Court Opinion

ID: 9363096
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-01-13 18:57:06.230035+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:15:28.688542
License: Public Domain

FOR PUBLICATION

  UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
       FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,                No. 20-10318

            Plaintiff-Appellee,           D.C. Nos.
                                        2:16-cr-00217-
 v.                                        MCE-2
                                        2:16-cr-00217-
SHARMISTHA BARAI,                           MCE

            Defendant-Appellant.
                                          OPINION

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,                No. 20-10347

            Plaintiff-Appellee,           D.C. Nos.
                                        2:16-cr-00217-
 v.                                        MCE-1
                                        2:16-cr-00217-
SATISH KARTAN,                              MCE

            Defendant-Appellant.

        Appeal from the United States District Court
            for the Eastern District of California
      Morrison C. England, Jr., District Judge, Presiding
2                     UNITED STATES V. BARAI

           Argued and Submitted October 19, 2022
                 San Francisco, California

                    Filed December 20, 2022

Before: Sidney R. Thomas, Milan D. Smith, Jr., and Lucy
                H. Koh, Circuit Judges.

                     Opinion by Judge Koh

                          SUMMARY *

                          Criminal Law

   Affirming the district court, the panel held that 18 U.S.C.
§ 1589(a)—under which the defendants were convicted of
two counts of forced labor—lists alternative factual means,
about which the jurors did not need to agree unanimously so
long as they unanimously agreed that the defendants
knowingly obtained forced labor by prohibited means.
    The panel held that the district court therefore did not
abuse its discretion in declining to give a specific unanimity
instruction, and addressed the defendants’ other challenges
in a concurrently filed memorandum disposition.

*
  This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has
been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.
                   UNITED STATES V. BARAI                  3

                        COUNSEL

William W. Fick (argued) and Amy Barsky, Fick & Marx
LLP, Boston, Massachusetts; John J.E. Markham II
(argued), Markham Read Zerner LLC, Boston,
Massachusetts; Brian C. McComas, Law Office of Brian
McComas, San Francisco, California; for Defendants-
Appellants.
Katherine T. Lydon (argued), Assistant United States
Attorney; Jason Hitt; Camil A. Skipper, Assistant United
States Attorney, Appellate Chief; Phillip A. Talbert, Acting
United States Attorney; Office of the United States Attorney;
Sacramento, California; for Plaintiff-Appellee.
Virginia M. Bruner, McGuireWoods LLP, Richmond,
Virginia; Sean A. McClelland and Carolyn J. Appel,
McGuireWoods LLP, Washington, D.C.; Lindsey N.
Roberson and Alyssa C. Wheeler, The Human Trafficking
Institute, Fairfax, Virginia; for Amicus Curiae Human
Trafficking Institute.

                        OPINION
KOH, Circuit Judge:
    Between February 2014 and October 2016, Defendant
Sharmistha Barai and Defendant Satish Kartan recruited
several “nannies” to live and work in their home. These
nannies were subjected to a range of conditions, including:
eighteen-hour workdays, limited food, isolation from their
families, verbal and physical abuse, threats of violence,
threats to call the authorities, and no pay. After an eleven-
day jury trial, Barai and Kartan were convicted of conspiracy
4                    UNITED STATES V. BARAI

