Court Opinion

ID: 9914603
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-01-02 17:00:43.82331+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:14:11.516415
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-12744   Document: 34-1     Date Filed: 01/02/2024   Page: 1 of 23

                                               [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                  In the
              United States Court of Appeals
                        For the Eleventh Circuit

                         ____________________

                               No. 22-12744
                         Non-Argument Calendar
                         ____________________

        WILLIAM RICHARD CARTER, JR.,
        a.k.a. Rick,
                                                  Defendant-Appellant,
        UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                     Plaintiﬀ-Appellee.

                         ____________________

                Appeal from the United States District Court
                    for the Middle District of Alabama
USCA11 Case: 22-12744         Document: 34-1         Date Filed: 01/02/2024   Page: 2 of 23

        2                          Opinion of the Court                 22-12744

                      D.C. Docket No. 2:21-cr-00049-MHT-JTA-3
                             ____________________

        Before ROSENBAUM, GRANT, and LAGOA, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
                William Richard Carter, Jr., appeals his convictions for con-
        spiracy, wire fraud and aiding and abetting, and aggravated identity
        theft and aiding and abetting. On appeal, Carter argues that the
        government materially varied from the indictment by eliciting tes-
        timony about Carter’s role in an uncharged conspiracy; that the
        district court constructively amended the indictment by instructing
        the jury as it did on the conspiracy charge; and that the district
        court plainly erred with respect to its jury instructions for aggra-
        vated identity theft. For the following reasons, we aﬃrm.
                                              I.
               Carter was indicted by a grand jury as part of a multi-party
        conspiracy with codefendants Trey Holladay (“Mr. Holladay”),
        Deborah Holladay (“Mrs. Holladay”), Gregory Corkren, David
        Tutt, and Thomas Sisk. Carter was charged with: one count of
        conspiracy either to commit any oﬀense against the United States
        or to defraud the United States, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371;
        eighty-ﬁve counts of wire fraud and aiding and abetting, in viola-
        tion of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1343 and 2 1; and thirty-ﬁve counts of

        1 Before trial, six of these counts were dismissed.
USCA11 Case: 22-12744      Document: 34-1     Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 3 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                        3

        aggravated identity theft and aiding and abetting, in violation of 18
        U.S.C. §§ 1028A(a)(1) and 2.
              The indictment alleged the following facts regarding the de-
        fendants’ fraudulent scheme. In 2015, Mr. Holladay, the superin-
        tendent of Athens City Schools (“ACS”), a public school district in
        Athens, Alabama, received approval from the Alabama State De-
        partment of Education (“ASDE”) to implement Athens Renais-
        sance School (“ARS”) as a virtual and blended K-12 public school.
        ASDE approved Mr. Holladay’s request on the understanding that
        ACS would receive state funding only for full-time students at ARS.
               Mr. Holladay then allegedly worked with both Corkren and
        Carter to convince private schools to permit ACS to enroll their
        students in ARS. In exchange, they oﬀered payments and other in-
        centives to the private schools. Corkren, a retired teacher and
        friend of Mr. Holladay’s, formed Educational Opportunities and
        Management, LLC (“Ed Op”), which contracted with ACS to re-
        cruit private schools to participate in the scheme. The indictment
        alleged that ACS would pay $45 to Ed Op per month for each stu-
        dent, and Mr. Holladay would receive a portion of the proﬁts in
        cash. Corkren and Carter allegedly worked together to create false
        veriﬁcation release forms—which represented that the relevant stu-
        dents had unenrolled from their private schools before enrolling in
        ARS—false enrollment forms, and false report cards and grade lists.
               The indictment also alleged that Mr. Holladay and Corkren
        struck a deal with Sisk, the superintendent of Limestone County,
        Alabama, School District (“LCS”), which also had a virtual
USCA11 Case: 22-12744        Document: 34-1        Date Filed: 01/02/2024       Page: 4 of 23

