Opinion ID: 3052350
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: the scope of the “brings to” offense after lopez

Text: Singh contends that there was insufficient evidence to establish that he brought, or aided and abetted the bringing of, one alien into the United States for the purpose of commercial advantage or private financial gain, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1324(a)(2)(B)(ii).2 There is no dispute that Singh did not 2 8 U.S.C. § 1324(a)(2) penalizes Any person who, knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that 8814 UNITED STATES v. SINGH “bring” Patel to the United States. The dispute centers on the aiding and abetting portion of the charge. Specifically, Singh argues that his telephone conversations with people in Canada, ultimately resulting in an agreement for Singh to provide state-side transport and the return of the passport to Canada, were insufficient to sustain a conviction for aiding and abetting the crime of bringing an alien to the United States. The starting point for our analysis is our recent en banc decision in United States v. Lopez, 484 F.3d 1186 (9th Cir. 2007). We begin by noting one critical difference between our case and Lopez. We reviewed de novo Lopez’s sufficiency of the evidence claim because he had preserved his claim by moving for acquittal at the close of the evidence under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 29. See United States v. Bahena-Cardenas, 70 F.3d 1071, 1072 (9th Cir. 1995). Because Singh did not preserve this claim of sufficiency of the evidence by moving for acquittal at the close of the evidence, our review is more deferential, requiring reversal “only upon plain error or to prevent a manifest injustice.” United States v. Delgado, 357 F.3d 1061, 1068 (9th Cir. 2004). In any case, a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence requires us to determine whether, “after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. We began in Lopez by observing that in 8 U.S.C. § 1324(a)(1), Congress created four distinct immigration an alien has not received prior official authorization to come to, enter, or reside in the United States, brings to or attempts to bring to the United States in any manner whatsoever, such alien, regardless of any official action which may later be taken with respect to such an alien . . . . Id. Under § 1324(a)(2)(B), if such an offense is “done for the purpose of commercial advantage or private financial gain,” id. at § 1324(a)(2)(B)(ii), then the person shall “be fined under Title 18 and shall be imprisoned . . . not less than 3 nor more than 10 years.” Id. at (a)(2)(B)(iii). UNITED STATES v. SINGH 8815 offenses: “1) bringing an alien to the United States; 2) transporting or moving an illegal alien within the United States; 3) harboring or concealing an illegal alien within the United States; and 4) encouraging or inducing an illegal alien to enter the United States.” Id. at 1190-91. Specifically, in Lopez we addressed the issue of whether a driver who transports a group of illegal aliens from a drop-off point in the United States to another destination in this country commits only the offense of transporting aliens “within” the United States or whether that individual is also guilty of the additional offense of aiding and abetting the crime of ‘bringing’ the aliens “to” the United States. Id. at 1187. Lopez clarified the temporal aspect of “bringing to”3 the United States and held that: although all of the elements of the “bringing to” offense are satisfied once the aliens cross the border, the crime does not terminate until the initial transporter who brings the aliens to the United States ceases to transport them—in other words, the offense continues until the initial transporter drops off the aliens on the U.S. side of the border. At that point the offense ends, regardless of the judicial district in which the termination occurs. Id. at 1187-88. Because Lopez encountered the aliens and transported them only after they had been dropped off in the United States by someone else, her act of transporting the aliens occurred only 3 Following Lopez, “we use the terms ‘brings to’ and ‘bringing to’ interchangeably when referring to the offense proscribed by § 1324(a)(2). id. at 1188 n.1. 8816 UNITED STATES v. SINGH after the “brings to” offense was complete and her transportation of the aliens could not, standing alone, support her conviction for bringing an undocumented alien to the United States or her conviction for aiding and abetting such an offense. Id. at 1198. We concluded that the convictions must “be reversed unless the government can prevail on its second theory, that Lopez acted before the drop-off to aid and abet the extraterritorial offense.” Id. at 1198-99. This case begins where we left off in Lopez.