to commit forced labor in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1594(b)
and two substantive counts of forced labor in violation of 18
U.S.C. § 1589(a). Kartan was also convicted of fraud in
foreign labor contracting in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1351(a).
Barai and Kartan challenge their convictions and sentences.
    We publish this opinion to address Barai’s and Kartan’s
challenge to the district court’s refusal to give a specific
unanimity instruction with respect to the means by which
they obtained forced labor. 1 We hold that 18 U.S.C.
§ 1589(a) lists alternative factual means, about which the
jurors did not need to agree unanimously so long as they
unanimously agreed that Barai and Kartan knowingly
obtained forced labor by prohibited means.
    BACKGROUND AND PROCEEDINGS BELOW
     Sharmistha Barai is a legal immigrant originally from
Bangladesh. She is a physician and worked as a child
psychiatrist. Satish Kartan is a naturalized United States
citizen originally from India who worked nights as an IT
engineer. The couple married in 2011, and had their first
child, a daughter, in or around 2013. In 2015, the family
moved to Stockton, California, where they lived when the
events at issue occurred.
     Between February 2014 and October 2016, Kartan
advertised live-in nanny positions on South Asian classified
listing services. The advertisements stated that the nannies
would be paid for childcare and domestic work. The trial
evidence showed that during this period, Barai and Kartan
recruited at least six nannies to live and work in their

1
  We address the remainder of Barai’s and Kartan’s challenges in a
concurrently filed memorandum disposition.
                   UNITED STATES V. BARAI                 5

Stockton home.
    The substantive forced labor charges were predicated on
Barai’s and Kartan’s treatment of victim Rathanam Thamma
and victim Puspanjali Thapa, respectively. Thamma worked
for Barai and Kartan for one month and twenty days from
July 2016 to August 2016. She came to the United States on
a tourist visa prepared by a broker in which she represented
that she was visiting a nonexistent daughter in New Jersey.
Consistent with the other victims, Thamma testified at trial
that her work hours were from 6:00 AM to 12:00 AM.
During that time, she did not get enough food or sleep. She
was not allowed to lock the door to her room or use the
bathroom during the two periods during which she was
required to feed the baby, totaling nine hours per day. She
did not have a working cell phone to contact her family, so
she gave Kartan $500, the only money she brought with her
from India, to buy her one. Kartan never gave her a phone
or returned her money. When she was allowed to use
Kartan’s phone to contact her family, Barai and Kartan were
present for the calls and even turned off a fan in the room.
    When Thamma complained to Kartan that she could not
work the long hours, Kartan told Barai. Barai then yelled at
Thamma and said, “This is my house. I will kill you and put
you in the garbage. You come to my address so you have to
work.” Kartan berated Thamma, clapped his hands in her
face, and threatened her for “telling on us” to her family.
Barai also called Thamma derogatory names and, on at least
one occasion, struck Thamma in the mouth for asking to
bring in her drying clothes during hours when she was
required to feed the baby.
    Barai and Kartan required that Thamma warm her hands
using a gas stove before handling the baby. Once, when the
6                   UNITED STATES V. BARAI

baby had not had a bowel movement for several days, Barai
and Kartan concluded that Thamma’s hands were not warm
enough. They stood on either side of her and watched while
she warmed her hands. Barai then pushed Thamma’s hands
closer to the fire. Thamma testified that her hands were
burned and that she experienced pain. Barai and Kartan did
not offer Thamma any assistance after she was burned.
About three days later, after Thamma left the house,
Homeland Security Investigations agents took Thamma to
an emergency room. There, a doctor diagnosed her with
“first- and second-degree burns” on both of her hands.
    Thamma testified that Barai’s and Kartan’s actions
scared her. She said, “If I am here, they will kill me. I have
to go somewhere. If I’m staying here, they will kill me. I
have to leave this place and go.” One day, when Barai and
Kartan left the house, Thamma went to a neighbor’s house,
and the neighbors called the police to assist her. Thamma
was never paid for her work.
     Another victim, Thapa, worked for Barai and Kartan for
five days in September 2016. Her working hours were from
5:00 AM to 11:00 PM, or later, and Kartan woke her up
every morning by pounding on her door. She was not
allowed to take breaks. When she tried to prepare food while
sitting down, Kartan told her to stand up and took her chair
away. She was not allowed to eat the food that she prepared
for the family and was instead told to eat leftovers that were
three to four days old. She said that these leftovers were
“old, wet rice” that made her sick. Kartan and Barai verbally
berated her, calling her an “illegitimate woman,” a
“shameless person,” and a “whore.” She also testified that
Barai and Kartan “would come close to me as if they’re
going to beat me,” call her derogatory names, and would
shake their hands four to six inches from her face. She had
                        UNITED STATES V. BARAI                          7

