Justia U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

The State appealed the district court's grant of habeas relief under 28 U.S.C. 2254 to petitioners, convicted of first degree murder. The district court concluded that petitioners' Sixth Amendment rights were violated when the trial court removed the only juror advocating for acquittal. The district court removed the juror for willful misconduct under California Penal Code 1089 because she offered her expert opinion on petitioners' mental health and violated the court's instructions by consulting a dictionary in order to obtain a medical definition that she presented to her fellow jurors during deliberations. The court concluded that, without the benefit of the Supreme Court's recent guidance in this area, the district court erred in applying a de novo review of petitioners' claims instead of applying the appropriate standard of review under section 2254(d). The court also concluded, inter alia, that the state court's determination that the trial court properly discharged the juror for cause was neither contrary to, nor an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law. Further, Petitioner DeMola failed to establish an Eighth Amendment violation in regards to her sentence. Accordingly, the court reversed and vacated, remanded for further proceedings. View "Bell v. Uribe" on Justia Law

Petitioner, convicted of second degree robbery, petitioned for review of the district court's denial of his 28 U.S.C. 2254 habeas corpus petition, alleging prosecutorial misconduct when the prosecutor knowingly elicited and then failed to correct false testimony. The district court concluded that the prosecutor's misconduct violated Napue v. Illinois but upheld the conviction because the district court found that it was not reasonably likely that, absent the misconduct, petitioner would have obtained a more favorable verdict. The court concluded that, in rejecting petitioner's claim, the state court applied a harmlessness standard that was "contrary to" the harmlessness standard required by Napue. The Napue standard was different from the ordinary harmlessness standard, and was referred to in Napue and its progeny as a "materiality" standard. Even assuming that the state court applied the Napue materiality standard, its application of that standard would have constituted an unreasonable application of clearly established Supreme Court law. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded. View "Dow v. Virga" on Justia Law

Defendants appealed their sentences after pleading guilty to conspiracy to possess an unregistered firearm. Defendants had purchased a grenade launder from an undercover ATF agent. In consolidated appeals, at issue was the definition of a missile under U.S.S.G. 2K2.1(b)(3)(A) and 26 U.S.C. 5845(f). Adopting the common meaning of the word missile, the court held that the definition of a missile, under the sentencing guidelines, was a self-propelled device designed to deliver an explosive. The court concluded that the 40-mm cartridges in this case did not qualify as missiles, and the district court erred in concluding otherwise and enhancing defendants' base offense level by fifteen levels. Accordingly, the court vacated the sentences and remanded for resentencing. View "United States v. Flores" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction for illegally storing hazardous wastes without a permit in violation of the Resources Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), 42 U.S.C. 6928(d)(2). The hazardous wastes at issue were used toluene and excess methanol. The court affirmed the conviction, holding that the district court properly instructed the jury that, for purposes of the RCRA, "disposal" of hazardous waste begins not with an individual's subjective decision to dispose but with an act of disposal. View "United States v. Humphries" on Justia Law

Defendants were convicted of using a thermal lance to cut open the back of an ATM in order to steal the money it contained. Under 18 U.S.C. 844(h)(1), a mandatory ten-year consecutive sentence was imposed on anyone who "uses fire... to commit any felony." The enhancement was increased to twenty mandatory consecutive years for a second offense. Rejecting the government's definition of "fire," the court concluded that the use of a thermal lance tool - designed to cut through metal using extreme heat - did not fall within the ordinary, contemporary, and common meaning of "uses fire." Further, the purpose, context, and history of the statute make clear that it was not intended to apply to the use of a tool such as the thermal lance that was not designed to cause fire. Finally, application of the rule of lenity was required in these circumstances where defendants did not have "fair warning" that their conduct was subject to the enhancement penalty of section 844(h)(1). Accordingly, the court reversed defendants' convictions under section 844(h)(1) and reversed as to the conspiracy counts as well. The court vacated the sentences and remanded for resentencing. View "United States v. Thompson" on Justia Law