        4                        Opinion of the Court                     22-12744

        education program, Limestone County Virtual School (“LCVS”).
        Pursuant to this deal, the indictment alleged that Ed Op assisted in
        obtaining additional enrollment for LCVS for $55 per month for
        each student. Corkren would then allegedly set aside a portion of
        this payment and deliver it to a certain charity requested by Sisk.
        Carter, however, was not mentioned in any of the allegations con-
        cerning LCS or LCVS.
                In 2017, Tutt and Mrs. Holladay allegedly became involved
        in the scheme. The indictment also alleged that Corkren withdrew
        some of the money ACS and LCS paid to Ed Op and gave it to Mr.
        Holladay and Carter, among other codefendants.
               The indictment charged the above facts as a single conspir-
        acy, which constituted Count 1. Among the counts of aggravated
        identity theft were Counts 125 and 126, which involved the victims
        “A.H.” and “A.D.,” who were students of Southern Academy, one
        of the participating private schools.
               Carter was the only codefendant to go to trial. 2 The trial
        lasted for over two weeks, and nearly one hundred witnesses testi-
        ﬁed.
               Thomas Bice, a former state superintendent of education,
        testiﬁed that Alabama public school funding was based on how

        2 Mr. Holladay, Sisk, Tutt, and Corkren all pled guilty to one or more of the

        charged counts. And the government moved to dismiss Mrs. Holladay’s in-
        dictment as part of its agreement with Mr. Holladay, which the district court
        granted.
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1     Date Filed: 01/02/2024    Page: 5 of 23

        22-12744              Opinion of the Court                       5

        many students were enrolled in a school system for the ﬁrst twenty
        days after Labor Day. He further testiﬁed that, if a student was
        enrolled simultaneously in a public school and a non-public school,
        that enrollment would not count towards a public school’s state
        funding. And he stated that Alabama did not authorize the enroll-
        ment of full-time private school students as full-time public stu-
        dents for funding purposes. However, because Alabama’s system
        did not track students enrolled in private school, Bice acknowl-
        edged that ASDE would have no way of knowing if that occurred.
              Marc Mickleboro, the former headmaster at Southern Acad-
        emy, testiﬁed about Mr. Holladay, and a man he assumed to be
        Carter, approaching him in 2015 to oﬀer technology upgrades and
        other incentives in exchange for student information. Southern
        Academy later agreed to participate in the program.
               Both Amelia Harrison, who is the victim for Count 125, and
        Anna Katherine Day, who is the victim for Count 126, testiﬁed that
        they graduated from Southern Academy in 2018. And both only
        took Spanish class online. Neither Harrison nor Day recognized a
        report card that bore their name from ARS, although the infor-
        mation displayed on the report card was similar to information re-
        garding the classes they took while attending Southern Academy.
        Charles Stringham, an employee for ASDE, testiﬁed that both Har-
        rison and Day were included in ACS’s 2016 submission for funding
        purposes.
             Corkren then testiﬁed to the following. Mr. Holladay
        wanted him to participate in a scheme to recruit private school
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024    Page: 6 of 23

        6                     Opinion of the Court                22-12744

        students for ACS’s virtual education program so that ACS could
        receive $5,600 in funding from the state for each student. Mr. Hol-
        laday told Corkren that he could not deal with the private schools
        directly and needed Corkren as a middleman. Mr. Holladay recom-
        mended that Corkren form Ed Op to contract with ACS, rather
        than work with ACS directly. Mr. Holladay told Corkren to report
        to Carter, who was essentially the head of ARS at that time.
        Corkren paid for a showcase, which was organized by Carter, for
        the various private schools that they wanted to participate in their
        scheme, during which Mr. Holladay and Carter persuaded four pri-
        vate schools to participate, including Southern Academy. Carter
        and Mr. Holladay instructed Corkren to collect enrollment forms
        from the participating private schools, after which he gave them to
        Carter. Corkren also sent Carter grades and other academic infor-
        mation. Carter would send Corkren a template to use when get-
        ting student information from the private schools. This infor-
        mation would then be entered into the ACS system.
               Sisk testiﬁed to the following. Mr. Holladay explained to
        Sisk that Corkren could recruit additional students for LCVS. Sisk
        participated in a meeting with Mr. Holladay, Carter, and Corkren
        to discuss how LCS could involve more students in virtual learning,
        after which Sisk entered into a contract with Ed Op to recruit stu-
        dents statewide. Carter’s role was to assist LCS staﬀ members in
        organizing their branch of virtual education. And Corkren was
        paid $55 per month for each student, which was increased from the
        original price of $45 per month. Most of the $10 diﬀerence was
        then sent to Sisk through a charity.
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024    Page: 7 of 23