her own cell phone, but whenever she used it, Kartan tried to
grab the phone from her. When she confronted Kartan about
leaving, he told her “no, no, no, no, work, work.”
    Thapa testified that she was scared of Kartan and Barai,
and she kept working. When Thapa tried to leave, she lied
to Kartan, telling him that her son needed to bring her a
suitcase, and asked Kartan for the address. Kartan refused
to give her the address and later gave her the wrong address.
She had to call a friend and get instructions on how to find
the house number on the outside of the door. She testified
that when she asked to leave, Kartan threatened to call the
police to scare her. Eventually, Thapa’s nephew came to get
her. She asked Kartan for the gate key so her nephew could
enter the gated community. Kartan refused and told her to
leave right away. Thapa was also never paid for her work.
     The district court presided over an eleven-day jury trial,
during which similar evidence of Barai’s and Kartan’s
treatment of other nannies was admitted. 2 At the close of the
trial, the district court instructed the jury. The instruction for
the two substantive forced labor charges under § 1589(a)
stated that the government needed to prove the following
three elements beyond a reasonable doubt:
         First, the defendant obtained the labor or
         services of another person;
         Second, that the defendant did so through at
         least one of the following prohibited means:
             a. force, threats of force, physical
             restraint, or threats of physical restraint to
             that person;

2
  Because that evidence is not relevant to this opinion, we do not discuss
it here.
8                     UNITED STATES V. BARAI

           b. serious harm or threats of serious harm
           to that person;
           c. the abuse or threatened abuse of law or
           legal process; or
           d. a scheme, plan or pattern intended to
           cause the person to believe that if that
           person did not perform such labor or
           services that person or another person
           would suffer serious harm or physical
           restraint; and
        Third, that the defendant acted knowingly.

Barai and Kartan proposed an instruction that would have
told the jury that they must be unanimous as to which of the
four prohibited means Barai and Kartan used to compel
forced labor. The district court rejected the proposed
instruction. The jury returned a unanimous guilty verdict on
the operative counts. 3
                          DISCUSSION
    Barai and Kartan argue that the district court’s forced
labor instruction was erroneous because § 1589(a)’s
paragraphs each describe different legal elements. We
“review[] for abuse of discretion the district court’s denial of
a defendant’s request for a specific unanimity instruction.”
United States v. Tuan Ngoc Luong, 965 F.3d 973, 985 (9th
Cir. 2020) (citation omitted). Although ordinarily, a general
instruction that the verdict must be unanimous is sufficient,
“[a] specific unanimity instruction is necessary ‘where it

3
  The government voluntarily dismissed count 3, which charged Barai
with benefitting from forced labor in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1589(b),
after the close of evidence and before the jury began deliberations.
                    UNITED STATES V. BARAI                    9

appears that “there is a genuine possibility of jury confusion
or that a conviction may occur as the result of different jurors
concluding that the defendant committed . . . acts”’
consisting of different legal elements.” Id. (quoting United
States v. Anguiano, 873 F.2d 1314, 1319 (9th Cir. 1989)).
    Calling a particular part of a statute an “element,” as
opposed to a “means,” is legally significant.             See
Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U.S. 224, 239
(1998) (noting that an element must be stated in an
indictment, proven by the government to a jury, and proven
beyond a reasonable doubt). Relevant here, “a jury in a
federal criminal case cannot convict unless it unanimously
finds that the Government has proved each element.”
Richardson v. United States, 526 U.S. 813, 817 (1999).
However, “a federal jury need not always decide
unanimously which of several possible sets of underlying
brute facts make up a particular element, say, which of
several possible means the defendant used to commit an
element of the crime.” Id. Thus, the United States Supreme
Court has drawn a distinction between the legal elements of
a crime and the factual means by which a defendant may
commit that crime. See Mathis v. United States, 579 U.S.
500, 514–15 (2016) (affirming, in a categorical approach
case, the elements-means distinction in the Court’s caselaw).
In Rendon v. Holder, we recognized the well-established
status of the means-elements distinction and concluded that
it “parallels the need for juror agreement.” 764 F.3d 1077,
1086 (9th Cir. 2014) (“[T]he Supreme Court regards
elements as those circumstances on which the jury must
unanimously agree, while it regards means as those
circumstances on which the jury may disagree yet still
convict.”).
10                  UNITED STATES V. BARAI

