Opinion ID: 1238399
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Arhebamen's 152-month sentence

Text: We now turn to Arhebamen's appeal of the sentence that he is currently serving the 152 months of imprisonment for failure to appear at sentencing, making false claims of United States citizenship, corruptly endeavoring to obstruct justice by lying to the Probation Office, and making false statements to judicial officials. Arhebamen argues that the district court abused its discretion when it increased his total offense level from 19 to 28 and his criminal history category from V to VI. These increases more than doubled the applicable Guidelines range. A district court that considers a departure from the Guidelines range must decide whether any features of the case take it outside the Guidelines' `heartland' and make it a special, or unusual, case. United States v. Erpenbeck, 532 F.3d 423, 439-40 (6th Cir.2008) (quoting Koon v. United States, 518 U.S. 81, 95, 116 S.Ct. 2035, 135 L.Ed.2d 392 (1996)). The court must then proceed to determine whether the Commission [has] forbidden departures based on those features and, if not, whether a departure based on those features is either encouraged or discouraged by the Commission. Koon, 518 U.S. at 95, 116 S.Ct. 2035. We will consider each of the upward departures in this case individually. Because the district court used the 2000 version of the Sentencing Guidelines Manual, all references are to that version.
In its calculation of Arhebamen's base offense level, the district court applied a two-level enhancement under § 3C1.1 of the Sentencing Guidelines for providing materially false testimony during the trial. The district court supported the enhancement for obstruction of justice by enumerating four instances where Arhebamen perjured himself: (1) false statements regarding his name, birth date, and place of birth; (2) false claims about having informed his probation officer about his use of the name Mark Arhebamen; (3) a false statement that Judge Rosen's clerk had told him not to worry about appearing for his sentencing in the tax-fraud case, and (4) a false claim that he had taken correspondence courses from Oxford University Press. In addition to the § 3C1.1 obstruction enhancement, the district court applied a two-level upward departure pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 5K2.0, stating that [t]he extent of [Arhebamen's] willful and obstructive behavior ... is not adequately taken into consideration by the 2 level enhancement of § 3C1.1. The court reasoned that Arhebamen's obstructive behavior fell outside the heartland of cases considered by the Sentencing Guidelines because he not only committed perjury at trial, but also: (1) filed many appeals of unappealable orders during the trial, (2) refused to accept case-related documents that his counsel offered to Arhebamen for reviewbehavior that resulted in a contempt order that was later purged, and (3) filed a meritless request for the district judge to recuse himself. According to the court, this behavior warranted the two-level § 5K2.0 upward departure in addition to the two-level § 3C1.1 obstruction enhancement because such conduct demonstrates a pattern of abuse of the judicial system by [Arhebamen] and ... related directly to his attempts to exert undue influence on the ... proceedings. Section 5K2.0 provides that the district court may impose a sentence outside the range established by the applicable guidelines where there exists an aggravating or mitigating circumstance of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission. Departures under this section therefore fall into two categoriesdepartures based on facts of a different kind than those taken into account by the underlying Guidelines and departures where the relevant circumstance is present to an unusually large or small degree. The district court here did not opine that Arhebamen had perjured himself at trial to an unusual degree, but rather concluded that Arhebamen's meritless appeals and frivolous motions, together with his refusal to accept documents offered by his attorney, warranted the § 5K2.0 departure. In other words, this case falls in the first category of departures purportedly based on circumstances of a kind not contemplated by the underlying obstruction-of-justice Guideline. Arhebamen argues that the relevant extraordinary facts here are not of a kind that warrants a § 5K2.0 departure. We agree. In essence, the district court applied the § 5K2.0 departure because Arhebamen's abysmal lawyering on his own behalf unnecessarily delayed the proceedings against him. The district court cited two cases in support of its decision to add a § 5K2.0 departure onto the § 3C1.1 obstruction enhancement. One of the cases is United States v. Furkin, 119 F.3d 1276, 1284 (7th Cir.1997), where the court affirmed a § 5K2.0 departure because the defendant's conduct was far more severe than the ordinary case where the obstruction of justice enhancement applies. The defendant in that case had instructed three witnesses to lie to the grand jury, had encouraged two others to sign back-dated leases, and had intimidated another. Id. at 1283-84. He also hid the profits of his illegal gambling business. Id. at 1284. Such conduct, according to the court, constituted obstruction to a greater degree than in the usual § 3C1.1 obstruction-enhancement case. Id. Arhebamen's case, by contrast, involves a departure based on conduct of an entirely different kind than his obstruction-enhancement conduct of perjury. The second case cited by the district court, United States v. Ventura, 146 F.3d 91 (2d Cir.1998), is more on point because it is an of a kind case like Arhebamen's. In Ventura, the district court first enhanced the sentence