Opinion ID: 163645
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: calculation of victim restitution

Text: 31 In evaluating the district court's award of victim restitution, we review its factual findings for clear error. Grissom, 44 F.3d at 1514. We review its calculation and ultimate award of restitution for abuse of discretion, recognizing that the calculation of an award is not an exact science. Id.; United States v. Teehee, 893 F.2d 271, 274 (10th Cir.1990). Defendants are entitled to notice of an estimate of victim restitution amounts prior to sentencing under 18 U.S.C. §§ 3664(a), (d)(5). 8 32 At his sentencing on April 29, 2002, the district court ordered Kravchuk to pay $34,699.51 in restitution. According to the Presentence Report, that amount included $14,280 payable to Stillwater National Bank (the owner of the ATM), $9,000 payable to the Minute Stop Convenience Store in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, and $11,419.51 payable to The Hartford, the convenience store's insurer. In testimony at trial, the owner of the convenience store claimed that Kravchuk and his co-participants had taken $16,500 out of the store's safe. On April 1, 2002, Kravchuk objected to the inclusion of the $16,500 in his Presentence Report, and the Probation Office revised the figure down to $9,000, based on the statements of Kravchuk's co-participants in the theft and information gathered during the investigation. The district court adopted the Probation Office's revised figure of $9,000 in its final sentence. 33 On appeal, Kravchuk first argues that the district court did not follow proper procedure in entering its judgment for the award. He asserts that the government failed to notify the court pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3664(d)(5), and by extension him, that a victim's losses were not ascertainable 10 days prior to sentencing. He next argues that there was no evidentiary basis in the record for the district court's adoption of the $9,000 figure. 34 We find Kravchuk's argument regarding procedure to be without merit based on the filings in the record. First, 18 U.S.C. § 3664(d)(5) was not implicated in Kravchuk's case because, although there was a dispute about the appropriate amount of money at stake, at no point before sentencing did either party conclude that a victim's loss from the burglary was not ascertainable. Second, even if 18 U.S.C. § 3664(d)(5) had applied, its 10-day notice provision would have been satisfied. Kravchuk filed his objection on April 1, 2002, twenty-eight days before his sentencing on April 29, 2002, that the only disputed dollar amount for victim restitution in the presentence report was too high. The Probation Office did revise the figure downward in response. 35 We find that Kravchuk's next argument that there was no evidentiary basis for the district court's adoption of the $9,000 figure also fails based on the record. We recognize that the determination of restitution is not an exact science and that the calculation of a loss need not be precise. Grissom, 44 F.3d at 1514-15; Teehee, 893 F.2d at 274. 36 The district court explained from the bench that its estimate of the loss was based both on the testimony presented at trial and the investigation that the Probation Office had done in preparing the presentence report. 9 Kravchuk solely disputed the amount of restitution payable to the owner of the convenience store. The owner of the store had testified he had two weeks' worth of receipts in his safe, totaling $16,500 in cash, but Kravchuk argued that this amount was opportunistically inflated. After Kravchuk's objection, the Probation Office revised the figure down to $9,000 based on, among other things, the testimony of Kravchuk's co-participants at trial about the amount of money each of them had kept from the crime. On the basis of this evidence, the district court agreed that nine thousand dollars was a reasonable estimate of what Kravchuk may have taken from the safe. 37 Accordingly, the district court did not clearly err in its factual findings, and did not abuse its discretion in the calculation of the award. We will not reverse its decision regarding victim restitution. 38