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US v. Conaway - Terrorism claims and appeal

In September 2010, Roman Otto Conaway made a series of threatening phone calls to an imam and numerous government officials. These threats to, among other things, blow up the entire block turned out to be bogus—an ominous-looking device strapped to his chest held squares of putty, not explosive C-4. He was sentenced to two concurrent sentences of 60 months' imprisonment after pleading guilty to making false threats to detonate an explosive device, see 18 U.S.C. § 1038(a)(1), and influencing a federal official by threat, see 18 U.S.C. § 115(a)(1)(B). He argued on appeal that his 60-month sentences were both procedurally and substantively unreasonable in light of his crime and what he viewed as mitigating factors that the district court failed to adequately consider. For the reasons that follow, the Court affirmed.
Conaway's elaborate plot came on the heels of a widely publicized threat by Terry Jones, a Gainesville, Florida pastor, to burn 200 copies of the Quran on the 2010 anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks. Based on this earlier threat, Conaway set his own plan in motion just ten days later on September 21, 2010 with a page taken from Jones's playbook: He posted on Facebook his plans to burn the "holy quaran" (sic) and invited anyone with a camera or video camera to witness the event at his home address, also posted on Facebook.
In his appeal, Conaway relied heavily on United States v. Miranda, 505 F.3d 785 (7th Cir. 2007),  The facts of this case are distinguishable, where the defendant suffered from persistent delusions and hallucinations and was in fact experiencing auditory command hallucinations telling him that "we need money" at the time he robbed a bank. Id. at 789. 
Based on these facts, the Court opined, "[I]t is perfectly acceptable for courts to assign varying weights to the [§ 3553(a)] (sentencing) factors as they deem appropriate in the context of each case."). The decision under review was not an abuse of the district court's discretion.
For the foregoing reasons, the Court AFFIRMED Conaway's convictions and sentences in all respects.