        22-12744              Opinion of the Court                        7

               State oﬃcials later showed up at LCS to check on the sudden
        increased enrollment and found enrollment forms signed by pri-
        vate school headmasters. These oﬃcials told Sisk that this was in-
        suﬃcient, as a parental signature was needed. Later, the oﬃcials
        met with Mr. Holladay and Carter and asked for the same enroll-
        ment forms for ACS virtual students. Mr. Holladay told the oﬃcials
        that the forms were not available and then told Corkren to get new
        forms with the parents’ signatures. Corkren did so and sent them
        to Carter. Some students had out-of-state addresses, and Corkren
        changed their addresses to locations in Alabama. Corkren paid the
        private schools for the forms and then sent an invoice to Carter for
        the money.
               On a later date, ACS decided to conduct an audit in response
        to further inquiries from ASDE, and Carter was put in charge. Ac-
        cording to Corkren’s testimony, Carter requested evidence to sup-
        port the idea that the virtual students enrolled in ARS were truly
        enrolled in the program. Carter knew, according to Corkren, that
        the students were not actually taking full course loads and told
        Corkren that the reports needed to show that they were complet-
        ing the work for four full classes. Corkren testiﬁed that he fabri-
        cated grades and coursework in creating the fake reports and that
        Carter was aware the reports were fake. At one point, Carter told
        Corkren that the reports needed to be more detailed and that he
        wanted more course work indicated.
              These reports were eventually sent to ASDE, but its investi-
        gation did not stop, and eventually federal investigators became
USCA11 Case: 22-12744      Document: 34-1     Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 8 of 23

        8                      Opinion of the Court                22-12744

        involved. The co-conspirators—other than Sisk, who withdrew
        from the scheme after state oﬃcials visited LCS—decided to end
        the scheme in the middle of 2018.
               Throughout the underlying proceedings, Carter requested
        that the district court instruct the jury on the unanimity require-
        ment for the conspiracy charge. Before trial began, Carter submit-
        ted proposed jury instructions to the district court. In his proposed
        instructions, he included an instruction addressing the unanimity
        requirement. His proposal stated, “Rick Carter is charged in Count
        One of the indictment with conspiring to commit wire fraud. You
        must unanimously agree that Rick Carter formed a particular
        agreement with a particular person to pursue at least one particular
        criminal object of the alleged conspiracy.” It then deﬁned unanim-
        ity:
              Each juror must agree with each of the other jurors
              that Rick Carter reached the same agreement with
              the same person to pursue the same criminal object
              of the charged conspiracy. The jury need not unani-
              mously agree on all agreements, all persons in, or all
              criminal objects of a charged conspiracy. But, in or-
              der to convict Rick Carter of the conspiracy charged
              in Count One, you must unanimously agree that Rick
              Carter knowingly and willfully entered into the same
              agreement with the same person . . . with the speciﬁc
              intent to advance or further at least one particular
              criminal object of the alleged conspiracy. Unless the
              government has proven that Rick Carter knowingly
              and willfully entered into the same agreement with
USCA11 Case: 22-12744      Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 9 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                         9

              the same person . . . with the speciﬁc intent to ad-
              vance or further the same criminal object of the al-
              leged conspiracy to each of you, beyond a reasonable
              doubt, you must ﬁnd Rick Carter not guilty of the of-
              fense alleged in Count One of the Indictment.
                At the jury instruction hearing, Carter’s attorney argued for
        the inclusion of the jury unanimity instruction, stating that “[w]e
        have multiple conspiracies in this case, and it’s important that the
        jury understand that if they ﬁnd Dr. Carter guilty, that there is una-
        nimity as to their ﬁndings in terms of conspiracy.” The govern-
        ment argued that the district court’s proposed instruction already
        adequately stated the law. The district court then read the instruc-
        tion it intended to use:
              Proof of several separate conspiracies isn’t proof of
              the single overall conspiracy charged in the indict-
              ment unless one of the several conspiracies proved is
              a single overall conspiracy charged in the indictment.
              You must decide whether the single overall conspir-
              acy charged in the indictment existed between two or
              more conspirators. If not, then you must ﬁnd the de-
              fendant not guilty.
        Carter’s attorney stated that he did not agree with that instruction
        because it made it sound as if the jury could ﬁnd “that Mr. Corkren
        and Mr. Holladay were in a conspiracy, and [Carter] would be
        found guilty of that.”
                The district court initially rejected this argument but then
        stated, “You’re right. I don’t include the defendant there.” The
        district court then stated:
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 10 of 23