    Thus, the question in this case is: Are the listed
alternatives in the forced labor statute elements or means?
We hold that the listed alternatives of 18 U.S.C. § 1589(a)
are factual means, rather than distinct legal elements. The
district court therefore did not abuse its discretion when it
denied the defendants’ proposed specific unanimity
instruction.
    We begin with the statute’s text. “When called on to
interpret a statute, this Court generally seeks to discern and
apply the ordinary meaning of its terms at the time of their
adoption.” BP P.L.C. v. Mayor & City Council of Baltimore,
141 S. Ct. 1532, 1537 (2021). The forced labor statute reads:
       (a) Whoever knowingly provides or obtains
       the labor or services of a person by any one
       of, or by any combination of, the following
       means–
           (1) by means of force, threats of force,
           physical restraint, or threats of physical
           restraint to that person or another person;
           (2) by means of serious harm or threats
           of serious harm to that person or another
           person;
           (3) by means of the abuse or threatened
           abuse of law or legal process; or
           (4) by means of any scheme, plan, or
           pattern intended to cause the person to
           believe that, if that person did not
           perform such labor or services, that
           person or another person would suffer
           serious harm or physical restraint,
       shall be punished as provided under
       subsection (d).
                    UNITED STATES V. BARAI                  11

18 U.S.C. § 1589(a) (emphasis added). By its own terms,
the forced labor statute indicates that the listed alternatives
are means by which a defendant might commit forced labor.
The word “means” is used five times in 18 U.S.C.
§ 1589(a)—once before referring to each of the four
alternatives and once when describing that a person obtains
forced labor by “any one of, or by any combination of” such
means.
    In addition to the plain language, the Supreme Court has
identified certain aspects of a statute’s structure that inform
whether a statute describes means or elements. See Mathis,
579 U.S. at 518. If statutory alternatives carry different
punishments or if the statute identifies which alternatives
must be charged, then the alternatives must be elements. Id.
Accordingly, in United States v. Mickey, we held that the sex
trafficking statute lists alternative factual means rather than
legal elements in part because the alternatives do not carry
different punishments and the statute does not identify each
alternative as an element of the crime. 897 F.3d 1173, 1181–
82 (9th Cir. 2018). Similarly here, the forced labor statute’s
alternatives do not carry different punishments and the
statute does not identify each alternative as an element of the
crime. See 18 U.S.C. § 1589(d).
    Moreover, the sex trafficking statute in Mickey uses
substantially similar language for its alternatives as the
forced labor statute here. The sex trafficking statute in
Mickey prohibits sex trafficking “by means of force, threats
of force, fraud, or coercion described in subsection (e)(2), or
by any combination of such means.”                18 U.S.C.
§ 1591(b)(1). “Coercion” includes:
12                  UNITED STATES V. BARAI

       (A) threats of serious harm to or physical
       restraint against any person;
       (B) any scheme, plan, or pattern intended to
       cause a person to believe that failure to
       perform an act would result in serious harm
       to or physical restraint against any person; or
       (C) the abuse or threatened abuse of law or
       the legal process.”