Petitioner was convicted of felony murder after he and his girlfriend robbed the house of her stepmother. After they left the stepmother hogtied and face-down with a sheet taped around her head, the stepmother was not breathing and had no pulse when police arrived. Petitioner argued that the "logical nexus" requirement between the robbery and the death was unconstitutionally vague, that its application in his case was unconstitutionally retroactive, and that the trial court's evidentiary rulings and jury instructions violated his constitutional rights. The court rejected petitioner's void-for-vagueness argument, concluding that there was a clear connection between the felony petitioner set out to commit and the stepmother's subsequent death. The court also concluded that petitioner was unable to identify any California case actually absolving a criminal defendant of felony murder for a killing done by his accomplice during a felony but not in furtherance of a felony. Accordingly, the California Supreme Court's decision was not an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law. Because there was a clear logical nexus between petitioner's crime and the stepmother's death, failure to instruct the jury on the required connection could not have prejudiced petitioner. The court rejected petitioner's remaining claims and affirmed the district court's denial of petitioner 28 U.S.C. 2254 habeas corpus petition. View "Cavitt v. Cullen" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his sentence after pleading guilty to investment fraud. The district court ordered defendant to pay restitution pursuant to the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 (MVRA), 18 U.S.C. 3663A. The court concluded that the district court abused its discretion in including a certain sum in defendant's restitution order where intervening events made defendant's connection to another investor's losses in the scheme at issue simply "too attenuated" to impose liability on defendant for the investor's victims' losses. Accordingly, the court vacated the sentence with regard to this amount of restitution and remanded for the limited purpose of entering an amended restitution order. The court concluded, however, that the district court did not clearly err in finding that defendant failed to establish that he played a minor role in the offense and therefore was not eligible for a two-level reduction in the base offense level. Accordingly, the court affirmed as to this issue. View "United States v. Swor" on Justia Law

In two separate cases, the government charged defendant with being an alien in the United States after deportation, as well as misrepresenting his identity and citizenship to fraudulently obtain supplemental social security benefits, acquire food stamps, and make a claim of citizenship, and apply for a passport. Defendant was convicted of all charges and his primary defense to all the charges was that he was a citizen of the United States. The court concluded that the district court erred in invoking an inherent "gate-keeping" authority to exclude defendant's birth certificate pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 104(a) without relying on some substantive basis outside of Rule 104(a); the district court erred by concluding that no reasonable juror could determine that the birth certificate was "substantively genuine," and by excluding the birth certificate pursuant to Rule 403 without first assessing its probative value when taken as a true record of defendant's birth; and the district court's exclusion of the central piece of evidence for defendant's main defense to a critical element of all the charges in the two cases was violation of defendant's Fifth Amendment right to present a defense. Because the district court's error was not harmless, the court vacated all of the convictions and remanded for a retrial. View "United States v. Evans, Sr." on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of sixteen counts of making a false claim for farm benefits in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1014 and subsequently appealed the district court's loss calculation. The court concluded that the record revealed sufficient evidence that defendant was not entitled to any portion of the indemnity payments as an "intended beneficiary" under U.S.S.G. 2B1.1 cmt. n.3(F)(ii), and the district court did not err in including in the loss calculation the full indemnity amount for all claims from the properties at issue; the district court did not err by including the total amount of the indemnities in the loss calculation; and the district court did not err by including in the loss calculation two other categories of expenses: A&O expenses - fees that the government pays to the insurance company for selling and servicing the policy - and premium subsidies. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Torlai, Jr." on Justia Law

Defendant repeatedly violated his terms of supervised release after a child pornography conviction and the district court revoked his supervised release. Opper v. United States held that, in criminal proseuctions, where guilt must be established beyond a reasonable doubt, the Supreme Court required a conviction to rest on more than the uncorroborated confession of the defendant. The court concluded that the Opper rule did not apply to supervised release revocation proceedings and the district court did not abuse its discretion in revoking defendant's supervised release based on defendant's confession that he had violated restrictions on contact with minors. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Hilger" on Justia Law