Justia U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

After a shoplifting incident at a Colorado Kmart and a shootout two days later, the federal and state governments both indicted Defendant Joshua Garcia. The federal government waited nearly twenty-three months to prosecute Defendant, while the state prosecution ran its course. The district court held the delay violated Defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial and dismissed the federal indictment against him. "Violating a defendant’s Sixth Amendment speedy-trial right compels a severe remedy: dismissing the indictment with prejudice. But a defendant cannot avail himself of that protection when he did not diligently assert that right." The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals held the delay in this case did not violate Defendant’s speedy-trial right and the district court improperly dismissed his indictment. Judgment was reversed and the case remanded for further proceedings. View "United States v. Garcia" on Justia Law

Defendant Ahmad Salti appealed a district court’s determination of how to calculate his restitution obligation when his co-conspirator also paid some of it. Defendant was sentenced to pay the victim $35,000 in restitution, which was a “Joint and Several Amount” also owed by co-conspirator Pattrick Towner. Towner’s sentence required him to pay restitution to the victim of $72,000, owed jointly and severally with Defendant. After Defendant deposited $35,000 with the court clerk as restitution, the clerk informed the government that Defendant should receive a refund for overpayment. The clerk explained that Towner had paid $5,117.92 in restitution and the clerk had apportioned that amount pro rata between the obligation owed by both Defendant and Towner ($35,000) and the amount owed solely by Mr. Towner ($37,000). Because 35/72 of Towner’s payments ($2,487.87) had been credited to the $35,000 in restitution owed jointly and severally by both defendants, Defendant had overpaid by that amount. The government moved the district court to order the clerk not to pay Defendant a refund of $2,487.87. The district court agreed with the government, declaring that Defendant had to continue to make payments toward his $35,000 obligation unless (because of payments by Towner) the victim had already been fully compensated for its $72,000 loss. Defendant appealed. The Tenth Circuit affirmed, finding the decision of the district court maximized compensation to the victim and treated both Defendant and Towner fairly. View "United States v. Salti" on Justia Law

Doctor Shakeel Kahn (Dr. Kahn) was convicted in federal district court in Wyoming, in part, for dispensing controlled substances not “as authorized,” in violation of the Controlled Substances Act (the CSA). Included in his appeal to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals was his contention that the jury instructions issued by the district court improperly advised the jury regarding the mens rea requirement of CSA § 841(a). The Tenth Circuit affirmed Dr. Kahn’s convictions, rejecting both his challenge to the instructions given, and his challenges to multiple searches and the evidence seized. In upholding the instructions, the Tenth Circuit relied on precedent, United States v. Nelson, 383 F.3d 1227 (10th Cir. 2004), and further reaffirmed its holding, which was guided by 21 C.F.R. § 1306.04(a). Dr. Kahn appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, raising only his instructional challenge. The Supreme Court held that § 841(a)’s “knowingly or intentionally” mens rea applied to the “except as authorized” clause of the statute, vacated the Tenth Circuit's judgment, and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with its opinion. The parties submitted supplemental briefing, and the matter went again before the Tenth Circuit. After review, the Tenth Circuit concluded the jury instructions issued in Dr. Kahn’s trial incorrectly stated the mens rea requirement of § 841(a) and the error was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. This prejudicial error infected all of Dr. Kahn’s convictions. Therefore, Dr. Kahn’s convictions were v View "United States v. Kahn" on Justia Law

