United States v. Atilano-Ruiz

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
United States v. Atilano-Ruiz, 581 F. App'x 54 (2d Cir. 2014)

United States v. Atilano-Ruiz

Opinion

SUMMARY ORDER

On September 9, 2018, Defendant-Appellant Ramon Atilano-Ruiz pled guilty to one count of illegally reentering the United States in violation of 8 U.S.C. §§ 1326(a) and (b)(1). At his January 7, 2014 sentencing hearing, the district court (Suddaby, J.) imposed a twelve-month prison sentence with no period of supervised release to follow. Atilano-Ruiz now challenges the substantive reasonableness of that sentence. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts, the procedural history, and the issues for review.

“Article III of the Constitution limits the judicial power of the United States to the resolution of cases and controversies.” Cooper v. U.S. Postal Serv., 577 F.3d 479, 489 (2d Cir. 2009) (citing U.S. Const. art. III, § 2). “In order to satisfy the case-or-controversy requirement, a party must, at all stages of the litigation, have an actual injury which is likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision.” United States v. Mercurris, 192 F.3d 290, 293 (2d Cir. 1999). Thus, “if an event occurs during the course of the proceedings or on appeal that makes it impossible for the court to grant any effectual relief whatever to a prevailing party, we must dismiss the case” as moot. United States v. Blackburn, 461 F.3d 259, 261 (2d Cir. 2006) (quoting United States v. Quattrone, 402 F.3d 304, 308 (2d Cir. 2005)) (internal quotation marks omitted).

We conclude, and Atilano-Ruiz concedes, that Atilano-Ruiz’s appeal is moot because he has been released from prison and is not on supervised release. See, e.g., United States v. Williams, 475 F.3d 468, 479 (2d Cir. 2007) (ruling that a sentencing appeal was moot because the appellant had *55 been “release[d] from prison” and the district court could not “impose a reduced term of supervised release”). According to records from the Bureau of Prisons and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Atilano-Ruiz completed his sentence on August 19, 2014 and was removed from the United States on September 2, 2014. A “post-release sentencing correction cannot alleviate injury that resulted from [an] earlier incarceration,” and Atilano-Ruiz has not established another “continuing or imminent concrete injury” to invoke this Court’s jurisdiction. United States v. Ben Zvi, 242 F.3d 89, 99 (2d Cir. 2001).

For the foregoing reasons, the appeal is DISMISSED as moot.

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Reference

Full Case Name
UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Ramon ATILANO-RUIZ, Defendant-Appellant
Status
Unpublished