United States v. Roache

── United States v. Roache ── Case No.: 25-1157 Court: Court of Appeals for the First Circuit Date: March 30, 2026 Category: General United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit No. 25-1157 UNITED STATES, Appellee, v. AIZAVIER ROACHE, Defendant, Appellant. APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS [Hon. Leo T. Sorokin, U.S. District Judge] Before Aframe, Howard, and Dunlap, Circuit Judges. Christine DeMaso, Assistant Federal Public Defender, for appellant. Donald C. Lockhart, Assistant U.S. Attorney, with whom Leah B. Foley, United States Attorney, was on brief, for appellee. March 30, 2026  DUNLAP, Circuit Judge. Defendant-Appellant Aizavier Roache ("Roache") appeals from the district court's judgment imposing a sentence of fifty-seven months of imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release, for conspiring to traffic firearms in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 933(a)(1), (3). Roache argues that the district court erred procedurally by applying a six-point enhancement to his offense level computation under the United States Sentencing Guidelines (the "guidelines" or "U.S.S.G.") based on prior statements of Roache's co-conspirator, Travon Brunson ("Brunson"), to agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives ("ATF"). Because the district court did not abuse its discretion in its reliability determination, we affirm. I. In January 2021, ATF agents traced a pistol that had been used in a crime in Massachusetts and recovered by Massachusetts state police to Brunson, a South Carolina resident who had purchased the pistol from a gun shop in South Carolina eight months earlier.1 A few months later, in June 2021, ATF Because this appeal stems from a sentence following a guilty 1 plea with no plea agreement, we set out the facts as gleaned from the unchallenged portions of the Presentence Investigation Report ("PSR"), the sentencing record, and the sentencing hearing transcript. See United States v. Guía-Sendeme, 134 F.4th 611, 614 (1st Cir. 2025); United States v. Melendez-Hiraldo, 82 F.4th 48, 51 n.1 (1st Cir. 2023); United States v. Coplin-Benjamin, 79 F.4th 36, 38–39 (1st Cir. 2023). - 2 - agents traced another pistol used in a crime in Boston, Massachusetts, and subsequently recovered by Boston police to Brunson, who had bought the pistol from another gun shop in South Carolina about a month earlier. On August 5, 2021, ATF agents assigned in South Carolina conducted a consensual interview with Brunson "regarding his suspected involvement in firearms trafficking from South Carolina to Massachusetts." Brunson told the agents that he had bought twenty-four firearms for someone he knew as "Boston," and he identified Roache as "Boston" when he was shown Roache's photo. In the interview, Brunson explained how the firearms transactions typically occurred. First, Roache would text Brunson pictures of firearms he wanted. Second, Roache would meet with Brunson and give him cash to purchase the firearms. Third, Brunson would buy the firearms Roache wanted and meet again with Roache at different locations to give him the firearms. Brunson also told the agents that he did not buy firearms for anyone other than Roache, and that Roache was a resident of South Carolina. Brunson stated that he did not know why Roache used him to purchase firearms instead of pu