Petitioner-appellant Taberon Honie confessed to murder. About two weeks before trial, following his lawyer’s advice, Honie waived his Utah statutory right to jury sentencing in favor of sentencing by the trial judge. Years later, Honie sought habeas relief, arguing: (1) soon after he waived jury sentencing, a fellow inmate told him that he had made a mistake in doing so; (2) a week before trial, Honie asked his trial counsel to withdraw the waiver; and (3) that counsel told him it was too late. During the defense’s opening statement at the murder trial, Honie’s counsel conceded that Honie was guilty of the aggravated-murder charge, telling the jury that the case would be about punishment. After hearing the evidence, a Utah state jury convicted him of aggravated murder. The trial judge imposed the death sentence. The Utah Supreme Court upheld the conviction and sentence. In seeking state postconviction relief, Honie argued under the Sixth Amendment that his trial counsel performed deficiently in two ways: (1) by inadequately explaining his right to jury sentencing, and (2) by not following his direction to retract his waiver. The Utah Supreme Court rejected Honie’s first claim, concluding that Honie’s counsel had performed competently. On the second, the court didn’t rule on the deficient-performance question. For both claims, the court ruled that Honie had suffered no prejudice. Before the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, Honie argued the Utah Supreme Court's application of the substantive-outcome test for prejudice announced in Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984) was unreasonable. Honie argued the holdings of three more-recent Supreme Court cases required the Utah Supreme Court to instead use the process-based test as done in Hill v. Lockhart, 474 U.S. 52 (1985). If Hill’s standard applied, Honie would have instead needed to show a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s errors, he would have chosen jury sentencing. The Tenth Circuit denied relief, finding: (1) the Supreme Court never applied Strickland’s general prejudice standard in a case involving a waiver of jury sentencing in a capital case; and (2) the Supreme Court has never held that a process-based prejudice test applied to jury-sentencing waivers. View "Honie v. Powell" on Justia Law

Jane Doe and two boys were accused of killing Doe’s parents. Even though Doe was a juvenile at the time of the murders, the government charged her with two counts of first-degree murder. The government successfully moved to transfer her case to adult court, where the punishments for first-degree murder are death or mandatory life imprisonment without parole. These punishments would be unconstitutional when applied to a juvenile. Doe argued she could not be transferred to adult court because, even if guilty, there was no statutory punishment available for her alleged crime. She also argued the district court used an incorrect legal standard for transfer from juvenile to adult court and improperly weighed the relevant factors for transfer. The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals found her constitutional argument was not ripe, the district court applied the correct legal standard, and the district court did not abuse its discretion in weighing the transfer factors. The Court therefore affirmed the district court’s transfer of Doe’s case from juvenile to adult court. View "United States v. Doe" on Justia Law

Defendant Joshua Leib challenged the 100-month sentence he received for his conviction for being a previously convicted felon in possession of a firearm. The specific sentencing question presented by this appeal was whether the district court clearly erred in calculating Leib’s advisory prison range under the sentencing guidelines by enhancing his base offense level under U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B). The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals concluded there was sufficient evidence for the sentencing court to find, by a preponderance of the evidence, that this enhancement applied in Leib’s case. The Court therefore affirmed Leib’s sentence. View "United States v. Leib" on Justia Law

Defendant-Appellant Germaine Coulter, Sr. appealed his convictions for child sex trafficking and conspiracy to commit child sex trafficking. For many years, Coulter was a pimp in the Oklahoma City area. Upon release from a five-year state prison term in 2017, he conscripted an underage girl, “Doe 2,” to recruit a schoolmate, “Doe 1,” to perform sex work for him. After Doe 1 expressed interest, Elizabeth Andrade, one of Coulter’s longtime sex workers, took pictures of Doe 1 in various stages of undress and sent them to Coulter. He forwarded the photos to potential clients with messages suggesting that Doe 1 would perform sex acts for money. Andrade also sent the photos to potential clients and used one of the photos to advertise Doe 1’s services online. A grand jury indicted Coulter and later issued a superseding indictment charging him with (1) conspiring with Andrade to commit child sex trafficking, (2) child sex trafficking with respect to Doe 1, and (3) child sex trafficking with respect to "Doe 3." The grand jury also indicted Andrade for conspiracy to commit child sex trafficking. She pled guilty. Relevant to this appeal, the jury deliberated for about six hours before reporting it had reached a verdict. It filled out verdict forms finding Coulter guilty on Counts 1 and 2 related to Doe 1, but said it was deadlocked on Count 3 related to Doe 3. When the district court polled the jury, one juror said the verdict did not reflect her opinion and expressed that she did not want to return to the deliberations. The he district court recessed for the weekend. On Monday morning, Coulter moved for a mistrial based on these events with the jury. The district court denied the motion. The jury did continue deliberations, but reached the same result. Coulter thereafter moved for a new trial, arguing (1) the evidence against him was insufficient to support the jury verdict and (2) the district court erred in admitting certain testimony. The motion was denied and Coulter was sentenced to 360 months in prison. The Tenth Circuit found the trial court handled its post-trial jury interactions without abusing its discretion. Further, the Court found any admission of testimony was harmless. Accordingly, Coulter's convictions and sentence were affirmed. View "United States v. Coulter" on Justia Law

