Cartwright: Captain need not be sole captain

In United States v. Cartwright, No. 04-13398 (11th Cir. June 24, 2005), the Court (Anderson, Carnes, Pryor), affirmed the 87-month sentence for a defendant who entered a plea of guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute one thousand kilograms of marijuana and a detectable amount of hashish. Mr. Cartwright and two other men were intercepted by the United States Coast Guard aboard a vessel northeast of Cuba. The Court rejected Mr. Cartwright's contention that the district court improperly enhanced his guidelines sentence under U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(b)(2)(B) finding that Mr. Cartwright "acted as a pilot, copilot, captain, navigator, flight officer, or any other operation officer" of the vessel in question. Mr. Cartwright argued that he was never officially named captain of the vessel and that he had no license or special skill as a captain. The Court rejected the invitation to establish a formal definition of captain or pilot of a vessel and instead noted that Mr. Cartwright's admissions (he was a lifelong fisherman, he drove the boat as it left Jamaica, he was driving the boat when it was intercepted, he followed instructions on where to steer the boat, and he used a compass to navigate) supported the enhancement. The fact that all three men took turns driving the boat on its voyage was immaterial. The Court also ruled that it lacked jurisdiction to review the district court's ruling on his Rule 35 motion which was filed on the same day as his notice of appeal because no independent notice of appeal was filed from the denial of the Rule 35 motion. Finally, on plain error review, the Court held that Mr. Cartwright failed to demonstrate that the Booker error affected substantial rights. [Note: The Court reviewed the Booker error for plain error even though Mr. Cartwright raised a Blakely claim in his Rule 35 motion.]