Facts
- Samuel "Dickey" Davis died testate in 2013, leaving his real property Armentrout Farm to his wife, Rae Lee Mills [lines="17-18"].
- Rae Lee claimed the estate failed to exonerate the mortgage on Armentrout Farm before it passed to her [lines="20-21"].
- The circuit court ruled that Dickey's will did not demonstrate the requisite contrary intent to the presumption of nonexoneration under Code § 64.2-531(A) [lines="22-24"].
- Dickey's will included directives for selling properties and paying debts from the estate, but no specific reference was made concerning the exoneration of the Armentrout Farm mortgage [lines="65-69"].
- Following legal challenges, the property was quitclaimed to Rae Lee for her to inherit, and the executor did not exonerate the mortgage as instructed in the will [lines="120-132"].
Issues
- Whether Dickey's will clearly expressed a contrary intent to the statutory presumption of nonexoneration regarding the mortgage on Armentrout Farm [lines="36-37"].
- Whether the estate’s directives to pay debts were sufficient to overcome the presumption of nonexoneration as prescribed by Code § 64.2-531(A) [lines="226-238"].
Holdings
- The circuit court ruled that Dickey's will did not clearly set out a contrary intent to nonexoneration, affirming Rae Lee's property acquisition subject to the mortgage [lines="162-163"].
- The court held that general directives to pay debts do not express a clear intent for exoneration, thus affirming the presumption of nonexoneration applied in this case [lines="372-374"].
OPINION
Case Information
*2 Before J ILL P RYOR , N EWSOM , and A NDERSON , Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Aaron Martinez appeals his sentence of 248 months impris- onment followed by five years of supervised release for possession of methamphetamine and cocaine with intent to distribute, posses- sion of a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking offense, and being a felon in possession of a firearm. Martinez argues that the district court violated his Fifth Amendment right to due process by imposing discretionary conditions of supervised release in its writ- ten judgment without first pronouncing those conditions at sen- tencing.
Objections not raised before the district court are normally reviewed only for plain error. United States v. Etienne , 102 F.4th 1139, 1144 (11th Cir. 2024). However, where a defendant “had no opportunity to object [to a condition of supervised release] at sen- tencing because the court included the requirement for the first time in its written final judgment,” we review their legal argument de novo. United States v. Bull , 214 F.3d 1275, 1278 (11th Cir. 2000); United States v. Rodriguez , 75 F.4th 1231, 1246 n.5 (11th Cir. 2023).
The “district court must orally pronounce a defendant’s sen- tence in his presence,” and generally may not “add to the defend- ant’s sentence in a written judgment entered after the sentencing hearing.” Rodriguez , 75 F.4th at 1246. In the context of supervised release conditions, this principle means that “a district court must pronounce at the defendant’s sentencing hearing any discretionary *3 23-10757
conditions of supervised release—that is, any condition of super- vised release other than those mandatory conditions set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3583(d).” Id. Failure to do so represents a “deni[al] [of] due process with respect to these conditions,” and requires that the conditions be vacated. Id. at 1249.
Here, the district court included 16 discretionary conditions of supervised release for the first time in its written final judgment. As such, Martinez did not have an opportunity to object to the con- ditions at sentencing, and this Court should review them de novo. Rodriguez , 75 F.4th at 1246 n.5. We vacate the discretionary condi- tions, because the district court’s failure to pronounce them at sen- tencing deprived Martinez of his due process rights under the Fifth Amendment. Id. at 1249.
At the sentencing hearing, the district court did not refer- ence any of the 19 standard conditions of supervised release it im- posed in the final written judgment, including the 16 discretionary conditions. While the conditions were drawn from a standing ad- ministrative order, the district court never referenced that order during sentencing; nor did it reference the written plea agreement’s recommendation that Martinez be “subject to the Court’s standard conditions of supervised release” after his term of imprisonment. Because the district court included the additional discretionary con- ditions of supervised release in its written judgment without indi- cating at sentencing that it would adopt them, it deprived Martinez of notice of the conditions and an opportunity to object in violation of the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. Id. Therefore, we *4 vacate the discretionary conditions and remand for resentencing, so that the district court may reconsider whether to impose the conditions after giving Martinez an opportunity to be heard.
VACATED AND REMANDED