Timothy Sumpter was convicted of aggravated kidnapping, attempted rape, and aggravated sexual battery, arising from his 2011 sexual assault of J.B. in Wichita, Kansas. The controlling sentence was for aggravated kidnapping, a conviction which added over 15 years to Sumpter’s sentence. Sumpter petitioned for a Writ of Habeas Corpus, claiming that his convictions were obtained in violation of his constitutional rights. The district court granted in part Sumpter’s petition for relief, vacating the aggravated kidnapping conviction but denied his remaining claims. Furthermore, the district court denied Sumpter’s request for a certificate of appealability (“COA”) with respect to his unsuccessful claims. The State of Kansas appealed the partial grant of habeas relief; Sumpter sought to appeal the partial denial. After review, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the district court’s grant of habeas relief, concluding—under the deference prescribed in the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”)—that the Kansas Court of Appeals (“KCOA”) was reasonable in determining that any ineffective assistance of counsel was not prejudicial because the evidence was sufficient to support the aggravated kidnapping conviction. Even if the decision was not entitled to deference, the Court concluded under de novo review, the KCOA's decision should have been upheld. The matter was remanded for entry of judgment in Kansas' favor; the Court denied Sumpter's request for a COA and dismissed his cross-appeal for lack of jurisdiction. View "Sumpter v. Kansas" on Justia Law

Defendant-appellant Roger Harbin pled guilty to various drug and firearm offenses and was sentenced to a total of 280 months of imprisonment. On appeal, Harbin challenged his sentence, contending the district court plainly erred by enhancing his sentence under U.S.S.G. § 4B1.1. The Tenth Circuit determined Harbin did not meet his burden of demonstrating that any error in applying the § 4B1.1 enhancement was clear or obvious. Accordingly, the district court's sentencing decision was affirmed. View "United States v. Harbin" on Justia Law

In 2018, Joseph “Tiger King” Maldonado-Passage was indicted and later convicted by jury on several counts, including two murder-for-hire schemes. He was sentenced to a 264-month term of imprisonment. He appealed to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, claiming, inter alia, his murder-for-hire counts should have been grouped for purposes of calculating his total offense level. The Court affirmed Maldonado-Passage’s murder-for-hire convictions, but held his 18 U.S.C. § 1958(a) offenses shared a “common criminal objective” and should have been grouped under § 3D1.2(b) of the United States Sentencing Guidelines. On remand, Maldonado-Passage moved for reconsideration of the denial of a pretrial motion to dismiss one of the two § 1958(a) counts as multiplicitous. He proposed his counts be merged and subject to a single penalty. In its denial of the motion, the district court concluded Maldonado-Passage failed to demonstrate adequate grounds for reconsideration. Furthermore, during resentencing, the district court announced it would not exercise its discretion to expand the scope of sentencing beyond the grouping error identified by the Tenth Circuit prior to the remand, Maldonado-Passage I. The district court revised Maldonado-Passages’ total offense level and advisory Guidelines sentencing range and accordingly imposed a reduced sentence of 252 months’ imprisonment. This sentence included two consecutively run 102-month terms for each murder-for-hire conviction. Maldonado-Passage appealed here claiming the text of § 1958(a) prohibited his conduct from being parsed into two offenses with consecutively run sentences. To this, the Tenth Circuit disagreed: the district court did not abuse its discretion by limiting its sentencing scope and refusing to reconsider Maldonado-Passage’s previously denied motion to dismiss for multiplicity. Therefore, no vehicle to challenge the § 1958(a) components of his sentence as multiplicitous remains. Nonetheless, the Tenth Circuit confirmed § 1958(a)’s “plot centric” unit of prosecution permits separate offenses and consecutive sentences when, as here, two unrelated hitmen are hired to kill the same person. View "United States v. Maldonado-Passage" on Justia Law