Opinion ID: 795717
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Version of the Sentencing Guidelines Used at Sentencing

Text: 76 Generally, the district court is instructed to apply the version of the Sentencing Guidelines that were in place at the time of a defendant's sentencing, unless applying the current Guidelines would amount to a violation of the Ex Post Facto Clause. Davis, 397 F.3d at 346 (citing U.S.S.G. § 1B1.11(a), (b)(1)(2002)); see also Art. I, § 9, cl.3 of the United States Constitution. In that case, the Guidelines instructed the sentencing court to apply the version that was in place at the time the defendant's offense was committed. Id. (citations omitted). The Ex Post Facto Clause is implicated where a law punishes retrospectively; a law is retrospective if it changes the legal consequences of acts completed before its effective date. Davis, 397 F.3d at 347 (citations and quotations omitted). 77 At his sentencing hearing in January 2005, Lupo objected to the version of the Guidelines that were used in the calculation of his sentence. Lupo argued that the 1998 version of the Guidelines should apply rather than the 2003 version, because although the Superseding Indictment set forth allegations from 1990-2002, there was actually no conduct that occurred after 2000, except for the 2002 meeting in the bathroom of Lucido's Insurance between Lupo and Hudson. 78 The government opposed using the 1998 Guidelines because it contended that the 2002 meeting was an attempt by the two men to get their stories straight, and that this was significant conduct during the course of the conspiracy. (J.A. at 2183.) The district court believed, and Lupo's attorney conceded that, if one viewed the 2002 meeting between Lupo and Hudson to be in furtherance of, or part, of the conspiracy, then the 2003 Guidelines would in fact apply. (J.A. at 2187.) Lupo's attorney argued, however, that this meeting was not in furtherance of the conspiracy because she contended that Hudson was already cooperating with the government, and that the government was somehow involved in the meeting. The district court rejected that notion, finding that the evidence showed that the meeting between Lupo and Hudson was consistent with a part of the conspiracy, and that there was nothing to suggest that the government was in anyway involved in the meeting. We agree with the district court that the 2002 meeting should be considered to be part of the ongoing criminal conspiracy charged in the indictment. 79 Lupo contends on appeal that the alleged 2002 meeting between himself and Hudson should not be considered a continuation of the main objectives of the conspiracy because it occurred after the central objectives of the conspiracy had been obtained. To support this argument, Lupo relies upon the case United States v. Howard, 770 F.2d 57, 60 (6th Cir.1985), in which we stated that an agreement to conceal a completed crime does not extend the life of a conspiracy. In so ruling, however, the Howard Court found that although an agreement to conceal a crime does not extend the life of a conspiracy, avoidance of detection can further a conspiracy if the conspiracy has not achieved its central aim. Id. (discussing Krulewitch v. United States, 336 U.S. 440, 69 S.Ct. 716, 93 L.Ed. 790 (1949)). We ultimately held that [i]n conspiracies where a main objective has not been attained or abandoned and concealment is essential to success of that objective, attempts to conceal the conspiracy are made in furtherance of the conspiracy. Id. at 61; see also Grunewald v. United States, 353 U.S. 391, 402, 77 S.Ct. 963, 1 L.Ed.2d 931 (1957) (stating that a distinction must be made between acts of concealment done in furtherance of the actual criminal objective, and those done after these criminal objectives have been obtained, for the mere purpose of covering up the crime). 80 While we agree with Lupo that Howard and Grunewald stand for the proposition that a distinction should be made between acts of concealment done in furtherance of the criminal conspiracy and those taken after the criminal objectives have been obtained, we do not believe that Lupo has definitively established in this case that the alleged conspiracy and his involvement in the alleged conspiracy terminated prior to 2002. In United States v. Mayes, 512 F.2d 637, 642 (6th Cir.1975), we held that where a conspiracy contemplates a continuity of purpose and continued performance of acts, it is presumed to exist until there has been an affirmative showing that it has terminated; and its members continue to be conspirators until there has been an affirmative showing that they have withdrawn. In Mayes, we concluded that the government had met its burden of establishing that the defendants were part of a single conspiracy to transport and sell in interstate commerce stolen automobiles; and that the government had shown that the acts occurred over an extended period of time, involved many people, and was very successful until it was detected. Id.; see also United States v. Etheridge, 424 F.2d 951, 964 (6th Cir.1970). 