United States v. Jorge Carrillo-Alvarez

Jorge Carrillo-Alvarez appeals his sentence on the ground that the district court improperly departed upward under § 4A1.3 of the sentencing guidelines. That section permits a departure if the defendant’s criminal history category under the guidelines inaccurately reflects his or her prior criminal conduct. We vacate and remand for resen-tencing.

I.

Jorge Carrillo-Alvarez (“Carrillo”) was arrested after leading Border Patrol agents on a seven-mile chase on Interstate 5 and on the surface streets of Oceanside, California. He admitted that the passengers in his vehicle (all but one of whom, on his instruction, left the vehicle before the chase began) were undocumented workers and that he was transporting them for a fee. He pleaded guilty to one count of transportation of illegal aliens, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1324 (a)(1)(B).

Under the Sentencing Reform Act (Title II of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984), 18 U.S.C. § 3551 et seq., the district court must consider at sentencing both the nature of the defendant’s offense and his or her overall criminal history. The defendant’s offense is expressed numerically as a total offense level, which is calculated as a base…