        10                     Opinion of the Court                 22-12744

               I would go on to say, but if you decide that a single
               overall conspiracy charged in the indictment did exist,
               then you must decide who the conspirators were.
               And if you decide that a particular defendant was a
               member of some other conspiracy not charged, then
               you must ﬁnd the defendant not guilty. To ﬁnd a de-
               fendant guilty, you must all agree that the defendant
               was a member of the conspiracy charged.
        Carter’s attorney said that the instruction “sounds familiar, like the
        conspiracy to commit wire fraud pattern.” And Carter’s attorney
        said he “[thought] that’s appropriate, what [the district court] just
        said. That goes right to this speciﬁc intent, unanimity.” The gov-
        ernment did not object to this proposed instruction, and the district
        court said that it would “give something like that, then.”
               Regarding the unanimity issue, the district court ultimately
        instructed:
              Proof of several separate conspiracies is not proof of
              the single, overall conspiracy charged in the indict-
              ment unless one of the several conspiracies proved is
              the single overall conspiracy charged in the indict-
              ment.
              You must decide whether the single overall conspir-
              acy charged existed between two or more conspira-
              tors and included the defendant. If not, then you
              must ﬁnd the defendant not guilty of that charge.
              But if you decide that a single overall conspiracy
              charged in the indictment did exist, then you must de-
              cide who the conspirators were. And if you decide
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1     Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 11 of 23

        22-12744              Opinion of the Court                       11

              that the defendant was a member of some other con-
              spiracy—not the one charged—then you must ﬁnd
              the defendant not guilty. So to ﬁnd the defendant
              guilty, you must all agree that the defendant was a
              member of the conspiracy charged—not a member
              of some other separate conspiracy.
                With respect to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, the dis-
        trict court, among other things, instructed:
              When considering whether the government has
              proven that the defendant conspired to commit wire
              fraud, you must decide whether: (1) there is proof be-
              yond a reasonable doubt that the defendant willfully
              entered into an agreement to execute a scheme to de-
              fraud; and (2) there is proof beyond a reasonable
              doubt that wire communications in interstate com-
              merce were transmitted to help carry out the scheme
              to defraud.
                And regarding the charges of aggravated identity theft, the
        district court instructed:
              The government also must prove that the means of
              identiﬁcations [sic] was possessed “during and in rela-
              tion to” the crime alleged in the indictment. The
              phrase “during and in relation to” means that there
              must be a ﬁrm connection between the defendant,
              the means of identiﬁcation, and the crime alleged in
              the indictment. The means of identiﬁcation must
              have helped him with some important function or
              purpose of the crime, and not simply have been there
              accidently or coincidentally.        The means of
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1       Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 12 of 23

        12                     Opinion of the Court                 22-12744

              identiﬁcation at least must facilitate or have the po-
              tential of facilitating, the crime alleged in the indict-
              ment.
                The jury found Carter guilty as to one count of conspiracy
        to defraud the United States, four counts of wire fraud, and two
        counts of aggravated identity theft, and either found Carter not
        guilty, or failed to reach a verdict, as to the remaining counts. The
        government moved to dismiss the counts with respect to which the
        jury failed to reach a verdict, which the district court granted.
                The district court sentenced Carter to 66 months’ imprison-
        ment. The sentence consisted of 42 months’ imprisonment for
        each conspiracy and wire fraud count to be served concurrently
        with each other, and 24 months’ imprisonment for each aggravated
        identity count to be served concurrently with each other and con-
        secutively to the terms for the other counts. The district court also
        sentenced Carter to a term of three years’ supervised release, con-
        sisting of three years for the conspiracy and wire fraud counts and
        one year for the aggravated identity theft counts, all to run concur-
        rently with each other.
              This timely appeal follows.
                                         II.
              We review a defendant’s claim of a material variance
        “through viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the
        government to determine whether a reasonable trier of fact could
        have found that a single conspiracy existed beyond a reasonable
        doubt.” United States v. Castro, 89 F.3d 1443, 1450 (11th Cir. 1996).
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1        Date Filed: 01/02/2024   Page: 13 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                        13