81 The Mayes principle of continuity and purpose has been used by some of our sister circuits in RICO conspiracy cases to establish that a defendant's acts to conceal his involvement in a criminal enterprise do extend the conspiracy for the purpose of the RICO statute. In United States v. Maloney, 71 F.3d 645, 660 (7th Cir.1995), the Seventh Circuit held, in a RICO conspiracy case in which a state court judge in Chicago was indicted for receiving bribes to fix cases that came before him, that [c]oncealment [] was an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy's main objective. The Court reasoned that the main criminal objective to fix cases was neither accomplished nor abandoned as long as the defendant judge was on the bench, and the conspirator attorney continued to practice before him. Id. The Maloney Court distinguished Grunewald on the ground that the conspiracy's main final objective was never finally attained. Id. at 659. According the Court, [u]nlike many . . . concealment cases where the object of the conspiracy was a discrete criminal act, here we deal with a crime that had no specific terminating event. Id. at 659-60 (citations and quotations omitted). The Seventh Circuit stated that [a]s long as the conspiracy is presumed to exist, acts of concealment are presumed to occur during the period of the conspiracy and are not introduced for the purpose of extending the life of the conspiracy. Id. at 660 n. 10; see also United States v. Spero, 331 F.3d 57, 60 (2d Cir.2003) (relying upon the above quote from Mayes, the Second Circuit found that generalized loan sharking activity is exactly the type of activity that contemplates a continuity of purpose and continued performance of acts, and that [a]ccordingly, once the Government met its burden of proof by establishing that the loansharking conspiracy existed, it was entitled to a presumption that the conspiracy continued until defendant demonstrated otherwise; and that the burden was on the defendant to prove affirmatively that the conspiracy alleged was terminated before the date asserted as the end of the conspiracy, or that he withdrew from the conspiracy prior to that date in order to sustain his statute of limitations challenge). 82 We believe that the activities alleged by the government in the indictment against Lupo are also precisely the type of activity that contemplates a continuity of purpose and continued performance of acts. We further believe that Lupo has failed to demonstrate affirmatively either that the ongoing criminal conspiracy ended prior to 2002 or that he had withdrawn from conspiracy before 2002. Merely because the bribes may have ended because the government had begun an investigation into some of the individuals involved, does not mean that the criminal objectives of the conspiracy had all been achieved, nor does it demonstrate that Lupo had withdrawn from the conspiracy. In fact, Lupo's alleged withdrawal from the conspiracy is belied by the 2002 meeting between him and Hudson. Furthermore, Lupo was charged in the Superseding Indictment with engaging in a pattern of racketeering activity, along with his co-conspirators, which included a charge of obstruction of justice. At the 2002 meeting, Lupo and Hudson conspired to mislead the government and obstruct justice in order to cover up their criminal activities. Accordingly, it was appropriate that the district court considered this meeting to be part of the ongoing criminal conspiracy. Having proved the existence of the criminal enterprise and the conspiracy, under Mayes, the government was entitled to a presumption that the conspiracy continued absent an affirmative showing that the conspiracy was terminated or that Defendant Lupo withdrew. Lupo having failed to establish such, the district court properly found that the 2002 meeting was part of the ongoing criminal conspiracy, and that the 2003 version of the Guidelines applied. 83 Additionally, the government argues — and Lupo does not dispute — that the 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005 Guidelines are all identical as they pertain to Lupo's sentence, and that Lupo would only be entitled to a lower sentence under the 1998 version of the Guidelines. Consequently, there is no Ex Post Facto problem with using the 2003 Guidelines. 84