United States of America Plaintiff - Appellee v. Shawn A. Williams Defendant - Appellant (2017)

Shawn Williams directly appeals after he pled guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), and the district court ¹ sentenced him to 51 months in prison, which was the low end of the calculated Guidelines range. His counsel has moved to withdraw and has filed a brief under Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967), questioning the reasonableness of Williams's sentence.

Upon careful review, we conclude that the district court did not impose a substantively unreasonable sentence. See United States v. Feemster, 572 F.3d 455, 461-62 (8th Cir. 2009) (en banc) (sentences reviewed under deferential abuse-of-discretion standard; discussing substantive reasonableness); see also Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 51 (2007) (if sentence is within Guidelines range, appellate court may apply presumption of reasonableness). In addition, having independently reviewed the record pursuant to Penson v. Ohio, 488 U.S. 75 (1988), we find no nonfrivolous issues for appeal. Accordingly, we grant counsel's motion to withdraw, and we affirm.

FOOTNOTES

1.   The Honorable Stephen N. Limbaugh, Jr., United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Missouri.

PER CURIAM.