pursuant to § 3C1.1 due to the defendant's failure to appear at sentencing, and then departed upward under § 5K2.0 because the defendant also submitted a fraudulent birth certificate. Id. at 96. The Second Circuit affirmed, noting that departure may be especially justified where, as here, the defendant obstructed justice more than once through wholly discrete and unrelated acts. Id. at 97. Another case, United States v. Black, 78 F.3d 1, 5 (1st Cir.1996), has been cited by the government in support of the departure. In Black, the defendant perjured himself at trial, resulting in a § 3C1.1 enhancement, and also attempted to hide assets in order to frustrate the collection of a fine or restitution. Id. The First Circuit upheld the district court's imposition of a § 5K2.0 departure for the latter conduct because it amounted to a different act of obstruction. Id. at 6. Both Ventura and Black rested their § 5K2.0 departures upon separate acts of obstructive conduct similar to those set forth in § 3C1.1. Here, by contrast, the additional conduct relied upon by the district courtArhebamen's filing of meritless appeals and recusal motions as well as his refusal to accept documents offered by his attorneyare not remotely analogous to the examples of obstructive behavior listed in § 3C1.1, which include perjury, failure to appear for a proceeding, providing false statements to judges and other officials, tampering with witnesses, and the like. Arhebamen's acts were basically those of an overzealous pro se advocate. Although such behavior is undoubtedly annoying from the district court's point of view, it is not obstructive in the sense suggested by § 3C1.1. Our dissenting colleague, however, describes Arhebamen's conduct as a deliberate effort to delay and frustrate court proceedings that was so egregious as to be outside the heartland of similar cases. (Dissenting Op. at 304) In our view, these characterizations are simply not supported by the record. Moreover, Application Note 7 to § 3C1.1 makes clear that the enhancement under that provision should not be applied in cases where the charged offense is also an obstruction offense, except if a significant further obstruction occurred during the investigation, prosecution, or sentencing of the obstruction offense itself ( e.g., if the defendant threatened a witness during the course of the prosecution for the obstruction offense). Arhebamen's perjury at his trial presumptively qualifies as an obstruction offense, although we need not decide that issue because Arhebamen does not challenge the application of the § 3C1.1 enhancement itself. But in light of the high bar for § 3C1.1's application in this type of case, we conclude that the district court's decision to tack an additional departure under § 5K2.0 onto § 3C1.1 was erroneous. The Sentencing Commission makes no provision for upward departures based upon a pro se defendant's meritless filingshowever vexatious, numerous, or annoying. Nor does any case to our knowledge endorse such a departure. We therefore conclude that a § 5K2.0 departure may not be based on a defendant's poor performance as a pro se advocate regardless of the district court's conclusion that the defendant's conduct obstructed the proceedings. Such a departure amounted to a procedural error in the form of failing to calculate (or improperly calculating) the Guidelines range.... Gall, 128 S.Ct. at 597.
The next two departures imposed by the district court related to Arhebamen's conviction for failure to appear at sentencing in his tax-fraud case. In connection with his failure to appear, Arhebamen obtained reports from two physicians who recommended postponement of the sentencing hearing. He also moved to Arizona without authorization. The district court invoked the Guidelines departure provisions to increase Arhebamen's sentence in response to those acts. We will address the two departures in turn.
The district court imposed a two-level upward departure pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 5K2.7, which relates to the disruption of governmental functions. This departure was imposed because Arhebamen not only failed to appear for sentencing in the tax-fraud case, but also misled [two physicians] about his background and circumstances and used letters from [the physicians] to manipulate proceedings before Judge Rosen and avoid being sentenced. The court stated that Arhebamen actively solicited [the two physicians'] unknowing assistance, and concluded that such manipulation and the corresponding adjournment of sentencing is an unusual aggravating circumstance that was not adequately considered by the Sentencing Guidelines. Reasoning that the conduct resulted in the significant disruption of a government function ( i.e., the timely sentencing of the Defendant), the court imposed a § 5K2.7 departure. The policy statement regarding § 5K2.7 provides that [d]eparture from the guidelines ordinarily would not be justified when the offense of conviction is an offense such as bribery or obstruction of justice; in such cases interference with a governmental function is inherent in the offense, and unless the circumstances are unusual the guidelines will reflect the appropriate punishment for such interference. Both parties agree that the underlying offense herethe failure to appear for sentencingis one in which interference with a governmental function is inherent. Id. A Guidelines departure is therefore appropriate only if the circumstances are unusual, such that the underlying Guideline does not reflect the appropriate punishment for Arhebamen's failure to appear at his July 2001 sentencing in the tax-fraud case. Id. Arhebamen argues that his alleged manipulation of the two physicians does not create unusual circumstances warranting