18 U.S.C. § 1591(e)(2). This language is nearly identical to
the language used in the forced labor statute. Both statutes
prohibit “force,” “threats of force,” “threats of serious
harm,” “threats of physical restraint,” “any scheme, plan, or
pattern intended to cause a person to believe that [failure to
provide forced labor or perform a commercial sex act] would
result in serious harm to or physical restraint against any
person,” and “the abuse or threatened abuse of law or legal
process.” Compare 18 U.S.C. § 1589(a), with 18 U.S.C.
§ 1591(b)(1), (e)(2). “We . . . avoid interpretations that
would ‘attribute different meanings to the same phrase.’”
Cochise Consultancy, Inc. v. United States ex rel. Hunt, 139
S. Ct. 1507, 1512 (2019) (quoting Reno v. Bossier Par. Sch.
Bd., 528 U.S. 320, 329 (2000)). Because in Mickey we found
nearly identical language to be means rather than elements,
we read the forced labor statute in the same way.
    This is especially true because the sex trafficking statute
is part of the broader context for the forced labor statute.
Indeed, both statutes were added to Title 18 at the same time
through the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, and
for the same general purpose—to combat the modern-day
strategies by which traffickers exercise power over their
victims. See Pub. L. No. 106-386, § 102(a), (b)(13), 114
Stat. 1464, 1464 (2000). “When statutes ‘were enacted at
                    UNITED STATES V. BARAI                 13

the same time and form part of the same Act, the duty to
harmonize them is particularly acute.’” United States v.
Gallenardo, 579 F.3d 1076, 1083 (9th Cir. 2009) (quoting
US W. Commc’ns, Inc. v. Hamilton, 224 F.3d 1049, 1053
(9th Cir. 2000), as amended on reh’g (Sept. 13, 2000)); see
also Erlenbaugh v. United States, 409 U.S. 239, 243 (1972)
(“[A] legislative body generally uses a particular word with
a consistent meaning in a given context.”). Thus, the plain
text of the forced labor statute, the context in which the
language is used, and the broader context of the statute as a
whole counsel toward a finding that the forced labor statute’s
alternatives are factual means, rather than legal elements.
See United States v. Havelock, 664 F.3d 1284, 1289 (9th Cir.
2012) (en banc) (“Statutory interpretation focuses on ‘the
language itself, the specific context in which the language is
used, and the broader context of the statute as a whole.’”
(quoting Robinson v. Shell Oil Co., 519 U.S. 337, 341
(1997))).
    We must also consider whether construing the listed
alternatives as means “aggravates the dangers of unfairness.”
Richardson, 526 U.S. at 819. In Richardson, the Supreme
Court looked to the breadth and divergence of listed
alternatives when considering whether a statute lists
alternative factual means or legal elements. The Court
concluded that individual “violations” are not means for
purposes of 21 U.S.C. § 848(c)’s “series of violations”
language because the statute’s “breadth aggravates the
dangers of unfairness.” Id. The Court noted that
“violations” covered approximately ninety numbered
sections of drug crimes, which ranged from “removing drug
labels” to “endangering human life while manufacturing a
controlled substance in violation of the drug laws.” Id. By
comparison, the forced labor statute’s set of alternatives is
14                     UNITED STATES V. BARAI

far narrower, and we do not find that the breadth or
divergence of these alternatives is so significant that they
might aggravate any potential danger of unfairness to
defendants should the alternatives be treated as factual
means. Each of the paragraphs describes a type of coercion,
and each alternative is used to effectuate the same purpose:
the acquisition of forced labor. As noted above, we have
already held that a substantially similar list describes
alternative means, rather than elements. Therefore, we
conclude that the listed alternatives in the forced labor
statute are simply different means by which a person may
commit the same crime rather than “multiple, alternative
elements of functionally separate crimes.” 4 Rendon, 764
F.3d at 1085.
    Kartan argues that the forced labor statute’s paragraphs
must be elements because certain alternatives incorporate
additional scienter requirements. His argument is based on
the conclusions by our court and the Seventh Circuit that
“scheme . . . intended to cause a person to believe” and “in
order to exert pressure” incorporate scienter into the
alternatives at § 1589(a)(3) and (a)(4). See United States v.
Calimlim, 538 F.3d 706, 711 (7th Cir. 2008) (holding that
§ 1589(a)(4) contains a “second scienter requirement”

