Court Opinion

ID: 9408148
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-07-11 18:01:20.349342+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:42.080940
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-50314         Document: 00516816344             Page: 1     Date Filed: 07/11/2023

              United States Court of Appeals
                   for the Fifth Circuit
                                                                                  United States Court of Appeals
                                                                                           Fifth Circuit

                                      ____________                                       FILED
                                                                                      July 11, 2023
                                        No. 22-50314                                  Lyle W. Cayce
                                      ____________                                         Clerk

   United States of America,

                                                                      Plaintiff—Appellee,

                                             versus

   Kody James Menendez,

                                               Defendant—Appellant.
                      ______________________________

                      Appeal from the United States District Court
                           for the Western District of Texas
                               USDC No. 6:20-CR-124-1
                      ______________________________

   Before Haynes and Engelhardt, Circuit Judges, and Saldaña,
   District Judge. *
   Per Curiam: †
          Defendant-Appellant Kody James Menendez appeals the district
   court’s application of a three-point sentencing enhancement under U.S.S.G.
   § 3A1.2(a). Menendez and another individual broke into an off-duty police
   officer’s truck and stole a number of items, including the officer’s shotgun
          _____________________
          *
             United States District Judge for the Southern District of Texas, sitting by
   designation.
          †
              This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
Case: 22-50314      Document: 00516816344            Page: 2    Date Filed: 07/11/2023

                                      No. 22-50314

   and rifle. Within two days of the theft, Menendez told a confidential
   informant that he had burglarized a cop’s vehicle at the relevant location.
   Menendez was eventually taken into custody.               During an interview,
   Menendez explained that an individual named Ariel Santos had contacted
   him to tell him that a police officer owed Santos money. Santos told
   Menendez about the truck, with police equipment inside, and Menendez
   admitted that he burglarized the truck with the understanding that it was
   owned by a police officer. Thus, in two different conversations, he focused
   on the status of the owner of the vehicle.
          The Government charged Menendez with possession of a stolen
   firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(j) and 924(a)(2). He pleaded guilty
   to the indictment without a plea bargain agreement. A probation officer
   prepared a presentence investigation report (“PSR”), which recommended
   a base offense level of 20 and a criminal history category of 5. The PSR also
   recommended a three-point enhancement under § 3A1.2 because the victim
   was a law enforcement officer and Menendez was aware that he was breaking
   into a vehicle owed by an officer. With this enhancement and other factors
   not relevant to this appeal, the PSR recommended a total offense level of 24
   and a Sentencing Guidelines (“Guidelines”) imprisonment range of 92 to 115
   months.
          Menendez objected to the § 3A1.2 enhancement. The district court
   overruled this objection and adopted the PSR’s recommendations,
   sentencing Menendez to 92 months in prison. Menendez timely appealed.
          We have jurisdiction over Menendez’s appeal under 28 U.S.C. § 1291
   and 18 U.S.C. § 3742.         We review a district court’s application or
   interpretation of the Guidelines de novo, while we apply clear error review to
   its factual findings. United States v. Cisneros-Gutierrez, 517 F.3d 751, 764 (5th
   Cir. 2008). “A factual finding is not clearly erroneous if it is plausible in light

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                                    No. 22-50314