        “We will uphold the conviction unless the variance (1) was material
        and (2) substantially prejudiced the defendant.” Id. We review an
        alleged constructive amendment de novo. United States v. Feldman,
        931 F.3d 1245, 1253 (11th Cir. 2019). And we review a district
        court’s jury instructions for abuse of discretion. United States v.
        Dean, 487 F.3d 840, 847 (11th Cir. 2007).
               However, if a defendant asserts an argument for the ﬁrst
        time on appeal, we review for plain error. United States v. Patterson,
        595 F.3d 1324, 1326 (11th Cir. 2010). To prove plain error, a defend-
        ant must show that there is “(1) an error; (2) that is plain; (3) that
        aﬀects substantial rights; and (4) that seriously aﬀects the fairness,
        integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings.” Id. To show
        that an error aﬀected a defendant’s substantial rights, “the defend-
        ant generally must show a ‘reasonable probability’ that the error
        aﬀected the outcome of the district court proceedings, ‘which
        means a probability suﬃcient to undermine conﬁdence in the out-
        come.’” United States v. Iriele, 977 F.3d 1155, 1177 (11th Cir. 2020)
        (quoting United States v. Rodriguez, 398 F.3d 1291, 1299 (11th Cir.
        2005)).
                                         III.
               On appeal, Carter argues that: (1) the government materially
        varied the indictment by eliciting testimony from Sisk about
        Carter’s involvement with the Limestone County Virtual School,
        even though the indictment did not charge that Carter was in-
        volved in the Limestone County scheme; (2) the district court con-
        structively amended the indictment by instructing the jury as it did
USCA11 Case: 22-12744         Document: 34-1          Date Filed: 01/02/2024          Page: 14 of 23

        14                          Opinion of the Court                        22-12744

        on the conspiracy charge; and (3) the district court plainly erred in
        instructing the jury on aggravated identity theft. We take these
        arguments in turn and conclude that none provide cause for rever-
        sal.
                                                A.
               We ﬁrst address Carter’s material variance argument.3
        Carter must demonstrate both that there was a material variance
        and that this variance substantially prejudiced him. See Castro, 89
        F.3d at 1450. He has not made the ﬁrst showing, and we thus need
        not determine whether he has made the second.
               “A material variance between an indictment and the govern-
        ment’s proof at trial occurs if the government proves multiple con-
        spiracies under an indictment alleging only a single conspiracy.” Id.
        We determine if there was a material variance by asking “whether
        the evidence supports the jury’s conclusion that a single conspiracy
        existed.” United States v. Richardson, 532 F.3d 1279, 1284 (11th Cir.
        2008). “A material variance will only result if there is no evidentiary

        3 While Carter includes his variance argument as part of his constructive

        amendment argument in his brief, we address his variance argument sepa-
        rately. See Feldman, 931 F.3d at 1260 (“Constructive amendments should be
        distinguished from ‘material variances’ between the allegations in the indict-
        ment and the proof at trial, which are not reversible per se.”); see also United
        States v. Keller, 916 F.2d 628, 633–34 (11th Cir. 1990) (explaining the distinctions
        between an amendment and a variance). We also note that it is unclear
        whether Carter raised this exact variance argument below. But the govern-
        ment does not argue that it is not preserved, and even assuming it is preserved,
        Carter’s arguments are without merit.
USCA11 Case: 22-12744      Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024      Page: 15 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                         15

        foundation for the jury’s ﬁnding of a single conspiracy.” Id. To
        prove substantial prejudice, a defendant must show:
               1) that the proof at trial diﬀered so greatly from the
               charges that appellant was unfairly surprised and was
               unable to prepare an adequate defense; or 2) that
               there are so many defendants and separate conspira-
               cies before the jury that there is a substantial likeli-
               hood that the jury transferred proof of one conspir-
               acy to a defendant involved in another.
        United States v. Calderon, 127 F.3d 1314, 1328 (11th Cir. 1997).
                Here, Carter argues that, through Sisk’s testimony, the gov-
        ernment introduced evidence that Carter was involved in the Lime-
        stone County conspiracy, even though he was not charged in the
        indictment with participation in that conspiracy. As a result, he ar-
        gues that he may have been convicted with respect to a conspiracy
        that was not charged in the indictment. But Carter does not dis-
        pute that there is an “evidentiary foundation for the jury’s ﬁnding
        of a single conspiracy.” See Richardson, 532 F.3d at 1284. Indeed, in
        his brief, he concedes that a rational juror could have found that
        “all of the fraudulent activity revealed by the evidence adduced at
        trial was part of the one unitary scheme . . . alleged in the indict-
        ment.” Carter then recognizes that a “reasonable juror could have
        found a broader scheme, centered on fraudulent activity con-
        ducted by and through [Mr.] Holladay and Corkren, that encom-
        passed the Limestone County Schools and Athens City Schools,
        both as means of increasing the proﬁts of [Mr.] Holladay and
USCA11 Case: 22-12744      Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 16 of 23