4
  This conclusion is consistent with how we and the Fifth Circuit have
treated the forced labor statute’s paragraphs. See Martinez-Rodriguez v.
Giles, 31 F.4th 1139, 1150 (9th Cir. 2022) (“Because Plaintiffs pleaded
only a single forced-labor cause of action in their operative complaint,
the district court’s dismissal of that claim was erroneous if Plaintiffs
presented sufficient evidence to establish that Defendants engaged in any
one of these three means with the requisite mens rea.” (emphasis
added)); United States v. Toure, 965 F.3d 393, 400 (5th Cir. 2020)
(treating the prohibited means listed in § 1589(a) as a single element of
a forced labor offense).
                    UNITED STATES V. BARAI                  15

because it requires a “scheme . . . intended to cause a person
to believe . . .”); see also Martinez-Rodriguez, 31 F.4th at
1157 (noting that § 1589(a)(3) “already incorporate[s] an
element of scienter inasmuch as ‘abuse . . . of law or legal
process’ requires a showing that” the defendant did so “in
order to exert pressure” on the victims).
    We are not persuaded. We acknowledge that mens rea
is an element of a crime, rather than a means. See Elonis v.
United States, 575 U.S. 723, 734 (2015) (“[T]he ‘general
rule’ is that a guilty mind is a ‘necessary element in the
indictment and proof of every crime.’” (quoting United
States v. Balint, 258 U.S. 250, 251 (1922))). In this case, the
forced labor statute expressly defines the mens rea element:
“knowingly.” 18 U.S.C. § 1589(a). By contrast, we have
previously identified the incorporated scienter in the forced
labor statute to be part of the actus reus element of the
offense. See Martinez-Rodriguez, 31 F.4th at 1150, 1157
(noting that “the actus reus . . . incorporate[s] an element of
scienter”). “[T]he jury need not agree as to mere means of
satisfying the actus reus element of an offense.” Schad v.
Arizona, 501 U.S. 624, 632 (1991) (plurality opinion). Thus,
because the incorporated scienter is part of the actus reus of
a forced labor offense, the fact that some listed alternatives
incorporate scienter does not undermine our conclusion that
the alternatives are means.
    Furthermore, Kartan’s interpretation would be at odds
with fundamental rules of statutory interpretation because it
would require us to read the forced labor statute and the sex
trafficking statute inconsistently. See Cochise Consultancy,
139 S. Ct. at 1512. The phrases that integrate a secondary
scienter requirement into certain alternatives of the forced
labor statute (i.e. “intended to cause a person to believe” and
“in order to exert pressure”) are also used in the sex
16                 UNITED STATES V. BARAI

trafficking statute. Compare 18 U.S.C. § 1589(a)(4), (c)(1),
with 18 U.S.C. § 1591(e)(1), (e)(2)(B). If we were to
conclude that these phrases required us to hold that the
forced labor statute’s alternatives are legal elements, then
our holding would be directly at odds with Mickey. See 897
F.3d at 1181. We decline to read the two statutes, which
were enacted at the same time, as part of the same Act, and
with substantially similar language, as conflicting. See
Gallenardo, 579 F.3d at 1083. Thus, the jury did not need
to be unanimous on the means by which Barai and Kartan
obtained forced labor.
    We conclude that the general unanimity instruction was
sufficient. All that was required for the jurors to convict
Barai and Kartan under the forced labor statute was for the
jurors to unanimously agree that Barai and Kartan
knowingly obtained forced labor by one or more of the
prohibited means listed in 18 U.S.C. § 1589(a). The district
court did not abuse its discretion in declining to give a
specific unanimity instruction to the jury.
AFFIRMED.