United States v. Kaplan

Defendants Kaplan and Strycharske were convicted of charges related to their quest to manufacture homemade hash oil and the resulting fire that severely injured six victims and killed one victim due to complications arising out of her injuries. On appeal, defendants challenged their 36-month sentence and final judgment of restitution in the amount of $2,771,929 on the ground that the district court erred by calculating the restitution award using replacement value instead of fair market value. The court joined its sister circuits in concluding that fair market value generally provides the best measure to ensure restitution in the “full amount” of the victim’s loss, but that “replacement value” is an appropriate measure of destroyed property under 18 U.S.C. 3663A(b)(1)(B) where the fair market value is either difficult to determine or would otherwise be an inadequate or inferior measure of the value necessary to make the victim whole. In this case, the court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in using replacement value to calculate the value of destroyed personal belongings like clothes, furniture, and home appliances. The court rejected Strycharske's contentions that the district court made clearly erroneous findings of fact when it stated the apartment contained 64 cans of butane and that an open flame was involved; that the district court made a highly inflammatory analogy that prejudiced his sentencing; and that his sentence is substantively unreasonable. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Kaplan" on Justia Law