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A federal appeals court has upheld the more than 15-year prison sentence of a Lorain man who got a harsher sentence after he was found to be an armed career criminal.
Ronald Mickel, 43, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Cleveland in June 2021. A jury found him guilty in 2020 of being a felon in possession of ammunition.
He had four felony convictions for domestic violence in Ohio and was forbidden from owning or possessing guns or ammunition as a result.
Mickel appealed his sentence to the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, where a three-judge panel unanimously ruled against him in a decision announced Wednesday.
Mickel claimed he didn't know he could get a stiffer sentence prior to sentencing and that therefore it was a violation of his due process rights, but Senior Judge David McKeague and Judges Richard Allen Griffin and Chad Readler disagreed.
Mickel "was afforded all the process he was due," Griffin wrote in the 3-0 opinion.
Mickel "received notice that he might be considered a career offender in January 2021," five months before his sentencing, Griffin wrote.
Furthermore, Mickel's four prior felony domestic violence convictions were violent felonies based on a ruling by the 6th Circuit Court in 2015. Also, judges may use a defendant's prior convictions to increase a sentence without government prosecutors having to prove the convictions' existence during trial, the court ruled.
Ohio Adult Parole Authority officers were told in November 2019 that Mickel had a gun in a lockbox under his bed, an alleged violation of his parole. When he tested positive for marijuana during a visit to his parole officer, authorities got probable cause to search Mickel's home.
Thirty-two rounds of 9 mm ammunition and 16 grams of suspected marijuana were found during that search. Mickel denied they were his.
Mickel also has prior convictions for aggravated robbery, assault and burglary on his record, according to federal authorities and court records.
Contact Dave O’Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com. Follow him on Twitter @daveobrienCT.