additional punishment. He contends that obtaining an adjournment of less than a month [by obtaining a recommendation from the first physician] hardly constitutes an extraordinary or egregious disruption of the administration of justice, and that the fact that [he] enlisted the support of a report by [the second physician] did not make the delay any longer, nor did it disrupt the judicial process any further. The government argues in response that the circumstances surrounding defendant's failure to appear [were] particularly significant because they involved the unwitting involvement of third parties. In support of this argument, the government cites United States v. Heckman, 30 F.3d 738 (6th Cir.1994). That case involved a conviction for filing false documents with the IRSan inherently disruptive act. The court affirmed the application of a § 5K2.7 departure because, in addition to attempting to avoid his own tax liability, the defendant used the IRS to harass numerous persons who had the misfortune of coming into contact with him. Id. at 743. According to the government, Arhebamen's alleged harassment of the two physicians as innocent third parties makes Heckman like this case. But Arhebamen did not harass the physicians or cause them any harm or inconvenience; rather, he lied to them about the seriousness of the charges against him and his criminal background in an initially successful attempt to delay his sentencing. No case cited by the government suggests that the means employed by a defendant to interfere with a government function is material in deciding whether to apply the § 5K2.7 departure. Instead, the caselaw supports the proposition that such a departure is appropriate where the harm is greater than usual for the initial government-interfering offense, or where the defendant has interfered with a second, independent government function. See Heckman, 30 F.3d at 743; United States v. Garcia, 900 F.2d 45, 49 (5th Cir.1990) (affirming a § 5K2.7 departure for a defendant convicted of mail theft because the scale of the operation caused an unusually serious disruption of the mail); United States v. Anderson, 353 F.3d 490, 508 (6th Cir.2003) ( superceded by statute on other grounds as recognized in United States v. McBride, 362 F.3d 360, 374 (6th Cir.2004)) (affirming a § 5K2.7 upward departure from a tax-fraud sentence for the defendants' disruptive behavior at trial). In this case, Arhebamen's lies to the first physician delayed his sentence by one additional month beyond the delay that would have ensued had he simply failed to appear for his original sentencing date. No additional delay was caused by the report of the second physician. Nor does the record reflect that the physicians themselves were harmed or even inconvenienced by Arhebamen's dishonest interactions with them. In light of § 5K2.7's command that the departure not apply except in unusual circumstances, we conclude that the district court abused its discretion in departing upward by two levels on the basis of a one-month delay to Arhebamen's sentencing. The underlying Guideline § 2J1.6 adequately accounts for the harm caused by Arhebamen's failure to appear at his sentencing, making the use of § 5K2.7 to add additional punishment a procedural error.
During the one-month extension period that the district court granted in response to the first physician's report, Arhebamen moved to Arizona in direct defiance of his pretrial-services officer's orders. In response to this act, the court imposed an additional departure pursuant to § 5K2.0 in connection with the conviction for failure to appear at sentencing. The district court decided that a two-level upward departure was appropriate for Arhebamen's move to Arizona by employing an analogy to § 2F1.1(b)(6)(A) (2 level Specific Offense Characteristic where Defendant `relocated or participated in relocating, a fraudulent scheme in order to avoid law enforcement or regulatory officials'). As set forth above, § 5K2.0 departures are appropriate where the case involves characteristics of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission. The government argues that this departure was appropriate because the relocationin direct contravention of the orders of his pretrial services officerwas a serious aggravating circumstance that demonstrated total disregard for the authority of the district court and ma[d]e [this] case much different from the average failure to appear case. Arhebamen counters that because the jurisdiction of the U.S. Marshall is nationwide, he was at all times within the grasp of the authorities to return him to custody, and [t]he fact that he did not stay in the Eastern District of Michigan can hardly be characterized as unusual or extraordinary so as to impose an additional 2 levels of departure. We do not find the district court's analogy to U.S.S.G. § 2F1.1(b)(6)(A) persuasive here. Nothing in the record reflects that Arhebamen relocated in order to avoid law enforcement or regulatory officials or the authority of the court. See id. To the contrary, Arhebamen's wife provided a forwarding address to the pretrial-services officer and, as a result, Arhebamen was promptly arrested after he failed to appear. In light of these facts, Arhebamen's move to Arizona did not take his failure to appear for sentencing out of the heartland of similar cases, or burden the government in any unusual way. We are also unaware of any case that endorses the use of § 5K2.0 under analogous circumstances. In sum, we conclude that the district court committed a procedural error in imposing this two-level upward departure.
The next two departures at issue in this case involve Arhebamen's convictions for making false statements to the United States Probation Office. We address each in turn.
