Full Opinion

USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 1 of 12 NOT FOR PUBLICATION In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 26-10645 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus CORTEZ DEANDRE GREEN, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Alabama D.C. Docket No. 1:21-cr-00231-TFM-N-1 ____________________ Before ROSENBAUM, GRANT, and ED CARNES, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Cortez Green appeals the district court’s revocation of his supervised release and imposition of a 24-month sentence, an up- ward variance from his advisory guidelines range of 8 to 14 months. USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 2 of 12 2 Opinion of the Court 26-10645 Green contends that the district court abused its discretion in re- voking his supervised release because there was insufficient evi- dence to support the court’s finding that Green participated in the theft of a set of tires from his former employer, a tire wholesaler. He also contends that his 24-month sentence is substantively un- reasonable. I. In 2022 Green pleaded guilty to possession of a firearm as a convicted felon, and he was sentenced to 37 months in prison fol- lowed by a 3-year term of supervised release. His term of super- vised release began on August 20, 2024. This is the second time it has been revoked. The first time his probation officer filed a petition to revoke his supervised release was in September 2025. That petition alleged that Green had violated two mandatory conditions by failing to re- frain from unlawful use of a controlled substance and by failing to refrain from committing more crimes. The petition asserted that Green’s drug test had been positive for marijuana and that he had been arrested for possession of marijuana and tampering with evi- dence. Green admitted that he was guilty of those violations, and in October 2025 the district court revoked his supervised release. It imposed a sentence of time served and a 24-month supervised release term. The court also ordered Green to participate in a lo- cation monitoring program for 11 months. USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 3 of 12 26-10645 Opinion of the Court 3 Just a couple of months after that, in December 2025, Green’s probation officer filed another petition to revoke his super- vised release. That’s the one that led to this appeal. The petition alleged that Green had violated conditions of his release by: failing to comply with location monitoring when he did not notify the probation officer that he had been fired and in- stead continued to leave home and return during the scheduled ap- proved times for employment; failing to truthfully answer his pro- bation officer’s questions when he told the officer he was still em- ployed even though he had been terminated; and associating with a convicted felon. The petition also alleged that Green had violated the condition prohibiting him from committing any more crimes. According to the petition, security video footage from Green’s workplace showed him and a coworker stealing a set of tires from their employer, a tire wholesaler. The tires were rolled out from the warehouse, loaded on a truck, and delivered to a residential ad- dress that was not an authorized stop on the delivery route. The Mobile Police Department obtained a warrant for Green’s arrest for theft of property in the third degree, a violation of Ala. Code § 13A-8-4.1, a Class D felony. At the revocation hearing, Green admitted that he had vio- lated conditions of his supervised release by failing to notify his pro- bation officer when he lost his job and by failing to truthfully an- swer his probation officer’s questions about his employment. He USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 4 of 12 4 Opinion of the Court 26-10645 argued, however, that he had not been involved in the theft of the tires. 1 The government presented its evidence about Green’s in- volvement in the tire theft. Green’s probation officer was called as a witness, and he testified that he had received a report from the police about Green’s arrest for the tire theft, and he included that information in the petition seeking revocation of Green’s super- vised release. The government also called the operations manager from the company where Green had worked. She explained that, as a wholesaler, the company delivered tires to retail stores. An em- ployee reported to her that an extra set of tires worth nearly $1,000 had been rolled to the delivery truck. The manager checked the delivery list and determined that the tires the employee had identi- fied were not on it. Those tires were not listed on the “route” to be delivered. Then the manager and her boss watched the security cam- era footage and saw what had happened. She testified that the video footage showed Green walking out of the camera’s view to- ward the area where those particular tires were kept in the ware- house and then rolling them to his coworker, who loaded the tires 1 The government withdrew its allegation about Green’s association with a convicted felon. USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 5 of 12 26-10645 Opinion of the Court 5 on the truck. The video was admitted into evidence without ob- jection and was played for the court while the manager testified about it. She identified Green as the person in the area where the tires were located just before they were rolled toward the truck and identified his coworker as the person loading the tires into the truck. She also identified Green as the person shown on the video sticking his head out from between the stacks of tires after the set of tires had been rolled toward the truck. The manager testified on cross-examination that Green had worked at the company for at least a year without any other prob- lems. She acknowledged that other employees were present that day, including one who was authorized to instruct workers about which tires to put on trucks. The GPS tracker on the truck carrying the stolen tires established that the truck made its final stop at a residence that was not on the planned route. The manager didn’t talk to Green about the incident before terminating him, but he and his