Opinion ID: 599004
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the criminal offense level

Text: 16
17 Luscier asserts that the district court did not apply the correct base offense level to the two assault counts. We review de novo the district court's interpretation of the Sentencing Guidelines. United States v. Blaize, 959 F.2d 850, 851 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 2954, 119 L.Ed.2d 576 (1992). 18 In determining the base offense level, the court should apply the guideline most applicable to the offense of conviction. U.S.S.G. § 1B1.2(a); see United States v. McCall, 915 F.2d 811, 813-15 (2d Cir.1990). According to the Commentary accompanying section 2A2.2,  '[A]ggravated assault' means a felonious assault that involved (a) a dangerous weapon with intent to do bodily harm (i.e., not merely to frighten), or (b) serious bodily injury, or (c) an intent to commit another felony. U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2 commentary app. note 1. Aggravated assaults are assigned a base offense level of fifteen. Felonious assaults that do not fall within the scope of section 2A2.2 are classified as minor assaults. The base offense level for a minor assault with a dangerous weapon is only six. See id. § 2A2.3(a)(1). 19 Luscier pleaded guilty to two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon. The district court categorized the assaults as aggravated and calculated the offense levels in accordance with section 2A2.2 of the guidelines. The government maintains that because Luscier committed the assaults with a dangerous weapon, the district court applied the appropriate offense level. This argument ignores the fact that Luscier's conduct does not satisfy the definition of aggravated assault: Luscier was not found to have committed the assaults with intent to do bodily harm or another felony and the assaults did not result in any kind of bodily injury. That Luscier committed the assaults with a dangerous weapon is not, in itself, justification for classifying them as aggravated. The district court should have applied the base offense level for a minor assault with a dangerous weapon, as provided in section 2A2.3(a)(1).
20 Luscier also contends that, in calculating the combined offense level, the district court should not have departed from the guidelines and added one unit for each of the two assaults. As with the departure in the criminal history category, we review this departure in accordance with the approach established in Lira-Barraza, 941 F.2d at 746-47. We begin by inquiring whether the aggravating circumstances the district court relied on in support of the departure are of a kind or to a degree not adequately taken into account in the guidelines. Id. at 746. 21 The guidelines identify several factors that the Commission [was not] able to take into account fully in formulating the guidelines. U.S.S.G. § 5K2.0 p.s. The district court relied on three of these: the extreme psychological injury the surviving victims suffered, U.S.S.G. § 5K2.3 p.s., the extreme nature of Luscier's conduct, U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8 p.s., and the property damage that Luscier caused, U.S.S.G. § 5K2.5 p.s. The district court acknowledged that none of these factors taken alone was sufficiently aggravating or severe to justify departure. According to the district court, however, the combined effect of these factors renders Luscier's crime so serious as to exceed the typical murder/assault offense contemplated in the guidelines. 22 The government argues that when the district court discussed these three factors, it was not relying on them to justify departure. Rather, the government maintains that the Court's departure was based on the Court's conclusion that the guideline-calculated sentences for the two assault-with-a-dangerous-weapon convictions did not reflect the seriousness of those convictions. According to the government, the court merely discussed psychological injury, extreme conduct and property damage to emphasize its conclusion. 23 There are two problems with the government's argument. First, it ignores the district court's own statements that indicate that it was relying on the combination of factors to justify departure. For example, after discussing each of the three factors, the court concluded, Now you put all those things together, and it appears very clear to me that under the grouping rules that we deal with here, the offense levels for those two assaults are not adequate to reflect their seriousness. More significantly, however, if the government were correct in asserting that the district court justified its departure not on any particular aggravating circumstances, but, rather, on the more conclusory finding that the sentence prescribed by the guidelines did not adequately reflect the seriousness of the assault convictions, we would be forced to conclude that the district court's decision fell short of the Lira-Barraza standard. Lira-Barraza requires sentencing courts to identify aggravating circumstances justifying departure. See Lira-Barraza, 941 F.2d at 746-47. 24 We assume without deciding that, in identifying an aggravating circumstance supporting departure, the district court did not err in relying on a combination of factors which, standing alone, would not justify departure. We proceed to the second step of the Lira-Barraza and review for clear error the court's factual finding that the combination of the psychological harm the victims suffered, Luscier's extreme conduct, and the property damage rendered Luscier's offense so serious as to fall outside the scope of the guidelines. Id. at 746-47. 