Opinion ID: 33204
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Multiple Convictions under Section 924(c)(1)

Text: 43 Walters challenges his convictions on two counts charging violations of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1), 7 which resulted in a mandatory life sentence, as an improper application of the statute. Although both offenses occurred simultaneously with the single explosion of a single bomb, Count Two of the government's indictment charged Walters with the use of the bomb to assault a federal officer, while Count Four charged him with the use of the same bomb to damage a federal building. The district court, in accordance with section 924(c)(1)(B)(ii), sentenced Walters to 360 months under Count Two. Following that conviction, and in accordance with section 924(c)(1)(C)(ii), the court sentenced Walters to life imprisonment under Count Four (as a second conviction subsequent to the Count Two conviction for use of the bomb). Walters primarily relies on United States v. Phipps, 319 F.3d 177 (5th Cir.2003), in which this court held that section 924(c)(1) does not authorize multiple convictions for a single use of a single firearm based on multiple predicate offenses. Id. at 183. Walters contends that because the charged offenses involved only a single use of a single destructive device, only one of the section 924(c)(1) counts of conviction can stand. The government attempts to limit Phipps to its facts and urges the application of United States v. Salameh, 261 F.3d 271, 279 (2d Cir.2001), in which the Second Circuit permitted convictions for two counts under section 924(c)(1), one alleging the transportation and one alleging the use and carrying of a bomb set off in the World Trade Center in 1993. 44 In Phipps, the defendants abducted a woman in her car at gunpoint, gave the gun to an accomplice, and drove off. They repeatedly raped the victim before she escaped. 319 F.3d at 180-81. Defendants were convicted of kidnapping and carjacking. The jury also convicted the defendants for two counts under section 924(c)(1), one charging use of a firearm during and in relation to the kidnapping and one charging use of a firearm during and in relation to the carjacking. Id. at 181. On appeal, defendants urged that they could not be convicted twice under section 924(c)(1) for a single use of a single firearm, despite their convictions for two predicate offenses. The court began the analysis with the statutory language defining the unit of prosecution under section 924(c)(1), holding that it criminalized the use, carriage, or possession of a firearm during and in relation to a predicate offense. Id. at 186. The court concluded that the statute did not unambiguously authorize multiple convictions for a single use of a single firearm during and in relation to multiple predicate offenses. The court instead concluded that the language allows for only as many counts as there are uses of the firearm. Id. at 186. The court reasoned that although the defendants had committed two crimes (kidnapping and carjacking), they used the gun only once — in put[ting] the firearm to [the victim's] head — and could be convicted of only a single section 924(c)(1) violation. Id. 45 The Phipps court analyzed two earlier cases holding that section 924(c)(1) does not authorize multiple convictions for a single use of a single firearm based on multiple predicate offenses. In United States v. Wilson, 160 F.3d 732 (D.C.Cir.1998), the court held that a defendant convicted of first degree murder and killing a witness, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1512, could be convicted of only a single violation of section 924(c)(1) because the defendant used a firearm only once. Id. at 749. The Second Circuit reached a similar conclusion in United States v. Finley, 245 F.3d 199 (2d Cir.2001). The Finley defendant was convicted of both drug distribution and drug possession with intent to distribute after an undercover officer purchased drugs from the defendant and found additional drugs in a subsequent search of the defendant's home. Id. at 202. The officer also found a gun in the home. Id. The defendant was charged with and convicted of one count for using or carrying a firearm during and in relation to drug possession and one count for using or carrying a firearm during and in relation to drug distribution. Id. at 201. Agreeing with the widely-shared view that [section 924(c)]'s text is ambiguous, the Second Circuit reversed the defendant's second conviction under the statute. Id. at 208. The court reasoned that [t]he statute does not clearly manifest an intention to punish a defendant twice for continuous possession of a firearm in furtherance of simultaneous predicate offenses consisting of virtually the same conduct. Id. at 207. 46 In Salameh, however, the Second Circuit considered and rejected a similar challenge to two section 924(c)(1) convictions, one for the use or carriage of a firearm in relation to the underlying offense of assaulting a federal officer, and one for the use or carriage of a firearm in relation to the underlying offense of conspiracy to bomb buildings and property and to transport explosives in interstate commerce. 261 F.3d at 277. In finding that the defendants' section 924(c) convictions did not rest on a single use of a single explosive device, the court emphasized two facts. First, the indictment charged separate uses of the explosive device: transportation of the bomb from one state to another and use of the bomb by detonating it in the World Trade Center. Id. at 279. These separate uses distinguished Wilson and Finley, in which the defendants were charged with only a single use of a single firearm. Id. The Salameh court expressly noted that we are not here faced with a situation in which defendants' § 924(c) convictions rest on a single `use' of the firearm in question. Id. Second, Congress had separately criminalized transportation of a bomb, making it an offense independent of a later detonation. Id.; see 18 U.S.C. § 844(d). Given the separate, and separately culpable, nature of defendants' use and carriage of the bomb, the multiple convictions under section 924(c)(1) could stand. Id. 47 In the present case, in contrast to Salameh, the jury did not have to find that Walters both transported and used the bomb to convict him of the predicate offenses charged in the indictment. In contrast to the indictment in Salameh, the government did not charge Walters with separate offenses consisting of different actions relating to the bomb. Unlike Salameh, the government did not allege transportation of the explosive device as a separate, and separately culpable offense from the use of the device. Like the Phipps, Wilson, and Finley defendants, Walters used a single explosive device on a single occasion, during and in relation to the separate predicate offenses of assaulting a federal officer and damaging a federal building. Under the binding precedent of Phipps, Walters can be convicted of only a single section 924(c)(1) conviction for his single use of the single bomb. Phipps, 319 F.3d at 183; see Finley, 245 F.3d at 207; Wilson, 160 F.3d at 749. 48 The government argues that Phipps is distinguishable because of the unusual fact that defendants gave the firearm to [the accomplice] immediately after using it. Id. at 188. The government argues that this voluntary restriction on defendants' use of the firearm made Phipps unique. In that case, the voluntary transfer of the firearm at an early point in the defendants' criminal rampage was important because it limited how they used the firearm under section 924(c)(1). That limit precluded a sentence based on two convictions under section 924(c)(1), despite the fact that the defendants accomplished dual criminal purposes, carjacking and kidnaping. Similarly, the fact that Walters used a single bomb on a single occasion precludes sentencing based on two counts of conviction under section 924(c)(1), despite the fact that Walters accomplished the dual criminal purposes of assaulting a federal officer and damaging a federal building. 49 In Phipps, the court held that `[t]he proper remedy for multiplication of punishment is to vacate the sentences on all the counts and remand for resentencing with instructions that the count elected by the government be dismissed. The defendant[s are] then to be resentenced.' Phipps, 319 F.3d at 189 (quoting United States v. Privette, 947 F.2d 1259, 1263 (5th Cir.1991)). This court vacates the sentences for the two 924(c)(1) counts and remands for resentencing, with instructions that after the government chooses which of the section 924(c)(1) counts to dismiss, either Count Two or Count Four, the district court will resentence Walters on the remaining section 924(c)(1) count.