Opinion ID: 78019
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Aggravating-Role Adjustment

Text: Williams argues that the district court erred in applying the two-level aggravating-role adjustment per U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1(c) because her husband's acquittal on all counts precludes any basis for finding that she was an organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor of one or more other participants. [9] The federal sentencing guidelines provide for an increase in the defendant's base offense level by two levels if the defendant was an organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor in any criminal activity other than described in [subsections] (a) or (b). U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1(c). [10] The commentary states that to qualify for an adjustment under § 3B1.1, the defendant must have been the organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor of one or more other participants. U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1, cmt. n.2. [11] Participant is defined as a person who is criminally responsible for the commission of the offense, but need not have been convicted. Id., cmt. n.1 (emphasis added). The district court would not have been precluded from applying the § 3B1.1 adjustment merely because Williams's husband was acquitted on all counts. [12] At sentencing, the court did not face the same burden of proof  beyond a reasonable doubt  that the jury faced at trial. The court could have applied the § 3B1.1 adjustment if it found by a preponderance of the evidence that Bunnis Williams was criminally responsible for the wire fraud scheme or federal funds theft and that Alma Williams exerted some degree of control, leadership or influence over him. See United States v. Ndiaye, 434 F.3d 1270, 1304 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 127 S.Ct. 128, 166 L.Ed.2d 95 (2006). The relevant question, therefore, is whether Bunnis Williams was a participant, or someone criminally responsible for the commission of Williams's wire fraud and theft. The district court's application of § 3B1.1 to determine that a person is a participant is a question law that we review de novo, while we review the underlying factual findings for clear error. In applying the two-level upward adjustment under § 3B1.1(c), the district court considered, inter alia, Bunnis Williams's participation in the scheme. This record reveals, however, that Bunnis's role was de minimis and insufficient to justify a § 3B1.1(c) upward adjustment. At sentencing, the district court found that to accomplish her fraud, Williams directed the accounting entries to cover unauthorized expenses, which included travel expenditures and loan payments to Bunnis Williams. The court also found that Bunnis Williams would often take and use of ETA checks without the bookkeepers' knowledge and without justifying his expenses. Assuming, without deciding, that these factual findings are correct, they do not go so far as to establish, by a preponderance of the evidence, that Bunnis Williams was a criminally culpable participant in Williams's wire fraud or federal funds theft. A participant, as the guidelines defines the term, is a person who is criminally responsible for the commission of the offense. U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1, cmt. n.1. Bunnis's intent to defraud and steal is a requisite threshold question for determining his criminal responsibility. Because grant rules expressly permit commingling of funds in ETA's account and Bunnis Williams was the Chief Executive Officer of ETA, he could have taken funds from ETA's account, without intending to defraud the government or steal federal funds. Although these facts may amount to unethical conduct, they fall short of demonstrating by a preponderance of the evidence that Bunnis Williams was criminally responsible for his wife's wire fraud and federal funds theft. See United States v. Yates, 990 F.2d 1179, 1182 (11th Cir. 1993) (per curiam) (reviewing the guidelines commentary to § 3B1.1 and concluding that the district court's statement that the defendant was involved in an organization that was `otherwise extensive,' even if correct, was insufficient as a matter of law to justify an upward adjustment under § 3B1.1(a)). Because the evidence is insufficient as a matter of law to show that Williams was an organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor of one or more other participants in criminal activity, we conclude that the district court erred in applying the two-level aggravated-role adjustment under U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1(c).