        16                     Opinion of the Court                  22-12744

        Corkren.” These concessions are fatal to Carter’s arguments, and
        we therefore aﬃrm as to this issue.
                                          B.
                We next consider Carter’s constructive amendment argu-
        ment. The Fifth Amendment provides that “[n]o person shall be
        held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless
        on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury.” U.S. Const.
        amend. V. “This clause does not ‘permit a defendant to be tried on
        charges that are not made in the indictment against him’ or con-
        victed on theories that the indictment ‘cannot fairly be read as
        charging.’” Feldman, 931 F.3d at 1259–60 (quoting Stirone v. United
        States, 361 U.S. 212, 217 (1960)). “The ‘constructive amendment’
        of an indictment ‘occurs when the essential elements of the oﬀense
        contained in the indictment are altered’—for instance, by a faulty
        jury instruction—‘to broaden the possible bases for conviction be-
        yond what is contained in the indictment.’” Id. at 1260 (quoting
        United States v. Madden, 733 F.3d 1314, 1318 (11th Cir. 2013)). Such
        an error “is per se reversible because it violates the defendant’s con-
        stitutional right to be tried solely on the charges returned by the
        grand jury.” United States v. Johnson, 713 F.2d 633, 643 (11th Cir.
        1983). However, a defendant “cannot obtain reversal [for construc-
        tive amendment] based on a jury instruction that he aﬃrmatively
        accepted.” See Feldman, 931 F.3d at 1260.
                Here, Carter aﬃrmatively accepted the district court’s una-
        nimity jury instruction. Thus, he cannot obtain reversal. After the
        district court responded to Carter’s concerns regarding unanimity
USCA11 Case: 22-12744      Document: 34-1       Date Filed: 01/02/2024       Page: 17 of 23

        22-12744                Opinion of the Court                           17

        by reading its proposed instruction, Carter’s attorney said that he
        “[thought] that’s appropriate” and that the instruction “goes right
        to this speciﬁc intent, unanimity.” The district court then gave a
        materially identical instruction to the jury. Consequently, the doc-
        trine of invited error applies. See, e.g., United States v. Silvestri, 409
        F.3d 1311, 1337 (11th Cir. 2005) (“When a party responds to a
        court’s proposed jury instructions with the words ‘the instruction
        is acceptable to us,’ such action constitutes invited error.” (quoting
        Ford ex rel. Est. of Ford v. Garcia, 289 F.3d 1283, 1294 (11th Cir.
        2002))). And Carter cannot now “cry foul on appeal,” given his
        counsel’s statements to the district court. United States v. Brannan,
        562 F.3d 1300, 1306 (11th Cir. 2009).
                But even if Carter’s attorney had not aﬃrmatively accepted
        the instruction, Carter’s argument would still fall short. The dis-
        trict court clearly instructed the jury that it was required to unani-
        mously ﬁnd that Carter committed the single charged conspiracy
        in order to ﬁnd him guilty of Count One, and that if it decided he
        was a member of an uncharged conspiracy, it must ﬁnd him not
        guilty. This instruction did not “broaden the possible bases for con-
        viction beyond what is contained in the indictment.” See United
        States v. Keller, 916 F.2d 628, 634 (11th Cir. 1990).
               Finally, while Carter also argues that the district court’s later
        instruction about conspiracy to commit wire fraud contributed to
        the issue by failing to instruct the jurors that “that they had to agree
        unanimously on the existence of the same single scheme to
USCA11 Case: 22-12744        Document: 34-1         Date Filed: 01/02/2024        Page: 18 of 23

        18                        Opinion of the Court                       22-12744

        defraud,” Carter did not object to his instruction below.4 And he
        fails to make an argument on appeal that this instruction consti-
        tutes plain error. See United States v. Beach, 80 F.4th 1245, 1254 (11th
        Cir. 2023) (“If an appellant does not preserve an issue on appeal, we
        review for plain error.”). In any case, this instruction does not con-
        stitute plain error, or even error for that matter, when considered
        together with the unanimity instruction that Carter’s attorney as-
        sented to. See Watson v. Alabama, 841 F.2d 1074, 1076 (11th Cir.
        1988) (“Courts may not evaluate a single jury instruction in isola-
        tion, but must view it in light of the overall charge.”). For these
        reasons, Carter is not entitled to relief on this issue, and we reject
        his arguments.
                                              C.
               Finally, we consider Carter’s challenge to the district court’s
        jury instructions for aggravated identity theft. Both parties agree
        that we review only for plain error, as Carter’s argument is attribut-
        able to a change in the law and he raises it for the ﬁrst time on ap-
        peal. See United States v. Gladden, 78 F.4th 1232, 1245 (11th Cir. 2023)
        (“The plain-error standard applies even if, as is the case here, there
        were no legal grounds for challenging the instructions at the time
        they were given, but such legal grounds have since arisen due to a

