Criminal – Defendant thrice sentenced to same term of supervised release

Where the district court originally sentenced the defendant to a five-year term of supervised release, resentenced him to the same term after one of his convictions was vacated and then resentenced him to the same term because of a Rogers error at the second resentencing, this aspect of the sentence was affirmed.

Background

In 2016, a jury convicted Larry Pyos Jr., of one count of conspiracy to commit Hobbs Act robbery (Count One), five counts of Hobbs Act robbery (Counts Two, Six, Seven, Eight and Nine) and one count of attempted Hobbs Act robbery; two counts of discharging a firearm during a crime of violence (Counts 10 and 16); three counts of using a firearm during a crime of violence (Counts 11, 14 and 15) and eight counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1).

In April 2017, Pyos was sentenced to an aggregate sentence of 1390 months in prison, consisting of (1) 70 months for each of the Hobbs Act robbery and attempted robbery convictions, which were imposed to run concurrently to each other; (2) a 12-month sentence for Count 10, which was imposed to run consecutively to all other counts; and (3) 300-month terms for Counts 11, 14, 15 and 16, which were imposed to run consecutively to each other and consecutive to the 70-month aggregate sentence imposed for the Hobbs Act convictions. The court also imposed a five-year term of supervised release, which included four special supervised release conditions.

On appeal, this court agreed that Count 11 (brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence) was no longer valid because it was predicated on the attempted Hobbs Act robbery offense charged in Count Three. The court therefore vacated Pyos’ conviction on Count 11 and remanded the case for resentencing. It affirmed the remainder of the criminal judgment.

On remand, the district court accepted the parties’ agreement that the district court impose a sentence of one day on the non-mandatory minimum counts (Counts 1-3, 6-9, 18 and 23) and the 34-year mandatory minimum on the four § 924(c) counts. The court also imposed a five-year term of supervised release, albeit without the special supervised release conditions contained in Pyos’ original criminal judgment.

In his second appeal, this court ordered supplemental briefing regarding whether the district court complied with
United States v. Rogers, 961 F.3d 291 (4th Cir. 2020), when it pronounced that Pyos would be subject to a five-year term of supervised release. The government filed an unopposed motion to vacate the district court’s amended judgment and to remand the case for resentencing, which was granted.

At Pyos’ second resentencing hearing, the district court again observed that the parties agreed upon an appropriate sentence, and the parties explained that the only minor disagreement was what supervised release term should be imposed. The district court afforded Pyos an opportunity to allocute, and the court imposed the sentence to which the parties agreed, and again imposed a five-year term of supervised release. During the hearing, the district court expressly announced all discretionary supervised release conditions that it later included in the amended written criminal judgment.

Analysis

Although counsel and Pyos both seek to challenge Pyos’ convictions on this appeal, only his most recently imposed sentence is before this court for review. Thus, this court is tasked only with reviewing the sentence imposed at Pyos’ second resentencing for “reasonableness” by applying the “deferential abuse-of-discretion standard,” and it may review any unpreserved, non-structural sentencing errors for plain error.

In this case, the parties agreed—before Pyos’ first and second resentencing hearings—that a sentence of one day on the non-mandatory minimum counts, and the 34-year mandatory minimum on the four § 924(c) convictions, was an appropriate sentence and serves the goals of sentencing in Pyos’ case. The district court acted well within its discretion to accept the parties’ agreement as an appropriate sentence.

The district court heard argument regarding an appropriate term of supervised release and sided with the government. From the full context of the three sentencing hearings, and knowing that the parties had previously agreed on the supervised release term, this court can infer that the district court considered and rejected Pyos’ argument for a lesser supervised release term than the one the district court imposed.

The imposed conditions are not the type of onerous or lengthy conditions that would lead to plain error. Indeed, in the second resentencing, defense counsel appears to have asked for these conditions.

Affirmed.

United States v. Pyos, Case No. 24-4650, Feb. 4, 2026. 4th Cir. (per curiam), from EDVA at Alexandria (Hilton). Geremy C. Kamens and Frances H. Pratt for appellant. Jacqueline Romy Bechara for appellee. VLW 026-2-042. 7 pp.

Full-Text Opinion