The district court again employed § 5K2.0the general departure provision for acts of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commissionto further enhance Arhebamen's sentence under U.S.S.G. § 2F1.1(b)(2)(A). According to the district court, Arhebamen's false statements to the Probation Department involved more than minimal planning within the meaning of § 1B1.1 cmt. n. 1(f), and a 2 level enhancement of [the false-statement convictions] is appropriate pursuant to § 2F1.1(b)(2)(A). This 2 level enhancement, however, does not adequately take into account the extensiveness and history of the planning that has gone into the Defendant's false claim to the identity of McMaine Allen O'Georgia, and an upwards departure is warranted. The § 2F1.1(b)(2)(A) enhancement applies in cases where the extent of planning is more ... than is typical for commission of the offense in its typical form, and is deemed present in any case involving repeated acts over a period of time. U.S.S.G. § 1B1.1 cmt. 1(f) (defining more than minimal planning). According to the district court, the specific enhancement was insufficient to capture the full extent of Arhebamen's use of the O'Georgia alias, which lasted more than twenty years. The court thus added an additional one-level departure pursuant to § 5K2.0 because the degree of planning extended over such a long period of time. Arhebamen argues that the district court abused its discretion in invoking this one-level departure because [t]he fact that a defendant in a fraud type offense used an alias for a lengthy period of time is not extraordinary, and the district court failed to provide any evidence that this case should be so considered. We disagree. Because the district court is in the best position to compare a wide variety of cases over time, it has wide discretion to decide how much planning is extraordinary, such that the more than minimal planning enhancement is insufficient on its own. Arhebamen's multi-decade, elaborate attempt to take on his invented identity certainly involved an extraordinary number of repeated acts over a period of time. We therefore conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion by invoking this one-level departure pursuant to § 5K2.0. See, e.g., United States v. Kay, 83 F.3d 98, 102 (5th Cir.1996) ([T]he repetitiveness, intricacy, and sophistication of Kay's scheme were substantially in excess of that which ordinarily is involved in the crime of bank fraud, and ... this level of malfeasance was not accounted for by the `more than minimal planning' adjustment.).
The district court next employed U.S.S.G. § 5K2.9 to depart upward by two levels because Arhebamen falsely claimed that he had been born in Albany, Georgia on May 5, 1955 ... in order to conceal the commission of another offense i.e., his prior False Claim to U.S. Citizenship during the guilty plea before Judge Rosen. Section 5K2.9 states that [i]f the defendant committed the offense in order to facilitate or conceal the commission of another offense, the court may increase the sentence above the guideline range to reflect the actual seriousness of the defendant's conduct. Arhebamen argues that there is no evidence that he made false statements in order to conceal the commission of another offense, and that the consistent use of the O'Georgia alias for such a long period suggests a lack of such a purpose. The government responds by pointing out that Arhebamen's consistency in using his false identity in fact emphasizes his criminal purpose, noting that he did not accidentally adopt the identity of McMaine O'Georgia; rather, it was part of a deliberate and sophisticated plan for the purpose of conceal[ing] his true identity. Arhebamen has been subject to removal from the United States since the expiration of his visitor's visa in the late 1970s. The district court therefore reasonably concluded that Arhebamen did not call himself O'Georgia for two decades simply because he preferred the name, but rather because he wished to avoid removal from the United States. No abuse of discretion is apparent in the district court's determination that each time Arhebamen gave the name O'Georgiato the court, the Probation Office, or othershe did so at least in part for the criminal purpose of concealing his past commissions of identity fraud.
Finally, the district court departed upward in this case [b]ased upon the nature of [Arhebamen's] criminal history, and the likelihood that [he] will recidivate. The district court employed U.S.S.G. § 4A1.3, which provides that when reliable information indicates that the criminal history category does not adequately reflect the seriousness of the defendant's past criminal conduct or the likelihood that the defendant will commit other crimes, the court may consider imposing a sentence departing from the otherwise applicable guideline range. In support of this final departure, the court cited, among other things, Arhebamen's extended unlawful presence in the United States, the extensive scope of his tax-fraud activities (preparing 171 false federal income tax returns), civil judgments against him totaling more than $150,000, a period of about two months in 1995 when he was married to two women at the same time, and the more than $280,000 of unpaid child support that he owed at the time to one of his ex-wives. The district court thus adjusted Arhebamen's criminal history category from V to VI. Section 4A1.3 provides that a departure for the underrepresentation of a defendant's criminal history category is appropriate where prior sentence(s) of substantially more than one year [were] imposed as a result of independent crimes committed on different occasions and where prior similar misconduct [was] established by a civil adjudication or by a failure to comply with an administrative order. U.S.S.G. § 4A1.3 (b)-(c). The district court's consideration of Arhebamen's wrongdoings, particularly his outstanding civil debts and child support, was therefore appropriate. We find no error in the district court's decision to increase Arhebamen's criminal history category from V to VI.