Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-04-03971/USCOURTS-ca8-04-03971-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Gary W. Farris
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

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The Honorable Richard E. Dorr, United States District Judge for the Western

District of Missouri.

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

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No. 04-3971

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United States of America,

Appellee,

v.

Gary W. Farris,

Appellant.

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Appeal from the United States

District Court for the Western

District of Missouri.

[PUBLISHED]

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Submitted: October 10, 2005 

 Filed: June 5, 2006

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Before LOKEN, Chief Judge, GRUENDER and BENTON, Circuit Judges. 

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PER CURIAM.

 Gary Farris appeals the sentence pronounced by the district court1

 after he pled

guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1)

and possessing a firearm from which the serial number had been removed or

obliterated in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(k). We affirm.

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Sentencing in the period between Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296 (2004),

and United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005), the district court based Farris’s

guidelines sentencing range solely on facts admitted by the defendant. With this

limitation, the district court applied the guidelines in a mandatory fashion. The district

court found that Farris’s 2001 Missouri conviction for unlawful use of a weapon and

his 2001 Missouri conviction for tampering with a motor vehicle in the first degree

were both crimes of violence as defined by U.S.S.G. § 4B1.2, increasing Farris’s base

offense level from 14 to 24 under U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1. The district court then sentenced

Farris to 115 months’ imprisonment, the high end of the resulting guidelines range.

Farris appeals his sentence, arguing that (1) tampering with a motor vehicle is not a

crime of violence, and (2) his sentence was pronounced under mandatory guidelines

in violation of Booker.

We review de novo whether a prior conviction constitutes a crime of violence

under the sentencing guidelines. United States v. Kendrick, 423 F.3d 803, 809 (8th

Cir. 2005). The Missouri offense of tampering with a motor vehicle in the first degree

criminalizes both tampering by operation and tampering by possession. See Mo. Rev.

Stat. § 569.080.1(2). Tampering by operation is a crime of violence for purposes of

§ 4B1.2. United States v. Bockes, ___ F.3d ___, No. 04-3936, slip op. at 4 (8th Cir.

May 18, 2006); see United States v. Johnson, 417 F.3d 990, 997-99 (8th Cir. 2005),

reh’g denied, No. 04-1839 (8th Cir. May 3, 2006).

Because the Missouri statute is overinclusive, we apply the categorical approach

developed in Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. 13 (2005), and Taylor v. United

States, 495 U.S. 575 (1990), to determine if the conduct underlying the conviction

falls within the statutory category of tampering by operation. Bockes, slip op. at 4-5.

The Presentence Investigation Report (“PSR”) cited the charging document

underlying the 2001 tampering conviction to show that Farris “knowingly and without

consent of the owner operated a motor vehicle,” placing Farris’s conduct within the

definition of tampering by operation. In addition, because “the PSR described

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conduct derived from documents Taylor or Shepard permit” and Farris did not object

to those underlying facts, the Government was not obliged “to introduce at sentencing

the documentary evidence Taylor or Shepard requires.” United States v. McCall, 439

F.3d 967, 974 (8th Cir. 2006) (en banc). Therefore, the district court did not err in

finding that Farris’s conviction for tampering under the Missouri statute is a crime of

violence for § 4B1.2 purposes.

We review for harmless error the sentencing court’s use of mandatory

guidelines after Farris’s timely Blakely objection. See United States v. Pirani, 406

F.3d 543, 549 (8th Cir. 2005) (en banc). Because the district court determined Farris’s

sentencing guidelines range with no enhancements based on judge-found facts, the

error in using mandatory guidelines is not of constitutional magnitude, and the

Government bears the burden of demonstrating that no grave doubt exists as to

whether the defendant would have received a more favorable sentence under an

advisory guidelines system. Bockes, slip op. at 5. This burden is met where the

district court exercised its discretion to sentence the defendant in the middle of the

guidelines range. United States v. Brooks, 417 F.3d 982, 985 (8th Cir. 2005) (finding

no grave doubt because “[t]he district court was aware that it could have imposed a

lesser sentence on [the defendant], and it chose not to do so after considering the need

for adequate punishment, deterrence, and protection of the public”). After considering

Farris’s arguments for a sentence at the low end of the guidelines range, the district

court sentenced Farris at the high end of the range. Therefore, “we have no ‘grave

doubt’ in this case because the district court ‘left unused some of its discretion’ when

it sentenced [the defendant] . . . above the minimum Guideline range.” United States

v. Green, 428 F.3d 1131, 1135 (8th Cir. 2005) (quoting United States v.

Perez-Ramirez, 415 F.3d 876, 878 (8th Cir. 2005)). Thus, the district court’s use of

mandatory guidelines was harmless error.

Accordingly, we affirm the sentence imposed by the district court.

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