Opinion ID: 3049222
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: application of the adjustment under u.s.s.g.

Text: § 2A5.2(a)(2)1 1 Gonzalez’s related argument that the sentence was unreasonable is premised on the contention that the district court improperly invoked the enhancement. We need not address this issue in light of our conclusion that Gonzalez’s conduct falls within the range of conduct contemplated by the enhancement. UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ 7959 [1] The adjustment under § 2A5.2(a)(2) applies “if the offense involved recklessly endangering the safety of . . . an aircraft.” U.S.S.G. § 2A5.2(a)(2). Gonzalez argues that the “crucial legal fulcrum,” as he terms it, is whether he recklessly endangered the actual aircraft and that while he may have interfered with the crew and arguably even endangered passengers, the adjustment is inapplicable because he did not endanger an aircraft. In sum, he claims that he endangered only the flight crew and passengers, not the aircraft. To the extent Gonzalez’s point is that the adjustment requires conduct beyond the underlying offense, he is correct. Simply interfering with the flight crew is insufficient to warrant the nine-level enhancement. But Gonzalez’s ultimate argument fails for two reasons: first, endangerment of the aircraft does not require evidence of actual harm to the aircraft; and second, Gonzalez’s irresponsible statements, threats and conduct easily qualified as reckless endangerment to “the safety of . . . an aircraft” within the meaning of § 2A5.2(a)(2). Turning to the first argument, not surprisingly, Gonzalez points to no case that requires evidence of actual harm to the aircraft under § 2A5.2(a)(2). Common sense tells us that a defendant can endanger something without causing actual harm. See, e.g., Price v. United States Navy, 39 F.3d 1011, 1019 (9th Cir. 1994) (“Courts have . . . consistently held that ‘endangerment’ means a threatened or potential harm and does not require proof of actual harm.”) (Resource Conservation and Recovery Act) (citations omitted); Ethyl Corp. v. EPA, 541 F.2d 1, 13 (D.C. Cir. 1976) (“Case law and dictionary definition agree that endanger means something less than actual harm.”) (Clean Air Act). Nothing suggests that this commonly-accepted meaning should not apply here. In a closely analogous situation, the district court explained: Defendant urges this court . . . to find that 2A5.2(a)(2) applies only if there is actual harm to the 7960 UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ aircraft and passengers. Such a construction would mean that this Base Offense Level would apply only when an aircraft actually crashed or suffered other damage as a result of a defendant’s action. Had this been the intended meaning, the term ‘harming’ would have been more appropriate than endangering, which means ‘putting someone or something in dan- ger; exposing to peril or harm.’ United States v. Guerrero, 193 F. Supp. 2d 607, 608 (E.D.N.Y. 2002) (quoting Black’s Law Dictionary 547 (7th ed. 1999)). [2] Recognizing that actual harm to the aircraft is not required for behavior to constitute endangerment, we next consider the contours of “recklessly endangering the safety of . . . an aircraft.” Section 2A5.2 does not define “reckless.” However, Application Note 1 to U.S.S.G. § 2A1.4 defines the term “reckless” in the context of involuntary manslaughter as a situation in which the defendant “was aware of the risk created by his conduct and the risk was of such a nature and degree that to disregard that risk constituted a gross deviation from the standard of care that a reasonable person would exercise in such a situation.” U.S.S.G. § 2A1.4, app. n.1. We adopted this definition in United States v. Naghani, 361 F.3d 1255, 1263 (9th Cir. 2004), a case that raised similar issues involving reckless endangerment of an aircraft. In Naghani, the defendant entered the aircraft lavatory and lit a cigarette, which set off a smoke alarm. When confronted, he argued with a flight attendant and threatened to “kill all Americans.” Id. at 1260. Although Naghani denied making this statement or refusing to cooperate, the jury convicted him of interfering with the duties of a flight crew in violation of 49 U.S.C. § 46504. The district court imposed the enhancement under § 2A5.2(a)(2). In upholding the enhancement, we observed: UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ 7961 The district court found that Naghani had acted recklessly based on the entire course of Naghani’s alleged conduct. The district court properly found that Naghani was aware of the risk created by his smoking, obstreperous behavior and threats, and that such conduct constituted a gross deviation from a standard of ordinary care. Naghani should have been aware that his behavior would divert the flight attendants’ attention from their duties and require their presence. If an actual emergency had arisen at another part of the plane, the distraction would have delayed, and perhaps prevented, an effective response by the flight attendants. Id. at 1263 (emphasis added).2 The Tenth Circuit’s treatment of § 2A5.2(a)(2) is consistent with our analysis. See United States v. Jenny, 7 F.3d 953 (10th Cir. 1993). In Jenny, the defendant was convicted of intimidating a flight crew under 49 U.S.C. § 1472(j), the predecessor statute to 49 U.S.C. § 46504. The district court applied a base offense level of 18 under § 2A5.2(a)(2). Id. at 954. Jenny cursed at the flight attendant and other passengers, made sexually suggestive remarks and gestures, grabbed a female flight attendant’s breast and a female passenger’s arm, and approached the cockpit area and sat in the flight attendant’s jump seat, among other things. Id. at 954-55. The captain was forced to make an unscheduled landing due to 2 We cannot embrace the dissent’s suggestion that Naghani is “not binding because the court [in Naghani] did not consider the meaning of ‘aircraft’ or what level of interference satisfied the Guideline,” or that its analysis is dicta. Dissenting op. at 7971-72. Naghani squarely addressed the question presented here—i.e., whether the district court’s application of § 2A5.2(a)(2) was an abuse of discretion. Under the Guidelines in effect at sentencing, the government was required to show that Naghani had endangered both “the aircraft and passengers.” See U.S.S.G. § 2A5.2(a)(2) (2001). That the court did not parse the meaning of aircraft or that its analysis relating to § 2A5.2 was brief, does not render its conclusion dicta. 7962 UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ Jenny’s conduct. Id. at 955. The court affirmed the sentencing enhancement under § 2A5.2(a)(2), holding that Jenny “acted with an awareness to forseeable consequence.” Id. at 957. Two district court cases are also particularly instructive. In Guerrero, the court held that the enhancement applied when an intoxicated passenger was so unruly that the captain concluded that he must return to John F. Kennedy International Airport rather than continue on to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. 193 F. Supp. 2d at 609-10. The passenger’s behavior included shoving, hitting, sexual touching, and threats that he was going to kill everyone on the aircraft. Id. at 610. The pilot left his duties in the cockpit to deal with the passenger, and the aircraft had to be turned around and returned to New York.3 Id. The court held that these actions exposed the aircraft and passengers to harm within the meaning of the Guidelines. In the second case, United States v. Spellman, 243 F. Supp. 2d 285 (E.D. Pa. 2003), the court held that it could have applied the reckless endangerment enhancement, but did not do so because the parties had stipulated to a base offense level of nine. Id. at 295 n.19. During the flight, Alonzo Spellman, a former defensive end for the Chicago Bears, was extremely abusive and threatening to the flight attendants and fellow passengers, and made comments like, “I hope we make it to Philadelphia before this plane crashes into a building.” Id. at 287. He also “talked out loud about opening the door while in flight” and said to the flight crew, “Give me a parachute and I’ll jump off this plane.” Id. After multiple failed attempts by the captain, flight attendants and passengers to restrain 3 Of course it is not necessary for the pilot to leave the cockpit to address a crisis, thus diverting his attention. Here, the pilot’s ordinary flight routine was seriously disrupted when an alarmed flight attendant alerted him to the bomb threats and the fracas in the cabin. Given the increased security measures and policies in effect post-9/11, it may well have been imprudent for the pilot to have left the cockpit under the circumstances. UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ 7963 Spellman, the pilot requested a priority handling that allowed the plane to land early at the Philadelphia airport. See id. at 288. The district court found that Spellman created an atmosphere of “pervasive terror.” Id. at 294. As the court summarized: In typical prosecutions under Sections 1472(j) and 46504, the defendants insult, physically harass, and in some cases even threaten to kill flight personnel. However, it is the rare case in which passengers experience the degree of fear and intimidation that Spellman instilled in so many of his fellow passengers. Indeed, we found few cases in which the pas- sengers had serious grounds to worry that the offender would actually bring down the plane. Id. at 293 & n.13 (collecting cases) (emphasis added). [3] As these cases illustrate, diversion of the aircraft, behavior that instills fear and terror in the other passengers or the flight crew, and threats that could result in harm to the aircraft are sufficient, depending on the combination of circumstances, to constitute reckless endangerment of the safety of the aircraft. Gonzalez’s conduct encompassed these risks and more. [4] To be sure, simply disrupting the flight attendants and causing other passengers discomfort does not rise to the level of reckless endangerment. But Gonzalez’s statements about the bomb were no joking matter. Surely threats about a bomb —whether couched in terms of “do I have to say I have a bomb?” or “I’m blowing the plane up, I’m taking it down”— go beyond interference with the flight crew’s performance of duties and constitute “a gross deviation from the standard of care that a reasonable person would exercise in such a situation.” U.S.S.G. § 2A1.4, app. n.1. The passengers were yelling, “[w]e’re going to crash. We’re going down.” The air of 7964 UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ terror created by Gonzalez, who candidly admitted he knew what he was doing, was reckless in the extreme. [5] Gonzalez’s argument that his conduct—whatever its impact on the flight crew and passengers—does not amount to endangerment of the aircraft, misses the mark because his conduct endangered both the people and the aircraft itself. An aircraft is a captive, closed environment in which the safety of the passengers and the integrity of the aircraft are closely intertwined. It doesn’t take an aeronautical engineer to recognize that a threat of a bomb in that environment and the havoc that such a threat might cause is a threat to the safety of the aircraft. Nowhere in § 2A5.2(a)(2) is there a requirement that an actual weapon or bomb be found on the plane. Such a narrow interpretation would remove highly reckless and threatening conduct from the ambit of § 2A5.2(a)(2), a result that makes no common sense. [6] And finally, as occurred in both Guerrero and Spellman, Gonzalez’s conduct precipitated an emergency diversion of the aircraft and a return to Las Vegas. This diversion was yet another risk to the aircraft caused by Gonzalez’s escalating terror.4 The chaos engendered by Gonzalez goes far beyond his characterization of a threat solely to the safety of the crew and passengers. Their ultimate safety is inextricably bound with the safety of the aircraft but we need not decide whether a 4 The dissent’s statement that “the more reasonable inference [regarding the aircraft’s diversion] would seem to be that . . . the pilot concluded that it would be safer to return to Las Vegas, rather than continue on to Ontario, California,” dissenting op. at 7971, can only be described as a logical fallacy. The pilot apparently considered a diversion of the aircraft back to Las Vegas, even under emergency, distress situations, to be safer than proceeding to Ontario once Gonzalez threatened to bring down the plane. But such diversion was certainly not safer than the normal operation of the flight to Ontario in the absence of Gonzalez’s disruptive behavior and threats. UNITED STATES v. GONZALEZ 7965 threat solely to the passengers would be sufficient to invoke the enhancement. Gonzalez recklessly endangered the aircraft itself. He does not present the case of a drunken passenger who tips over the drink cart, harasses a flight attendant, threatens a passenger, or is simply obstreperous. The enhancement requires more and Gonzalez’s behavior easily falls within the contours of “recklessly endangering the safety of . . . an aircraft.” U.S.S.G. § 2A5.2(a)(2).