truck-driving coworker left work abruptly on the day the tires were stolen before a detective arrived and talked to the other employees. The manager explained that she hired people on super- vised release to “try to help” them. After she had viewed the secu- rity video footage, she contacted the police department. The government also presented testimony from the police officer who had recovered the stolen tires. He found them stacked in the carport at the home of an elderly woman. The address was USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 6 of 12 6 Opinion of the Court 26-10645 the same one that had appeared on the company’s GPS tracker as the unauthorized final stop. Green recalled as a witness his probation officer, who testi- fied that Green had been employed at the same tire company dur- ing the entire time he had been supervising Green. He also testified that the address where the tires were recovered had no “connec- tion” to Green or to his co-worker, who had delivered the tires there. After both sides had presented all the evidence they wanted to, the court invited the parties to present their arguments. Green acknowledged that his supervised release had been revoked before in 2025, but he described that as a “mistake” that was “drug re- lated,” and he had avoided any “issues” with his drug testing after that. He admitted the “other violations” he had most recently committed: failing to report his job loss and failing to comply with location monitoring. He also admitted that the situation with the tires “might be sort of suspicious,” but other employees had been present when the theft happened, no one saw Green roll the tires, and it was “odd” that he would risk “a good job” where he had been steadily working to steal four tires. The argument was that Green had no connection to the place where the tires were found, and it was just as likely that someone else had rolled the tires toward the truck. Also, Green and his coworker didn’t associate with each other out- side of work. Green asserted that the government had failed to USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 7 of 12 26-10645 Opinion of the Court 7 establish by a preponderance of the evidence that he had been in- volved in the theft. The government countered that it had met its burden. It pointed to the security video footage. The video showed Green walk to the area where the tires were located just before they were rolled out and then, after the tires were rolled, Green stuck his head out from that area. The government also argued that it was suspi- cious that Green and his truck-driving coworker left work abruptly before the detective arrived. The government asserted that it had shown by a preponderance of the evidence that Green had violated the terms and conditions of his supervised release. After considering all the evidence, the court was convinced by more than a preponderance. It stated that it found “beyond a reasonable doubt” that Green had helped his co-worker steal the tires. Green’s advisory guidelines range was 8 to 14 months im- prisonment, and he argued for a sentence at the low end of that range. The government asked for the statutory maximum sen- tence of 24 months. The court found that based on “the totality of [Green’s] con- duct and demeanor under supervision” and all of the violations he had committed, a significant upward variance was warranted. The court emphasized that it was “very difficult” to get employers to hire people who are on supervised release, and holding a regular job is one of the “chief indicators” of whether a person on super- USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 8 of 12 8 Opinion of the Court 26-10645 vised release will avoid going back to prison and will be a “contrib- uting member[] of society.” The court concluded that it was “very clear” that Green had helped steal the tires. And it determined that Green had participated in the theft to get some kind of benefit. It also found that Green’s conduct in withholding information from his probation officer established that he was not “trustworthy.” For all of those reasons, the court sentenced Green to 24 months imprisonment. II. Green challenges both the decision to revoke his supervised release and the substantive reasonableness of the sentence imposed upon revocation. We review a revocation decision for abuse of discretion, see United States v. Vandergrift, 754 F.3d 1303, 1307 (11th Cir. 2014), and the same standard applies to our review of the sub- stantive reasonableness of a sentence, including one imposed after a revocation of supervised release, United States v. King, 57 F.4th 1334, 1337 (11th Cir. 2023); see also United States v. Irey, 612 F.3d 1160, 1189 (11th Cir. 2010) (en banc). A. After considering the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors listed in 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e), a district court is authorized to “revoke a term of supervised release, and require the defendant to serve in prison all or part of the term of supervised release authorized by statute for the offense that resulted in such term of supervised release . . . if the court . . . finds by a preponderance of the evidence that the USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 9 of 12 26-10645 Opinion of the Court 9 defendant violated a condition of supervised release . . . .” 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3). 2 Green doesn’t dispute that he violated the conditions of his supervised release when he: failed to notify his probation officer that he had been fired from his job; lied to the officer about his em- ployment status when asked; and failed to comply with location monitoring. Instead, Green focuses on the more serious violation: that he committed another crime when he helped to steal the tires 2 The Supreme Court has held that when determining whether to revoke su- pervised release, district courts are limited to considering the § 3553(a) factors that are listed in § 3583(e). See Esteras v. United States, 606 U.S. 185, 195–97 (2025). Those factors are the ones in: § 3553(a)(1), (a)(2)(B), (a)(2)(C), (a)(2)(D), (a)(4), (a)(5), (a)(6), and (a)(7). 