Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-04-04010/USCOURTS-ca8-04-04010-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
United States of America
Appellee
Eric Clark Webster
Appellant

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

___________

No. 04-4010

___________

United States of America, *

*

Appellee, *

* Appeal from the United States

v. * District Court for the

* Southern District of Iowa.

Eric Clark Webster, *

*

Appellant. *

___________

Submitted: October 11, 2005

Filed: April 4, 2006

___________

Before ARNOLD, BOWMAN, and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.

___________

BOWMAN, Circuit Judge.

A jury convicted Eric Clark Webster of one count of being a prohibited person

in possession of a firearm, and the District Court sentenced him to 262 months'

imprisonment. Webster appeals his conviction, arguing that the District Court erred

in instructing the jury regarding his flight from police. He also challenges his

sentence. We affirm Webster's conviction but vacate his sentence and remand his case

for resentencing.

On January 16, 2002, employees at a Des Moines, Iowa, convenience store

called police to report suspicious activity outside the store. An officer responding to

the call spotted Webster in the area driving without wearing a seat belt. The officer

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After receiving credit for time served on a related Iowa state conviction,

Webster's actual sentence was 229 months' imprisonment.

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pulled his marked police car behind Webster's vehicle and activated the police car's

emergency lights and siren. Instead of pulling over, Webster accelerated in an attempt

to elude the officer. When the officer finally succeeded in stopping Webster's vehicle,

the officer removed Webster and his passengers from the vehicle and saw in plain

view a large plastic bag of marijuana and a .25 caliber Colt automatic pistol on the

floor in front of the driver's seat. 

Webster was indicted on one count of being a prohibited person in possession

of a firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). At his arraignment, Webster was

advised that his criminal history, including two Iowa felony convictions for operating

a motor vehicle while intoxicated ("OWI") and an Iowa felony conviction for

possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver, would be used to seek an

enhanced penalty under the Armed Career Criminal Act of 1984 (ACCA), 18 U.S.C.

§ 924(e). After a two-day trial, the jury found Webster guilty of the § 922(g)(1)

charge. The United States Probation Office prepared a presentence report ("PSR")

recommending application of an enhanced penalty under the ACCA. At sentencing

and over Webster's objection, the District Court determined that each of Webster's

Iowa felony OWI convictions constituted a "violent felony" as defined in

§ 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). The District Court then calculated Webster's sentence pursuant to

United States Sentencing Guidelines section 4B1.4, which implements the ACCA.

With an offense level of 34 and a criminal history category of VI, Webster's guideline

sentencing range under section 4B1.4 was 262 to 327 months' imprisonment. The

District Court sentenced Webster to 262 months' imprisonment.1

On appeal, Webster argues that the District Court erred when it instructed the

jury that his flight from police could be used to infer consciousness of guilt with

respect to his possession of a firearm. Webster also challenges his sentence,

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contending that the District Court erred in concluding that his Iowa felony OWI

convictions were violent felonies as defined in the ACCA and in applying section

4B1.4 of the sentencing guidelines in a mandatory fashion.

Webster first argues that the District Court erred in instructing the jury that it

could consider his flight from police to infer consciousness of guilt. "We review

challenges to jury instructions for an abuse of discretion." United States v. Wipf, 397

F.3d 632, 635 (8th Cir. 2005). We will "affirm if the entire charge to the jury, when

read as a whole, fairly and adequately contains the law applicable to the case." United

States v. Sdoulam, 398 F.3d 981, 993 (8th Cir. 2005) (internal citations and quotations

omitted). And we will reverse only if we find that an instructional error was

prejudicial to the defendant. United States v. Gianakos, 415 F.3d 912, 920 (8th Cir.),

cert. denied, 126 S. Ct. 764 (2005). A flight instruction may be given when such an

instruction is warranted by the evidence presented at trial. See United States v. Roy,

843 F.2d 305, 310 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 487 U.S. 1222 (1988). 

The District Court's Instruction 11 to the jury read:

You may also consider any evidence of flight by the defendant, along

with all of the evidence in the case, and you may consider whether this

evidence shows a consciousness of guilt and determine the significance

to be attached to any such conduct.

Whether or not evidence of flight shows a consciousness of guilt and the

significance to be attached to any such evidence are matters exclusively

within the province of the jury. In your consideration of the evidence of

flight you should consider that there may be reasons for this which are

fully consistent with innocence. 

Webster argues that this instruction improperly allowed the jury to infer consciousness

of guilt with respect to his alleged possession of a firearm when the evidence

suggested that he had other reasons to flee the police, namely, that he knew there were

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illegal drugs in the car and that he had violated a traffic law. We disagree. While the

flight instruction allowed the jury to consider the flight evidence, it also instructed the

jury to consider all the evidence admitted during the trial and determine what

significance, if any, to attach to the flight evidence. The District Court properly left

to the jury the issue of Webster's reason for fleeing from the police. That Webster

may have had other possible reasons for fleeing from police "does not render evidence

of the flight inadmissible to show consciousness of guilt" of the crime charged. Roy,

843 F.2d at 310; see also United States v. Clark, 45 F.3d 1247, 1251 (8th Cir. 1995).

The District Court instructed the jury that there may have been any number of reasons

for Webster to flee from police that were "fully consistent with innocence." The jury

heard Webster's evidence on the other possible motives for his flight. Whatever

weight the jury may have given the evidence of Webster's flight, there is sufficient

other evidence in the record to support the conviction. In these circumstances, we see

no abuse of discretion in the District Court's decision to give the flight instruction. 