        4 As recounted above, the district court instructed the jury that it must decide

        “whether: (1) there is proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant will-
        fully entered into an agreement to execute a scheme to defraud; and (2) there
        is proof beyond a reasonable doubt that wire communications in interstate
        commerce were transmitted to help carry out the scheme to defraud” when
        considering whether Carter conspired to commit wire fraud.
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 19 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                        19

        new rule of law arising between the time of conviction and the
        time of appeal.” (quoting United States v. Pelisamen, 641 F.3d 399,
        404 (9th Cir. 2011))).
                The criminal statute for aggravated identity theft states,
        “Whoever, during and in relation to any felony violation enumer-
        ated in subsection (c), knowingly transfers, possesses, or uses, with-
        out lawful authority, a means of identiﬁcation of another person
        shall, in addition to the punishment provided for such felony, be
        sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 2 years.” 18 U.S.C.
        § 1028A(a)(1). Subsection (c) enumerates, among other provisions,
        “any provision contained in chapter 63 (relating to mail, bank, and
        wire fraud).” Id. § 1028A(c)(5).
               In Dubin v. United States, 599 U.S. 110 (2023), the Supreme
        Court was tasked with remedying a circuit split as to what it means
        to “use . . . a means of identiﬁcation” in relation to a predicate of-
        fense under § 1028A(a)(1). Id. at 116–18. The defendant was con-
        victed for aggravated identity theft based on a predicate oﬀense of
        healthcare fraud. Id. at 113–15. The defendant, who “submitted a
        claim for reimbursement to Medicaid for psychological testing by
        a licensed psychologist,” overstated the qualiﬁcations of the em-
        ployee who performed the testing, which inﬂated the amount of
        reimbursement. Id. at 114. At trial, the government argued that
        § 1028A(a)(1) was satisﬁed because the fraudulent billing included
        a patient’s Medicaid reimbursement number. Id. at 115. The Court
        disagreed and held that a “defendant ‘uses’ another person’s means
        of identiﬁcation ‘in relation to’ a predicate oﬀense when this use is
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024    Page: 20 of 23

        20                     Opinion of the Court                22-12744

        at the crux of what makes the conduct criminal.” Id. at 131.
        “[B]eing at the crux of the criminality,” the Court explained, “re-
        quires more than a causal relationship, such as ‘facilitation’ of the
        oﬀense or being a but-for cause of its ‘success.’” Id. Instead, “the
        means of identiﬁcation speciﬁcally must be used in a manner that
        is fraudulent or deceptive.” Id at 131–32.
                With respect to the conduct at issue in Dubin, the Court rea-
        soned that the defendant’s “use of the patient’s name was not at
        the crux of what made the underlying overbilling fraudulent.” Id.
        “The crux of the healthcare fraud was a misrepresentation about
        the qualiﬁcations of [the defendant’s] employee,” and so, “[t]he pa-
        tient’s name was an ancillary feature of the billing method em-
        ployed.” Id. In all, the Court explained that the “fraud was in mis-
        representing how and when services were provided to a patient, not
        who received the services,” and for that reason, the defendant’s con-
        duct did not provide a basis for prosecution under § 1028A(a)(1).
        Id. (emphasis in original).
                We applied this interpretation of § 1028A(a)(1) in United
        States v. Gladden, 78 F.4th 1232 (11th Cir. 2023). There, we consid-
        ered the challenges of two defendants, Linton and Gladden, to
        their convictions for conspiracy to commit health care fraud as well
        as, among other substantive oﬀenses, aggravated identity theft. Id.
        at 1238. The defendants were employees of a pharmaceutical com-
        pany involved in ﬁlling prescriptions that billed “pharmacy beneﬁt
        managers (PBMs)” and received reimbursements from the PBMs
        and insurance companies for those prescriptions. Id. The
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1      Date Filed: 01/02/2024     Page: 21 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                        21

