not an impermissible policy disagreement with Guidelines; disparity statistics were not persuasive

United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725 (1993) (articulating plain-error standard for forfeited trial objections)
United States v. Windle, 74 F.3d 997 (10th Cir. 1996) (prior unlawful firearm possession can be treated as relevant conduct to a felon‑in‑possession conviction)
United States v. Damato, 672 F.3d 832 (10th Cir. 2012) (analysis of temporal‑proximity factor in same‑course‑of‑conduct inquiries)
United States v. Svacina, 137 F.3d 1179 (10th Cir. 1998) (regularity may be shown by repetition; two instances can suffice in context)
United States v. Roederer, 11 F.3d 973 (10th Cir. 1993) (same‑course‑of‑conduct looks to an identifiable behavior pattern across repeated offenses)
Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38 (2007) (abuse‑of‑discretion standard for reviewing substantive reasonableness of sentences)
United States v. Ruiz‑Gea, 340 F.3d 1181 (10th Cir. 2003) (plain‑error analysis requires established circuit or Supreme Court authority to find an error "plain")
United States v. Caldwell, 585 F.3d 1347 (10th Cir. 2009) (differences between incidents do not necessarily defeat similarity when substantial similarities remain)