Webster next argues that the District Court erred in concluding that a felony

OWI conviction under Iowa law is a "violent felony" as defined in the ACCA. The

ACCA defines violent felony as a felony punishable by a prison term exceeding one

year that "is burglary, arson, or extortion, involves use of explosives, or otherwise

involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another."

18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). After the parties filed their briefs and presented their

arguments in this case, our court en banc issued an opinion in United States v. McCall,

No. 04-1143, 2006 WL 625687, at *4 (8th Cir. Mar. 15, 2006) (en banc), in which we

held that "driving while intoxicated . . . is . . . a violent felony under the 'otherwise

involves' provision in § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii)." We therefore address Webster's arguments

in light of our recent decision in McCall.

We turn first to the Iowa statute defining an OWI offense to determine what

specific conduct is criminalized. In Iowa, a "person commits the offense of operating

while intoxicated if the person operates a motor vehicle . . . [w]hile under the

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influence of an alcoholic beverage or other drug." Iowa Code § 321J.2. The Iowa

Supreme Court has defined "operate" for purposes of the OWI statute "as the

immediate, actual physical control over a motor vehicle that is in motion and/or has

its engine running." State v. Hopkins, 576 N.W.2d 374, 377 (Iowa 1998) (internal

citations and quotations omitted). Thus, like the Missouri statute at issue in McCall,

Iowa's OWI statute criminalizes "both driving a vehicle and merely causing the

vehicle to function by starting its engine." McCall 2006 WL 625687, at *5. Because

the Iowa statute criminalizes conduct other than driving while intoxicated, McCall

instructs that we look to the judicial record, as limited by the United States Supreme

Court in Taylor v. United States, 495 U.S. 575 (1990), and Shepard v. United States,

125 S. Ct. 1254 (2005), to determine whether Webster's prior convictions involved

driving while intoxicated and thus constitute violent felonies for purposes of

§ 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). Id. at *5–6. 

As we noted in McCall, the Supreme Court held in Taylor that a state burglary

conviction constitutes a violent felony if "'the charging paper and jury instructions

actually required the jury to find all the elements of generic burglary in order to

convict the defendant.'" Id. at *5 (quoting Taylor, 495 U.S. at 602). We also noted

that in Shepard, the Court expanded this approach to include a guilty-plea conviction,

but restricted the evidence admissible to prove that the defendant pleaded guilty to a

generic burglary offense to "'the charging document, the terms of a plea agreement or

transcript of colloquy between judge and defendant in which the factual basis for the

plea was confirmed by the defendant, or to some comparable judicial record of this

information.'" Id. (quoting Shepard, 125 S. Ct. at 1263). A review of the record on

appeal in this case reveals that such evidence of Webster's guilty-plea convictions is

absent. 

Included in the record on appeal is Webster's PSR, which indicates that Webster

pleaded guilty to two Iowa felony OWI offenses in 1992. With respect to the first

offense, the PSR states that Webster "was observed by officers with the Des Moines

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Police Department operating a white 1979 Ford Fairmont while under the influence

of alcohol." PSR at 11. There is no assertion in the PSR that on this occasion

Webster was driving the vehicle when he was observed by officers. With respect to

the second OWI offense, the PSR states that Webster "was observed by officers

operating a motor vehicle (a Nissan pickup). Officers became involved in a chase

with the vehicle. Upon contact, officers observed the defendant had watery, bloodshot

eyes, slurred speech, and a strong odor of alcohol on his breath. A [blood alcohol

concentration] registered .158." Id. The PSR does assert that on this occasion,

Webster was driving the vehicle when he was observed by officers. The PSR

concludes that these two felony OWI convictions constitute violent felonies, and it

recommends that Webster receive a sentence calculated under section 4B1.4 of the

sentencing guidelines. Webster objected to the sentencing calculations included in the

PSR and to all underlying facts on which those calculations were based. 

We conclude that in these circumstances, the "fact recitals in the PSR are not

an adequate basis for affirming" Webster's sentence. McCall, 2006 WL 625687, at

*6. Webster objected to the calculation of his base offense level, the application of

all sentencing enhancements, and the recitation of facts in the PSR. Faced with such

objections, the government had an obligation at sentencing to introduce the

documentary evidence Taylor or Shepard requires if it intended to rely on Webster's

prior felony convictions to support an ACCA enhancement to Webster's sentence. Id.

The record on appeal does not include the charging documents, written plea

agreements, transcripts of plea colloquies, or comparable judicial records to establish

that Webster pleaded guilty to two while-driving felony OWI offenses. Accordingly,

we vacate the sentence imposed by the District Court and remand the case for further

sentencing proceedings at which the court may allow the government to submit

evidence admissible under Taylor or Shepard to establish that Webster's two prior

felony OWI convictions involved driving while intoxicated and thus were violent

felonies under § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). The District Court may allow the parties to

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Because we are remanding Webster's case for further sentencing proceedings

to determine whether his prior felony OWI convictions constitute violent felonies

under § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii), we decline to address the arguments Webster raises based

on United States v. Booker, 125 S. Ct. 738 (2005). The District Court is aware of its

duty on remand to impose a sentence in accordance with Booker. 

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supplement the sentencing record for this purpose. Id.; United States v. Deroo, 304

F.3d 824, 828 (8th Cir. 2002).2

 

For the reasons set forth above, we affirm Webster's conviction, but we vacate

his sentence and remand to the District Court for resentencing. 

______________________________

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