Opinion ID: 1311468
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Sufficiency of the evidence in support of restitution.

Text: Defendants also claim that the evidence presented by the government in support of its motion for restitution is not sufficient to support an order of restitution. See 18 U.S.C. § 3664(a) (listing potential items of information required by the district court before imposing restitution). They contend that the victims' and law enforcement officers' affidavits contained unsubstantiated conclusions and imprecise accusations. In ordering restitution, the district court relied on several different pieces of evidence. The victims submitted affidavits describing the harms that they suffered and estimating the number of sex acts that they were forced to perform during the period in question, and the government submitted evidence from four independent sources to support its estimate of the price that Defendants charged for each sex act. Because we hold that the district court erred by calculating restitution using the market value of the prostitution services that the victims performed, we need not decide whether sufficient evidence supported that calculation. Cf. Hughey v. United States, 495 U.S. 411, 422, 110 S.Ct. 1979, 109 L.Ed.2d 408 (1990) (holding that the district court used the wrong legal standard when calculating restitution and remanding for further proceedings, without discussing sufficiency of the evidence under the wrong standard). Of course, some of the evidence on which the district court relied may remain relevant when it recalculates restitution to reflect the victims' actual losses. In that regard, victim affidavits will generally provide sufficient, reliable evidence to support a restitution order. United States v. Waknine, 543 F.3d 546, 557 (9th Cir.2008). Moreover, it is inappropriate for Defendants to contest the sufficiency of the government's evidence in support of restitution to the extent that other documentary evidence that Defendants' associates deliberately destroyed may have contained information relevant to the restitution calculation. In particular, the district court found that, after Defendants' arrests, Kuo's wife returned to the Bao Lai and, along with a former employee, destroyed all of the accounting documents of the prostitution business. These records were certainly relevant to determining the amount of restitution under the method the district court incorrectly used, and some may also be relevant to establish the victims' actual losses under the proper methodology.