Court Opinion

ID: 9487534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:19:38.831378+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:20.420803
License: Public Domain

HEANEY, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I write to dissent on one issue only. In my view, the majority has stretched the concept of “relevant conduct” past the breaking point. ■ The majority holds that Ballew’s sentence for mail and wire fraud can be enhanced due to his alleged involvement with the theft of several trucks nearly eighteen months after the commission of the offense for which he was convicted. See U.S.S.G. § lB1.3(a)(2) and § 2Fl.l(b)(l)(F). I believe that the link between the stolen trucks and the insurance fraud is entirely too tenuous to constitute relevant Conduct, and would hold the district court’s finding to be clearly erroneous.
To sort out when uncharged conduct comprises part of a common scheme or plan, this court has embraced the .test set forth in United States v. Hahn, 960 F.2d 903, 910 (9th Cir.1992), the essential components of which are “similarity, regularity, and temporal proximity.” See, e.g., United States v. Chatman, 982 F.2d 292, 294 (8th Cir.1992). *945Only traces of these three elements are present in the case before us.
The degree of temporal proximity between the 1989 truck thefts and the 1987 insurance fraud is small. No ascertainable pattern of regularity links the truck thefts with Ballew’s insurance fraud. At sentencing, Corporal Dennis Overbey of the Missouri State Highway Patrol linked Ballew to the theft of three trucks in only two separate incidents during March or April of 1989. Sent. Tr. at 27, 28, 30, 32, 56-60. The government produced no evidence of ongoing criminal activities between 1987 and 1989. Given their remoteness and isolation from the false insurance claim, the truck thefts cannot be considered a regular component of Ballew’s wire and mail fraud.
Where regularity is lacking, there must be “a strong showing of substantial similarity.” Hahn, 960 F.2d at 911. No such strong showing has been made in this case. The insurance fraud and the truck thefts were different crimes with different victims, different ends, and different modi operand! There were no common accomplices, because Ballew was the sole perpetrator of, and beneficiary from, the 1987 insurance fraud. The majority apparently rests its decision on a finding of common purpose, believing that the truck thefts occurred in order to conceal Ballew’s wire and mail fraud. Yet when questioned about the purpose of the truck thefts, Officer Overbey testified that “[t]he vehicles were to be used [in] a custom combining operation that Mr. Clayton Hastings and Mr. Cecil Ballew were involved in [as] partners together.” Sent. Tr. at 28. The alleged participation of Hastings and Charles Chatman in the truck thefts strongly indicates that the trio’s purpose was to steal trucks, not to cover up Ballew’s earlier insurance fraud. If anything, the record supports the conclusion that the part-swapping occurred to conceal the thefts of the stolen trucks themselves.
In Hahn, the Ninth Circuit pointed out that “when illegal conduct does exist in 'discrete, identifiable units’ apart from the offense of conviction, the Guidelines anticipate a separate charge for such conduct.” Hahn, 960 F.2d at 909 (quoting U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3 comment). The insurance fraud and the truck thefts are such discrete, identifiable units of crime. The majority’s conclusion that the truck thefts and swapping of components were “integral to Ballew’s concealment and continuing use of the truck” that he fraudulently reported stolen is crucially undermined by the fact that Ballew used the truck for eighteen months without any change in components or appearance. Sent. Tr. at 31. The purpose of the part-swapping was first and foremost to disguise the stolen trucks, not to shield Ballew’s false stolen vehicle report and fraudulent insurance claim. It simply stretches credulity to conclude that the 1989 activities were “integral” to the insurance fraud for which Ballew was convicted.
While I agree that the later truck thefts and swapping of parts probably had the ancillary effect of further cloaking Ballew’s earlier insurance fraud, the asserted connection is too tenuous to bind together , these two discreet, identifiable units of crime into a single continuing offense. At trial, the prosecutor certainly treated the two crimes as separate offenses. The prosecutor told the jury that Ballew “had committed mail fraud and wire fraud in order to obtain insurance money from these two insurance companies.” V Trial Tr. at 215. The jury was also told that Chatman “uncovered for us ... a separate scheme.” Id. at 216. I also note that the Kentucky commonwealth attorney agreed to dismiss with prejudice his indictment of Ballew and Hastings for two of the truck thefts due to insufficient evidence. The state’s “only evidence [was] the testimony of Charles Chatman, an unindicted individual on whose property the stolen vehicles were discovered and recovered.” Commonwealth of Kentucky v. Ballew and Hastings, Calloway Cir.Ct. No. 91-CR-005 (May 28, 1993). The record simply lacks sufficient evidence of commonality, similarity, regularity, or temporal proximity to hold Ballew accountable for truck theft through his conviction for wire and mail fraud.
I would remand this ease to the district court with instructions to resentence Ballew without the five-level enhancement for relevant conduct deriving from the truck thefts. *946Consequently, I would direct the district court to reassess its additional enhancements, all of which depend in part upon the finding of relevant conduct.