        defendants played a part in a company-wide scheme “to defraud
        pharmacy networks by secretly billing PBMs for medically unnec-
        essary and fraudulent prescriptions.” Id.
               We aﬃrmed Linton’s convictions for aggravated identity
        theft on plain-error review under Dubin. Id. at 1244–46. We rea-
        soned that, even if Linton could meet the ﬁrst two requirements of
        the plain error test, she could not establish that there was a reason-
        able probability that the error aﬀected the outcome of the trial, for
        her “conduct f[ell] within the [aggravated identity theft] statute’s
        purview. Id. at 1245. This was because she changed the addresses
        on ﬁle for certain customers to those of another so that her com-
        pany could continue billing for prescriptions. Id. In other words,
        Linton used these customers’ identities “to continue reﬁlling pre-
        scriptions in their names, even though they were neither aware of
        nor received any products.” Id. We concluded that this forgery of
        the customers’ identities was “at the heart of the deception” be-
        cause it “directly enabled [the company] to continue billing for
        medically unnecessary prescriptions.” Id. We also explained how
        Linton altered a prescription to include medically unnecessary
        drugs without the prescribing doctor’s knowledge, which directly
        enabled her to bill for them. Id. at 1245–46. We thus concluded
        that Linton’s conduct fell “squarely within the classic variety of
        identity theft left untouched by Dubin,” as she “did not provide a
        service to a client while merely misrepresenting how the service
        was performed to inﬂate the bill,” but rather “used the means of
        identiﬁcation of former patients and prescribing doctors to overbill
        for certain products.” Id. at 1246.
USCA11 Case: 22-12744       Document: 34-1       Date Filed: 01/02/2024       Page: 22 of 23

        22                       Opinion of the Court                    22-12744

               As for Gladden, we vacated his aggravated identity theft con-
        viction. Id. at 1248–49. We concluded that the jury instruction
        adopted the “broad reading of Section 1028A” that Dubin rejected
        and that this error “‘aﬀected the outcome of the district court pro-
        ceedings’ as to Gladden.” Id. at 1248 (quoting United States v. Mar-
        cus, 560 U.S. 258, 262 (2010)). This was because Gladden’s misrep-
        resentations to PBMs and insurance companies “involved only
        whether the prescriptions were medically necessary.” Id. at 1248–
        49. Gladden, at no point, misrepresented “who received the pre-
        scriptions.” Id. at 1248.
               We ﬁnd that Carter’s case is more like Linton’s than Glad-
        den’s. There is no disagreement that the district court’s jury in-
        structions meet the ﬁrst two requirements of our plain error test,
        for they are obviously erroneous under Dubin. The district court
        instructed the jury that it could convict Carter for aggravated iden-
        tity theft if it found, among other things, that the means of identi-
        ﬁcation in the case facilitated his fraud, not if it found, as Dubin
        requires, that the use of the identity was at the crux of the predicate
        wire fraud oﬀense. See 599 U.S. at 131.
               But Carter’s argument fails at the third step of the plain error
        test. He cannot show that the jury instructions “aﬀected his sub-
        stantial rights,” Puckett v. United States, 556 U.S. 129, 133 (2009), i.e.,
        that there is “a reasonable probability that the error aﬀected the
        outcome of the trial,” Marcus, 560 U.S. at 262. In this case, Carter
        used the students’ information to make it appear that they were
        enrolled at ARS, which had the eﬀect of increasing state funding
USCA11 Case: 22-12744     Document: 34-1       Date Filed: 01/02/2024    Page: 23 of 23

        22-12744               Opinion of the Court                        23

        for ACS. And he oversaw the creation of fraudulent enrollment
        forms and report cards to carry out this scheme. Given this evi-
        dence, Carter’s fraud was in misrepresenting “who received the ser-
        vices,” and his use of the victim’s names and information was “at
        the crux of what made” the entire scheme fraudulent. See Dubin,
        599 U.S. at 132 (emphasis removed). Therefore, this conduct is
        more like Linton’s than Gladden’s, for Carter’s use of students’
        identities “directly enabled [ACS] to continue” receiving funding
        from ASDE. See Gladden, 78 F.4th at 1245. Indeed, “unlike in Du-
        bin, [Carter] did not provide a service to a client while merely mis-
        representing how the service was performed to inﬂate the bill.” See
        id. at 1246. Instead, he misused the identities of students to receive
        more funding from ASDE. Carter’s forgery of the students’ iden-
        tities is thus “at the heart of the deception” and his conduct “falls
        squarely within the classic variety of identity theft left untouched
        by Dubin.” Id. at 1245–46.
               Accordingly, even under Dubin’s interpretation of
        § 1028A(a)(1), the outcome of Carter’s trial would have been the
        same, and he is not entitled to vacatur of his aggravated identity
        theft convictions.
                                         IV.
               For these reasons, we aﬃrm Carter’s convictions.
               AFFIRMED.