Court Opinion

ID: 9953400
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-22 04:01:19.20212+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:03:05.035885
License: Public Domain

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION
                                  File Name: 24a0139n.06

                                          Case No. 23-5407

                            UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                 FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

                                                                                   FILED
                                                       )                         Mar 21, 2024
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,                                                KELLY L. STEPHENS, Clerk
                                                       )
          Plaintiff-Appellee,                          )
                                                       )     ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED
          v.                                           )     STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
                                                       )     THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF
DAMON SEAN BELLIS,                                     )     KENTUCKY
          Defendant-Appellant.                         )                        OPINION
                                                       )

Before: KETHLEDGE, BUSH, and READLER, Circuit Judges.

          CHAD A. READLER, Circuit Judge. A jury convicted Damon Bellis of assaulting a

federal officer. In calculating Bellis’s Sentencing Guidelines range, the district court increased his

base offense level under U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3)(A) because an officer suffered a “[b]odily

[i]njury” during the confrontation with Bellis. The court then sentenced Bellis to 60 months’

imprisonment. On appeal, Bellis contends that his sentencing range was improperly inflated by

application of the bodily injury provision. To Bellis’s mind, that provision is inapplicable because

he caused, at most, only superficial injuries. Seeing no error in the district court proceedings, we

affirm.

                                                  I.

          Equipped with an arrest warrant, federal officers Brandon Post and Jarod Pugh arrived at a

home where they believed they would find the warrant’s target, Damon Bellis. Pugh stationed
No. 23-5407, United States v. Bellis

himself behind the residence, while Post was in front. When Bellis exited the front door, Post

announced his presence. Bellis walked towards Post, drawing a long silver fishing spear tip from

his jacket. The two engaged. Pugh then entered the fray, restraining Bellis and dislodging the

spear. The melee ended with Post handcuffing Bellis. During the confrontation, Pugh suffered

minor injuries, including a bloody lip.

         Following an indictment and subsequent trial, Bellis was found guilty of assault on a

federal officer, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 111(a)(1) and (b). His case then moved to the sentencing

phase.    Invoking U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3)(A), the probation office suggested a three-level

enhancement to Bellis’s base offense level due to Pugh’s “[b]odily [i]njur[ies].” At sentencing,

the district court referenced photos depicting Pugh’s injuries and concluded that they qualified as

bodily injuries for purposes of the enhancement. But noting that the injuries were not severe and

that Pugh did not seek medical attention, the court varied downward and imposed only a two-level

increase. The district court sentenced Bellis to 60 months’ imprisonment, followed by three years

of supervised release. Bellis lodged no objections to his sentence when the opportunity arose. But

he did later appeal his sentence in a timely manner.

                                                   II.

         On appeal, Bellis argues that the district court erred in imposing a “[b]odily [i]njury”

enhancement. See U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3)(A). As Bellis did not object to his sentence following

its imposition, we review his challenge for plain error. United States v. Vonner, 516 F.3d 382, 386

(6th Cir. 2008) (en banc). As a result, Bellis must demonstrate the existence of a clear or obvious

error affecting his substantial rights and “the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of the judicial

                                                   2
No. 23-5407, United States v. Bellis

proceedings.” Id. (quotation omitted). “[O]nly in exceptional circumstances” do such errors exist.

Id. (quotation omitted).

       Bellis’s case does not present such circumstances, as we discern no error, plain or

otherwise. The Guidelines provision at issue instructs the district court to increase by three a

defendant’s base offense level for aggravated assault if a victim suffers a “[b]odily [i]njury.”

U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3)(A). Pugh’s bloodied lip fits the bill. As the term “bodily injury” is not

defined in the Guideline itself, we look to dictionaries to supply the term’s ordinary meaning.

United States v. Riccardi, 989 F.3d 476, 486 (6th Cir. 2021). Black’s Law Dictionary defines the

phrase “bodily injury” as “[p]hysical damage to a person’s body.” Injury, Black’s Law Dictionary

(11th ed. 2019). Other dictionaries are in accord. See, e.g., Bodily, Oxford English Dictionary

(Online ed. 2024) (“Of or belonging to the body or physical nature of man.”); Bodily, Merriam-

Webster (Online ed. 2024) (“[O]f or relating to the body”); Injury, Oxford English Dictionary

(Online ed. 2024) (“Hurt or loss caused to or sustained by a person or thing; harm, detriment,

damage.”); Injury, Merriam-Webster (Online ed. 2024) (“[H]urt, damage, or loss sustained”).

From this collection of sources, a plain reading of the phrase “bodily injury” equates the term to a

physical harm to one’s body, an understanding that captures the bloodied lip sustained by Pugh.