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e). “[D]istrict courts cannot consider § 3553(a)(2)(A) when deciding whether to revoke supervised release.” Esteras, 606 U.S. at 197. The § 3553(a)(2)(A) factors are the “retributive” ones, Esteras, 606 U.S. at 192, and they address the need for the sentence “to reflect the seriousness of the offense, to promote respect for the law, and to provide just punishment for the offense,” 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)(2)(A). As the Esteras de- cision explains, “when a defendant violates the conditions of his supervised release, it makes sense that a court must consider the forward-looking ends of sentencing (deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation), but may not con- sider the backward-looking purpose of retribution.” 606 U.S. at 196. The district court did not consider the forbidden factors in revoking Green’s supervised release or in imposing a sentence upon revocation. Instead, it based its revocation decision on the finding that Green had violated a mandatory condition by committing a crime while on supervised release when he helped his coworker steal tires from their employer. And it considered the totality of Green’s conduct while on supervised release and the other violations he had committed. Those were valid grounds for the court’s judgment. See 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e); id. § 3553(a)(B)–(C); supra at 11–12. USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 10 of 12 10 Opinion of the Court 26-10645 from his employer. Green contends that the government failed to prove that by a preponderance of the evidence. We disagree. The government presented ample evidence that Green helped his co-worker steal the tires. That evidence in- cluded the security video footage. It showed Green in the area where the tires were located just before they were rolled out of the warehouse toward the truck and then showed Green sticking his head out from between the tire stacks in that area after the tires had been rolled. The government also presented testimony from a manager identifying Green in the video. The district court did not clearly err in finding that Green was involved in stealing the tires. We will not disturb its factfinding. See United States v. Almand, 992 F.2d 316, 318 (11th Cir. 1993) (explaining that “[t]he district court reviewed the evidence and exercised its factfinding power,” and those findings “are binding on this court unless clearly errone- ous”) (quotation marks omitted). The court did not abuse its dis- cretion in revoking Green’s supervised release. B. Green contends that his 24-month sentence is substantively unreasonable. He argues that failing to inform his probation officer that he lost his job and his false statement that he had not lost it are technical violations that don’t justify a significant upward variance from the guidelines range. He asserts that he was doing well on supervised release after the last revocation in 2025, with no more USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 11 of 12 26-10645 Opinion of the Court 11 positive drug tests and a record of steady employment. And he re- asserts his challenge to the court’s finding that he was involved in stealing the tires. As the party challenging the sentence, Green has the burden to show that it is unreasonable “according to the facts of the case and the applicable [18 U.S.C.] § 3553(a) factors.” King, 57 F.4th at 1338. He has failed to do so. The court based its sentencing deci- sion on Green’s participation in the theft and the totality of his con- duct while on supervised release. The totality of his conduct in- volved multiple violations of the conditions of his release, includ- ing lying to his probation officer when asked about his employ- ment. And, as we have explained, the district court did not clearly err in finding that Green was involved in stealing the tires. The court emphasized that stealing from an employer while on super- vised release was particularly troubling because it is “very difficult” to get employers to hire people in that situation. Green’s conduct violated the trust that had been placed in him, leading the court to conclude that he had not been “trustworthy.” Although the court did not use the word “deter,” its com- ments clearly indicate that it gave substantial weight to specific and general deterrence. A court is well within the bounds of its sen- tencing discretion in considering those factors and giving them sub- stantial weight. See 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e) (listing the § 3553(a)(2)(B)– (D) factors as ones to be considered upon the revocation of super- vised release); id. § 3553(a)(2)(B)–(C) (providing that district courts USCA11 Case: 26-10645 Document: 24-1 Date Filed: 11/02/2026 Page: 12 of 12 12 Opinion of the Court 26-10645 “shall consider” the need for the sentence “to afford adequate de- terrence to criminal conduct” and “to protect the public from fur- ther crimes of the defendant”); United States v. Butler, 39 F.4th 1349, 1356 (11th Cir. 2022) (“[T]he weight to be accorded any given § 3553(a) factor is a matter committed to the sound discretion of the district court, and we will not substitute our judgment in weighing the relevant factors.”) (quotation marks omitted). “We have emphasized that general deterrence is a critical factor that must be considered and should play a role in sentencing defendants. Indeed, it is one of the key purposes of sentencing.” United States v. Oudomsine, 57 F.4th 1262, 1267 (11th Cir. 2023) (ci- tation and quotation marks omitted). The district court did not abuse its discretion by giving substantial weight to deterring Green and others on supervised release from violating the trust that is placed in them by committing criminal offenses against their em- ployers and deceiving their probation officers. The court’s com- ments also show that it weighed the nature and circumstances of Green’s violations of the conditions of his supervised release and his history and characteristics, which were appropriate factors to consider. See 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)(1); id. § 3583(e). Green has failed to show that his 24-month sentence is sub- stantively unreasonable. AFFIRMED.