United States v. Francisco Siaca Melendez

── United States v. Francisco Siaca Melendez ── Case No.: 25-12086 Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit Date: March 18, 2026 Category: NEW USCA11 Case: 25-12086 Document: 40-1 Date Filed: 03/18/2026 Page: 1 of 9 NOT FOR PUBLICATION In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 25-12086 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus FRANCISCO SIACA MELENDEZ, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida D.C. Docket No. 6:18-cr-00176-RBD-DCI-1 ____________________ Before LUCK, LAGOA, and TJOFLAT, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Francisco Siaca Melendez was given an upward variance sentence of 24 months’ imprisonment for violating probation. He appeals the sentence as procedurally unreasonable. We affirm. USCA11 Case: 25-12086 Document: 40-1 Date Filed: 03/18/2026 Page: 2 of 9 2 Opinion of the Court 25-12086 I. In October 2018, Siaca Melendez pleaded guilty in federal court to three counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm. For that, he was sentenced to three years’ probation, to run from March 4, 2019, to March 3, 2022. On February 18, 2022, Siaca Melendez was arrested and charged in Florida state court for ten counts of possession of child pornography. He pleaded nolo con- tendere and was adjudicated guilty. The state court sentenced him to eleven years in state prison. Because Siaca Melendez possessed the child pornography during his probation, the United States Probation Office petitioned the federal court to revoke the probation. It noted ten violations of probation in its petition, one for each conviction. At the probation revocation hearing, Siaca Melendez admit- ted to each violation. The Court then stated that Siaca Melendez had a criminal history category of I and that his Guidelines’ impris- onment range for the violations was 4 to 10 months. 1 After con- firming that Siaca Melendez was intelligently, freely, and voluntar- ily admitting to the violations, the Court accepted his admissions and found that he violated his probation. The Court summarized the violations as “new conviction[s] for . . . possession of sexual performance by a child.” It then asked the parties for their argu- ments as to the appropriate disposition. 1 The statutory maximum prison term was 10 years as that was the maximum prison term for each of Siaca Melendez’s three original firearm counts. USCA11 Case: 25-12086 Document: 40-1 Date Filed: 03/18/2026 Page: 3 of 9 25-12086 Opinion of the Court 3 The Government requested the Court impose a 24-month prison term, to run concurrent with Siaca Melendez’s state sen- tence. It emphasized that the most important condition of super- vised release is following the law and that Siaca Melendez “broke [that condition] in an extraordinary heinous manner,” demonstrat- ing his complete disrespect for the law, the orders of the Court, and the victims of crimes. It characterized each video as “a monument, a memorial to horrific violence that [is] inflicted on children” and stated that the children are revictimized each