       Consistent with this understanding, we have upheld application of the enhancement for

injuries of similar magnitude. We did so under a nearly identical provision of the Guidelines where

the defendant’s actions caused his victim to experience a ‘“goose egg’ lump on his head and

scrapes and bruises on his arm and shoulder.” United States v. Jackson, 918 F.3d 467, 487 (6th

Cir. 2019). We upheld application of a similar bodily injury enhancement where a beating resulted

in an officer suffering “numerous abrasions, the hyperextension of his shoulder, and soreness in

his knees and elbow for two weeks.” United States v. Muhammad, 948 F.2d 1449, 1451, 1456

                                                 3
No. 23-5407, United States v. Bellis

(6th Cir. 1991); see also United States v. Davenport, 30 F. App’x 338, 339–40 (6th Cir. 2002)

(order) (applying a bodily injury enhancement when a bank teller struck on the head with a gun

suffered a headache). And we did so under the same Guideline provision here where the victim

was “bleeding from the fingers” and suffered “marks on the neck” as well as “swelling of the face.”

United States v. Milen, No.16-6574, 2017 WL 4863120, at *3 (6th Cir. Aug. 23, 2017) (order).

        As a matter of degree, we see little difference between these injuries and Pugh’s bleeding

lip. True, as Bellis notes, Pugh’s injuries were not especially serious nor long-lasting. But it is

not enough for Bellis simply to say that “the injury just wasn’t serious.” Davenport, 30 F. App’x

at 340. Serious injury is not required. Confirming as much, with a more serious injury, a different

(and even greater) enhancement applies. See U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3)(B) (calling for a five-level

increase when a bodily injury is “[s]erious”). As “[c]ourts presume that the same words in the

same statute mean the same thing,” In re Jackson Masonry, LLC, 906 F.3d 494, 501 (6th Cir.

2018), we read the Commission’s use of the term “serious” in one place to exclude a seriousness

requirement where that term is not used. See Antonin Scalia & Bryan A. Garner, Reading Law:

The Interpretation of Legal Texts § 25 (2012) (explaining that a corollary of the presumption of

consistent usage is the principle that “a material variation in terms suggests a variation in

meaning”). So we find no error, plain or otherwise, in imposing the lesser enhancement in this

case.

        Drawing our attention to the Guidelines commentary, Bellis urges a different approach.

The commentary to § 2A2.2, he notes, explains that the definition of “bodily injury” is found in

the application note to § 1B1.1. U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2 cmt. n.1. There, “bodily injury” is defined as

“any significant injury; e.g., an injury that is painful and obvious, or is of a type for which medical

                                                  4
No. 23-5407, United States v. Bellis

attention ordinarily would be sought.” U.S.S.G. § 1B1.1 cmt. n.1(B). Bellis contends that Pugh’s

injuries do not meet this definition.

       Bellis’s conclusion leaps over important steps in our interpretive process. As a starting

point, we do not look to the commentary reflexively, as Bellis would have us do. Riccardi, 989

F.3d at 485; see also United States v. Havis, 927 F.3d 382, 386 (6th Cir. 2019) (en banc) (per

curiam) (explaining that the Guidelines “commentary has no independent legal force”). Instead,

whether to defer to the Guidelines commentary at sentencing is answered by looking to the

interpretive rules announced in Kisor v. Wilkie, 139 S. Ct. 2400 (2019). Riccardi, 989 F.3d at 485;

United States v. Phillips, 54 F.4th 374, 379 (6th Cir. 2022). Set outside the context of the

Sentencing Guidelines, Kisor considered, more broadly, how courts should interpret federal

regulations when an agency regulation is accompanied by the agency’s own interpretation. Kisor,

139 S. Ct. at 2408. Before deferring to that interpretation, Kisor explained, a court must find that

the regulation is “genuinely ambiguous.” Id. at 2414. If there is no deep ambiguity in the

regulation’s terms, as informed by “the standard tools of interpretation,” id., the terms’ plain

meaning carries the day.

       We follow this same approach when deciding whether to defer to the Guidelines

commentary. Riccardi, 989 F.3d at 486. And, as already explained, we see no ambiguity in the

Guideline’s phrase “bodily injury,” one that reflects a straightforward reading. Therefore, we need

not resort to any gloss to those terms provided in the commentary.

       Finally, Bellis argues that it is unclear whether he even inflicted the injuries experienced

by Pugh. This framing, however, minimizes the enhancement’s reach. For purposes of the

enhancement, it is fair game to consider any injury that was reasonably foreseeable as a result of

Bellis’s conduct, even those injuries not directly produced by a blow from him. Consider United

                                                 5
No. 23-5407, United States v. Bellis

States v. Fitzwater, 896 F.2d 1009 (6th Cir. 1990). There, we upheld a bodily injury enhancement

when a bank employee hit her head on a drawer while moving to the floor during a robbery—even

when, at the time of the injury, the defendant was outside the bank. Id. at 1012. Such harm, we

said, was a reasonably foreseeable outcome of the crime, and thus it was included within the

enhancement’s scope. Id. So too here. It was reasonably foreseeable that assaulting an officer

with a fishing spear would result in physical injury to the officer. The district court justifiably

increased Bellis’s offense level as a result.

                                   *       *    *       *       *

       We affirm the judgment of the district court.

                                                6