   of the record read as a whole.” United States v. Calbat, 266 F.3d 358, 364
   (5th Cir. 2001) (citation omitted). If the Government “seek[s] to adjust [a]
   sentence level,” it has the burden to “prove by a preponderance of the
   relevant and sufficiently reliable evidence the facts necessary to support the
   adjustment.” United States v. Herrera-Solorzano, 114 F.3d 48, 50 (5th Cir.
   1997) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).
          Menendez’s sole challenge is that the district court erred in applying
   the three-point enhancement pursuant to § 3A1.2(a). Per Menendez, the
   district court erred in concluding that he was motivated by the victim’s status
   as a police officer, and instead he was motivated by something akin to a
   personal dispute (i.e., a desire to recover money purportedly owed to Santos
   by a police officer). Therefore, because he lacked the requisite motive, he
   asserts that he does not qualify for the enhancement under § 3A1.2(a).
          Under § 3A1.2(a), if a victim was “a government officer or employee”
   and “the offense of conviction was motivated by such status,” the district
   court should “increase by 3 levels.” A related provision, § 3A1.2(b), states
   that, “[i]f subsection (a)(1) and (2) apply, and the applicable Chapter Two
   guideline is from Chapter Two, Part A,” the district court should “increase
   by 6 levels.” While the commentary to these provisions does not precisely
   define the phrase “motivated by such status,” it does clarify that the phrase
   “means that the offense of conviction was motivated by the fact that the
   victim was a government officer or employee.”                U.S. Sent’g
   Guidelines Manual § 3A1.2 cmt. n.3.               It also states that “[t]his
   adjustment would not apply, for example, where both the defendant and
   victim were employed by the same government agency and the offense was
   motivated by a personal dispute.” Id.
          We have “had limited occasion to interpret the ‘motivated by such
   status’ language of § 3A1.2(a) and (b).” United States v. Williams, 520 F.3d

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                                     No. 22-50314

   414, 424 (5th Cir. 2008) (citations omitted). To that end, many of our
   opinions dealing with § 3A1.2(a) and (b) have addressed the “motivated by”
   issue only in the context of government officials being the victim of crimes
   during the performance of their official duties. See, e.g., United States v.
   Munguia, 553 F. App’x 461, 461–62 (5th Cir. 2014) (per curiam). Unlike
   those situations, the police officer here was not a victim during the
   performance of his official duties.
          Nonetheless, the record supports the conclusion that Menendez’s
   motivation for burgling the truck was because he understood the truck
   belonged to a police officer.      Put differently, the record suggests that
   Menendez would not have broken into that particular truck if it did not belong
   to a police officer. To that end, it is noteworthy that Menendez himself
   emphasized to both a confidential informant and later to the jail interviewer
   that he committed a burglary of a police officer’s vehicle, which highlighted,
   rather than diminished, the officer’s status in the crime.
          While Menendez presses that he was motivated only by a personal
   dispute, the record indicates otherwise. Rather, his “sole reason[s]” for
   choosing to burglarize the truck in question were that (1) Santos told him that
   a police officer owed Santos money, and (2) the truck appeared to belong to
   a police officer. See Williams, 520 F.3d at 424 (considering an appellant’s
   argument that his assault of an officer was motivated by a personal dispute).
   These facts support the district court’s conclusion that the § 3A1.2(a)
   enhancement was appropriate in this case. See id.; see also United States v.
   Hooker, 997 F.2d 67, 75–76 (5th Cir. 1993) (deferring to a district court’s
   enhancement where various “statements [were] sufficient to show that
   [appellants] . . . knew [the officer] was a law enforcement officer, and that his
   status as a law enforcement officer motivated them to assault him”); United
   States v. Boyd, 231 F. App’x 314, 316 (5th Cir. 2007) (per curiam)
   (acknowledging that appellant’s crime against a judge “was undoubtedly

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                                        No. 22-50314

   motivated in part by” a personal dispute, but nonetheless affirming a district
   court’s enhancement where it was “reasonable to infer that [appellant] was
   also motivated by [the judge’s] status as a judge”). 1
          Therefore, especially considering the high bar for challenges to the
   district court’s factual findings, we conclude that the court’s findings
   undergirding its application of § 3A1.2(a) were “plausible in light of the
   record read as a whole” and not clearly erroneous. See Calbat, 266 F.3d at
   364.
          For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM.

          _____________________
          1
             Although Boyd “is not controlling precedent,” it “may be [cited as] persuasive
   authority.” Ballard v. Burton, 444 F.3d 391, 401 n.7 (5th Cir. 2006) (citing 5th Cir. R.
   47.5.4).

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