Opinion ID: 2998530
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Relevant Conduct Determination Was Error

Text: We find that the district court clearly erred when it concluded that Ripoll’s allegations concerning the additional 100 kilograms of cocaine constituted relevant conduct. We review a district court’s calculation of the quantity of drugs involved in an offense for clear error. United States v. Bacallao, 149 F.3d 717, 719 (7th Cir. 1998). A finding of fact No. 03-1471 7 is clearly erroneous when “although there is evidence to support it, the reviewing court on the entire evidence is left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed.” United States v. McEntire, 153 F.3d 424, 431 (7th Cir. 1998) (quoting United States v. Gypsum Co., 333 U.S. 364, 395 (1948)). In calculating a defendant’s base offense level under the now-advisory Sentencing Guidelines, “the sentencing court must consider types and quantities of drugs not specified in the counts of conviction but that were ‘part of the same course of conduct or common scheme or plan’ as the convicted offenses.” United States v. Beler, 20 F.3d 1428, 1431 (7th Cir. 1994) (citations omitted) (quoting U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3(a)(2)). In United States v. Duarte, we noted that this “relevant conduct” or “aggregation rule” “grants the government a fearsome tool in drug cases. It permits prosecutors to ‘indict defendants on relatively minor offenses and then seek enhanced sentences later by asserting that the defendant has committed other more serious crimes for which, for whatever reason, the defendant was not prosecuted and has not been convicted.’ ” 950 F.2d 1255, 1263 (7th Cir. 1991). However, the relevant conduct rule has limits. The rule allows sentencing courts to consider quantities of drugs not specified in the counts of conviction, provided “the unconvicted activities bore the necessary relation to the convicted offense.” Id. Two or more offenses are part of a common scheme or plan if they are connected by at least one common factor, such as “common victims, common accomplices, common purpose, or similar modus operandi.” U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3(a)(2), App. Note 9. In assessing whether offenses are part of the same course of conduct, we look to whether there is “a strong relationship between the uncharged conduct and the convicted offense, focusing on whether the government has demonstrated a significant ‘similarity, regularity, and temporal proximity.’ ” United States v. Acosta, 85 F.3d 8 No. 03-1471 275, 281 (7th Cir. 1996). Offenses are part of the same course of conduct if they are “part of a single episode, spree, or ongoing series of offenses.” U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3(a)(2), App. Note 9. Moreover, “section 1B1.3(a)(2) must not be read to encompass any offense that is similar in kind to the offense of conviction but that does not bear the required relationship to that offense.” United States v. Patel, 131 F.3d 1195, 1204 (7th Cir. 1997); see also United States v. White, 888 F.2d 490, 500 (7th Cir. 1989). We have held that the mere fact that the defendant may have engaged in other drug transactions “is not sufficient to justify treating those transactions as ‘relevant conduct’ for sentencing purposes.” United States v. Crockett, 82 F.3d 722, 730 (7th Cir. 1996). In this case, we are not convinced that the aggregated relevant conduct in question is sufficiently intertwined with the offense of conviction. See Bacallao, 149 F.3d at 721. To begin, there is no temporal proximity between the crimes to which Ortiz pled guilty and the relevant conduct which the district court attributed to Ortiz. Ripoll’s testimony provides no specific dates for any of the alleged cocaine purchases by Ortiz, other than the loose time frame of “1997 through 1999.” Ripoll testified that he first observed Ortiz purchase cocaine from Zambrana in “early 1997, but the next time he supposedly observed Ortiz purchase drugs from Zambrana was not until the “summer of 1998, over a year later. There is, at a minimum, a ten-month gap between Ripoll’s arrest in December 1999 and Ortiz’s first offense on September 21, 2000, which the government concedes. Such a temporal gap suggests the lack of a common plan or course of conduct. See United States v. Sykes, 7 F.3d 1331, 1337 (7th Cir. 1993) (temporal gap of 14 months “tends to indicate conduct that can easily be separated into ‘discrete, identifiable units’ rather than behavior that is part of the same course of conduct or common scheme or plan”) (quoting U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3 background comment); see also United States v. Mullins, 971 F.2d 1138, 1144 (4th Cir. 1992) No. 03-1471 9 (temporal proximity “extremely weak” where uncharged conduct occurred six months prior to offense of conviction); United States v. Hahn, 960 F.2d 903, 911 (9th Cir. 1992) (evidence of specific similarity and regularity important where period of five months separated drug transactions); United States v. Jones, 948 F.2d 732, 737-38 (D.C. Cir. 1991) (embezzlement that occurred over one year before mailbag fraud not part of same course of conduct or common plan). The government argues that this temporal gap problem can be explained if we make the assumption that Ortiz was forced to find another supplier after Ripoll’s arrest. However, the record simply does not indicate that this was the case, and we refuse to make such an assumption. The government relies on our holdings in United States v. Ruiz, 178 F.3d 877, 882 (7th Cir. 1999), and Sumner, 325 F.3d at 886 for this proposition. We find the government’s reliance on these cases unpersuasive. Although we did not remand in Ruiz because the error there did not affect the defendant’s sentencing range, we did find that the prior drug activities at issue could not be considered for sentencing purposes as additional relevant conduct. 