Opinion ID: 806207
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Request for Downward Departure

Text: This court reviews de novo a district court’s interpretation and application of the Sentencing Guidelines, and its findings of fact for clear error. Rivera-Mendoza, 682 F.3d at 733. A decision to depart from the Guidelines range is reviewed for abuse of discretion. Id. The district court is not required to impose a sentence within the Guidelines range if “there exists an aggravating or mitigating circumstance of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines that should result in a sentence different from that described.” 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b)(1). “If a factor is unmentioned in the Guidelines, the court must, after considering the structure and theory of both relevant individual guidelines and the Guidelines taken as a whole, decide whether it is sufficient to take the case out of the Guideline’s heartland.” United States v. Rodriguez, 414 F.3d 837, 848 (8th Cir. 2005) (citing Koon v. United States, 518 U.S. 81, 96 (1996)). Momoh contends the district court should have departed from the Sentencing Guidelines, pursuant to § 5K20, because this case falls outside the heartland.3 However, this court has held “[t]he discretionary denial of a motion for downward departure 3 Momoh also contends the district court should have applied U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1, cmt. n.3(E), which provides credit against loss in certain circumstances. Note 3(E) provides credit for services rendered “to the victim before the offense was detected . . . .” The victim in this case is Medicaid and not HopeCare’s clients. Therefore, note 3(E) is inapplicable. -8- [pursuant to § 5K2.0] is unreviewable unless the court failed to recognize its authority to depart.” United States v. Cubillos, 474 F.3d 1114, 1120 (8th Cir. 2007) (quotation omitted). At sentencing, the district court acknowledged its authority to depart, stating: a number of very eloquent arguments have been made on your behalf relating to the 3553(a) factors. I’m not going to go into them individually or detail them because they’re very well known by everybody in the room. But I’m going to tell you that your case does not fall out of that heartland. Your case does not fall into those 3553(a) factors that should cause this case to depart from that which is considered to be just what it is, the violation of law, based upon the loss that resulted and that lead to the numbers that are involved in establishing of a guideline sentence. Further, there is no argument the district court had an unconstitutional motive in refusing to depart downward. United States v. Sykes, 356 F.3d 863, 865 (8th Cir. 2004) (“Absent an unconstitutional motive, the extent to which a district court exercises its discretionary authority to depart downward is not subject to review.”). As the record reflects, Momoh received a Notice of Agency Action regarding his billing of personal-care-assistance services. The notice informed Momoh he had improperly billed Medicaid for 783.50 hours of personal-care-assistance services for one of his clients, K.B. The notice also informed Momoh that the Minnesota DHS investigators found numerous problems with his billing. After meeting with Momoh, the SIRS personnel informed Momoh of his billing problems, as noted in the May 2007 notice. Nonetheless, a subsequent SIRS audit showed Momoh continued to falsely bill Medicaid. In light of Momoh’s conduct, the district court chose to sentence Momoh at the bottom of the Guidelines range, stating: -9- Based on the facts set forth in the PSR and those noted above . . . . The Court finds that, pursuant to § 3553(a), a sentence within the guidelines range is appropriate in this case because it is sufficient, but not greater than necessary, to meet the goals of § 3553(a), including just punishment, deterrence, public safety, and the promotion of the law. In imposing this sentence, the Court rejects Defendant’s challenge to the Government’s amount-of-loss calculation, which was corroborated by the Probation Office in the [PSR]. Defendant’s challenge provided no supported basis upon which to undermine the amount as set forth by the Government. The district court carefully considered the facts and circumstances and determined the crime did not merit a sentence outside the Guidelines range. On these facts, we conclude the district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to depart downward.