Case Summaries

Criminal Law & Procedure

[08/20] US v. Hernandez-Orellana
Convictions for alien smuggling-related offenses are affirmed in part, reversed in part, and the sentences vacated and remanded where: 1) a reasonable jury could have determined that two defendants participated in a conspiracy to bring aliens from Mexico Mexico to the United States for financial gain in violation of federal laws; but 2) the en banc decision in United States v. Lopez, 484 F.3d 1186 (9th Cir. 2007), decided during the pendency of this case compelled the reversal of their convictions on substantive "bringing to" counts.

[08/20] US v. Djoumessi
Convictions for holding someone in involuntary servitude and for harboring an alien for private financial gain are affirmed over claims that the charges violated defendant's rights under the Double Jeopardy Clause and that the government failed to support the involuntary servitude conviction (and a related conspiracy conviction) with sufficient evidence.

[08/19] US v. Bonin
In a case involving an individual previously arrested for making threats to country music singer George Strait and later for threats to a magistrate judge, an order committing defendant to the custody of the Attorney General pursuant to a dangerousness determination is vacated and remanded where the determination contravened the requisite statutory procedure.

[08/19] US v. Duhon
On remand from the Supreme Court, sentence of probation for possessing child pornography is affirmed over the government's objections that: 1) the district court's failure to apply enhancements requested by the government was reversible error; 2) consideration of the disparity between defendant's and co-defendant's sentences was plain error; 3) the sentencing guidelines precluded sentencing defendant to probation; and 4) the sentence was substantively unreasonable.

[08/19] US v. Farr
A conviction for tax fraud is reversed where during trial the government constructively amended the indictment against her, trying her not just for the crime described in the indictment (failure to pay quarterly employment taxes for a medical clinic) but also for a separate and additional offense (failure to pay a trust fund recovery penalty assessed against her personally). The circuit court does, however, reject a claim that there was insufficient evidence in the record to sustain her conviction, and that consequently she could not be subjected to retrial under a lawful indictment.

[08/19] US v. Torres-Romero
A sentence for illegally reentering the United States following a prior deportation is affirmed where the district court did not err in its application of a sixteen-level enhancement pursuant to U.S.S.G. section 2L1.2(b)(1)(A) because defendant's 1990 Colorado guilty plea admitted all of the material facts in the charging information, including that he distributed and sold a controlled substance.

[08/19] People v. Meneses
Conviction and sentence for crimes related to defendant's participation in a scheme to defraud insurance companies is affirmed over claims of error regarding: 1) whether the court, on its own initiative (sua sponte), should have provided certain instructions to the jury; 2) prosecutorial misconduct; 3) whether the court should have sanitized a prior conviction for conspiring to forge immigration documents, by eliminating all reference to conspiracy when the prosecutor impeached defendant's credibility as a felon; 4) insufficiency of the evidence; and 5) ineffective assistance of counsel.

[08/19] US v. Carter
Sentence for tax fraud, money laundering, and engaging in illicit monetary transactions is affirmed over the government's objections as to: 1) findings based on defendant's age that she was unlikely to commit future crimes; 2) a finding that defendant's offenses were not typical money-laundering offenses; and 3) several other mitigating circumstances found pursuant to consideration of the 18 U.S.C. section 3553(a) factors.

[08/19] US v. Clark
Amended judgment correcting a sentence for possessing and conspiring to possess cocaine with intent to distribute is affirmed where: 1) a mandatory minimum sentence was statutorily required, and the sentencing court was required to invoke Fed. R. Crim. P. 35(a) to correct its initial imposition of a lesser sentence; and 2) judge-found facts based on a preponderance of the evidence standard were sufficient to determine the drug quantity.

[08/19] US v. Henry
Denial of defendants' motions to dismiss their indictment related to marijuana growing is reversed, and their convictions and sentences vacated and remanded where the continuance of trial for 103 days could not be excluded from defendant's speedy trial clock, which caused the total delay in defendant's case to exceed the seventy days allowed by the Speedy Trial Act.

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