U.S. v. Mencia-Hernandez

U.S. v. Mencia-Hernandez, 2014 WL 6791249 (12/3/14) (Ut.) (unpub'd) - It was not plain error for the district court not to ask Mr. Mencia-Hernandez if he wanted to allocute with respect to his supervised-release-violation sentence. While Rule 32 requires the court to address the defendant personally to seek allocution for an initial sentencing," Rule 32.1 only requires that the defendant be afforded an opportunity to allocute. Here the court personally addressed Mr. Mencia-Hernandez to seek allocution during the portion of the consolidated hearing set aside for the initial sentencing for a new offense, but did not again seek allocution during the revocation part of the hearing. This was not plain error, especially because the issues for sentencing on the new offense and the revocation were intermixed. Plus no harm done, since Mr. Mencia-Hernandez only said he wanted to be with his mom in Honduras for his allocution. He didn't suggest he would say something more persuasive with respect to the revocation sentence.