25 The district court clearly erred in ruling that the evidence supported departure. To begin with, the court did not find that Luscier's victims suffered psychological injury much more serious than that normally resulting from this type of offense. U.S.S.G. § 5K2.3 p.s. The only testimony regarding the extent of the victims' trauma came from the defendant's expert, Dr. Wise, who testified on direct that the victims were experiencing a normal psychological reaction to the event. Dr. Wise based his conclusion on records from the Quinault Mental Health Services and a letter to the district court from Kora Ward, written five months after the murder, in which Ward states that because of the stress of the event she had to move from her aunt's house, was having difficulty sleeping, was seeing a counselor, and was afraid of the dark and being alone. The government did not contradict Dr. Wise's testimony. Although it does indicate some psychological damage, the record does not support the conclusion that Luscier caused his victims unusually grave psychological injury. 26 The district court also concluded that although Luscier's conduct was not extreme, it came near to that under all of the circumstances. Section 5K2.8 defines extreme conduct as that which is unusually heinous, cruel, brutal, or degrading to the victim.... Examples of extreme conduct include torture of a victim, gratuitous infliction of injury, or prolonging of pain or humiliation. Id. p.s. Nothing in the record suggests that Luscier's behavior approached the level of extreme conduct described in section 5K2.8. Cf. United States v. Roberson, 872 F.2d 597, 602-04 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 493 U.S. 861, 110 S.Ct. 175, 107 L.Ed.2d 131 (1989) (holding that where defendant was convicted of credit card fraud, concealing and burning body of credit card owner constituted extreme conduct). Luscier committed the assaults while in a drug- and alcohol-induced fog. He threatened to harm the victims and repeatedly pierced the door with a sharpening steel. The victims, however, escaped quickly and without physical injury. The record does not support the district court's characterization of Luscier's offense as near to extreme conduct as defined in the guidelines. 27 The third aggravating factor that the district court considered was the property damage Luscier caused. Guideline section 5K2.5 provides that property damage may be an aggravating circumstance justifying departure if the damage was not taken into account within the guidelines. The guideline adds: 28 The extent of the increase ordinarily should depend on the extent to which the harm was intended or knowingly risked and on the extent to which the harm to property is more serious than other harm caused or risked by the conduct relevant to the offense of conviction. 29 The only property damage reflected in the record--the harm Luscier caused to the door when he repeatedly punched the sharpening steel through it--pales in comparison with the harm that Luscier threatened to inflict on his assault victims. This relatively trivial amount of property damage cannot fairly be considered in deciding whether to depart from the guidelines. 30 Under the Sentencing Guidelines, departure from the applicable guideline range is warranted only if the factor is present to a degree substantially in excess of that which ordinarily is involved in the offense. U.S.S.G. § 5K2.0 p.s. A combination of typical factors does not create an atypical case: taken together, the factors the district court relied on in support of departure do not render Luscier's offense substantially more egregious than the kinds of offenses contemplated in the guidelines. Cf. United States v. Rosen, 896 F.2d 789, 791-92 (3d Cir.1990) (holding that combination of unextraordinary mitigating factors in offender's favor does not justify downward departure). We hold, therefore, that the district court's finding that the evidence supported departure was clearly in error. 31 The district court's decision to depart was unquestionably influenced by the fact that, under U.S.S.G. section 3D1.4(c), the two assaults would be disregarded in determining Luscier's combined base offense level because they were more than nine offense levels below the level for second degree murder. The district court was of the view that the assaults should not go unrecognized in the offense level. Departure, however, created more distortion than the regular guideline procedure. By adding one point for each of the two assaults, the district court gave Luscier an offense level equivalent to that which he would have received if he had committed two additional offenses of seriousness equal to or only slightly less than that of the murder. U.S.S.G. § 3D1.4(a). 4 The guidelines, on the other hand, would disregard the two assaults as being overshadowed by the far more serious crime of murder, but would permit them to provide a reason for sentencing at the higher end of the sentencing range. U.S.S.G. § 3D1.4(c). The sentencing range for Luscier, with no departure, is 188 to 235 months. This extensive range offers adequate opportunity for the district court to take the assaults into account.