178 F.3d at 882. As in this case, in Ruiz we noted that the government was attempting to link drug transactions “on some occasions” to behavior that involved weekly transactions. See id. at 880, 882. In Sumner, we held that the defendant’s crack cocaine dealings were sufficiently similar and temporally proximate to the relevant conduct the district court found. However, in that case, the defendant specifically admitted that the supplier who had been incarcerated was supplying him drugs before his arrest. There is no such link here. We have held that without temporal proximity, the government needs a stronger showing regarding the other course of conduct factors, such as regularity or similarity of acts. Sumner, 265 F.3d at 541; Ruiz, 178 F.3d at 882 (7th Cir. 1999) (“If the prior incidents are remote in time, a 10 No. 03-1471 stronger showing of regularity and similarity may be necessary to support a determination of a single course of conduct.”). Here, there is no significant similarity or regularity between Ripoll’s allegations and Ortiz’s convicted offenses. The regular weekly purchasing activity Ripoll described in his testimony was part of a major, large-scale drug trafficking conspiracy extending throughout Indiana, Michigan, and Illinois. This drug trafficking ring ended in December 1999, with the arrest of Ripoll and others. In comparison, Ortiz’s charged offenses consisted of three drug sales that took place over a sixmonth time span. The sales all took place at one location, the Lake Station car repair shop. The sales only involved Ortiz and the DEA’s confidential informant. Additionally, while Ripoll describes Ortiz as exclusively purchasing cocaine, one of Ortiz’s convictions involves a different drug, marijuana. Most damning to the government, however, is that Ortiz’s three sales occurred in 2000 and 2001, long after the Zambrana/Ripoll conspiracy had been exposed. The quantity of cocaine involved in the charged offenses and the alleged relevant conduct is also different. Ripoll describes Ortiz as purchasing between one and three kilograms of cocaine a week throughout 1997 to 1999. The two controlled purchases of cocaine between Ortiz and the DEA’s confidential informant that took place in January and March 2001 equaled 10 ounces. In addition, we find nothing in the record indicating that the alleged weekly purchases of cocaine from Ripoll and Zambrana involved the same purpose or modus operandi as Ortiz’s convicted offenses. See Bacallao, 149 F.3d at 719 (stating courts cannot consider additional drug purchases when there is “no explanation indicating how the alleged purchase involved the same purpose or modus operandi as the convicted offense”). The convicted offenses here do not involve the same participants as the activities described by Ripoll. See Ruiz, 178 F.3d at 882 (finding that different No. 03-1471 11 participants indicated that transactions were not part of same conduct or scheme, even if transactions were similar). When we compare Ortiz’s role in his convicted offenses to those of the alleged relevant conduct, we also see substantial differences. Ortiz pled guilty to selling marijuana once and relatively small amounts (when compared to 100 kilograms) of cocaine twice. However, according to Ripoll, Ortiz purchased large quantities of cocaine on a weekly basis. As such, we find the government’s evidence that the relevant conduct involved the same purpose or modus operandi non-existent insufficient. Finally, the district court did not make specific findings on the issue of whether Ripoll’s allegations involved conduct relevant to the convicted offense.1 As we have noted before, the government’s burden at sentencing is considerably lightened because of the preponderance of the evidence standard and the relaxed evidentiary rules that govern sentencing. However, we have also held that the relevant conduct rule is “not without limits” and “because its application so favors the government,” we insist that courts be “scrupulous to ensure that the government has adhered to those limits.” Beler, 20 F.3d at 1432. One of the ways in which we ensure that these limits are maintained is by requiring sentencing courts to “explicitly state and support, 1 The district court, in making its relevant conduct finding, stated only the following: As to the objection of the Defendant as to relevant conduct, and actually we can run that with the base offense level together. All my findings here are by a preponderance of the credible evidence that the court has in front of it. The court does find that the testimony of Carlos Ripoll—I find that testimony to be very credible, so, the defendant should be held responsible for at least a hundred kilograms of cocaine as relevant conduct. Sentencing Hr’g Tr., Vol. II at 21. 12 No. 03-1471 either at the sentencing hearing or (preferably) in a written statement of reasons, the finding that the unconvicted activities bore the necessary relation to the convicted offense.” Id. (citing Duarte, 950 F.2d at 1263). The district court’s relevant conduct decision seems solely based on Ripoll’s testimony at the sentencing hearing. The district court did not address the fact that Ripoll’s assertions regarding over 100 kilograms of cocaine purchases from 1997 through 1999 do not appear anywhere in the presentencing report. Most importantly, the district court did not address any issues of temporal proximity, similarity, regularity, or modus operandi and failed to explain how the events to which Ripoll testified were related to the conduct to which Ortiz pled guilty. The district court’s terse findings, combined with our analysis examining the temporal proximity, similarity, regularity, and modus operandi of Ortiz’s alleged relevant conduct, all lead us to conclude that the district court’s finding that Ortiz was responsible for 100 kilograms of cocaine as relevant conduct was clearly erroroneous. D. The District Court’s Additional Sentencing Determinations We find that the district court also erred by denying Ortiz a downward adjustment of three points for demonstrating acceptance of responsibility, pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1(b)(1), and by adding two points for activity occurring during supervised release. We review both the district court’s acceptance of responsibility and supervised release factual findings for clear error. United States v. Wetwattana, 94 F.3d 280, 285 (7th Cir. 1996); United States v. Trotter, 270 F.3d 1150, 1153 (7th Cir. 2001). The district court made both of these determinations based exclusively on the alleged relevant conduct at issue here. Because we have already determined that the government’s allegations No. 03-1471 13 against Ortiz do not constitute relevant conduct, it follows that the district court’s acceptance of responsibility and supervised release findings are also clearly erroneous. E. Ortiz’s Booker Arguments Ortiz also argues that his Sixth Amendment rights were violated when the district judge made a finding by a preponderance of the evidence regarding Ortiz’s alleged relevant conduct. See Booker, 125 S. Ct. at 756. We are already remanding this case based on our finding that the district court clearly erred in its relevant conduct findings. Ortiz must be resentenced in accordance with Booker at that time, obviating the need for us to consider the propriety of a limited remand. See Paladino, 401 F.3d at 484.