United States v. Adebola Adefunke Adebimpe

649 F. App'x 449
Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit·Decided April 28, 2016·No. 14-10303, 14-10324, 14-10325·Unpublished·Cited by 3 cases

Opinion

MEMORANDUM *

Adebola Adebimpe, Patrick Sogbein, and Eduardo Abad appeal their convictions and sentences for health care fraud, conspiracy to commit health care fraud, and conspiracy to pay and receive kickbacks from a federal health program. We affirm the convictions and sentences.

1. The district court’s jury instructions on “Statements by Defendants” and “Health Care Fraud” did not “naturally and necessarily” call attention to Sog-bein’s decision not to testify at trial. United States v. Tam, 240 F.3d 797, 805 (9th Cir.2001) (citation omitted). These instructions only referred to out-of-court statements made by Sogbein; they did not refer to his decision not to testify. Moreover, the district court specifically instructed the jury not to consider Sogbein’s failure to testify. See United States v. Padilla, 639 F.3d 892, 897 (9th Cir.2011) (stating that instruction that jury was prohibited from considering defendant’s failure to testify was “sufficient to put the jury on notice of its obligation to draw no adverse inference”).

*452 2. The district court did not abuse its discretion in applying a four-level sentencing enhancement for Sogbeiris leadership role in the conspiracy. The Guidelines permit such an enhancement if the conspiracy involved five or more people and the defendant exercised authority over other participants in the conspiracy. U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual § 3Bl.l(a) (U.S. Sentencing Comm’n 2014); United States v. Rivera, 527 F.3d 891, 908 (9th Cir.2008). Sogbein does not dispute that there were five or more people in the conspiracy. There was sufficient evidence for the district court’s determination that Sogbein exercised authority over his co-conspirators. Sogbein directed Dr. Ca-laustro, the recruiters Abad and Mele Saavedra, and Valerie Fernandez, an office worker, on how to carry out their roles in the conspiracy; he also owned or operated the medical supply companies. See Rivera, 527 F.3d at 909-10 (holding that a leadership enhancement properly applied to defendant who “exercised decision making authority in the procurement and distribution of narcotics” and “directed” others in the conspiracy).

3. The district court did not err in determining the amount of the defendants’ intended loss. “The court need only make a reasonable estimate of the loss.” U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual § 2B1.1 cmt. n. 3(C). The total amount of claims submitted to Medicare is prima facie evidence of the intended loss amount. United States v. Popov, 742 F.3d 911, 916 (9th Cir.2014). A defendant’s intended loss amount is a factual determination reviewed for clear error. Id. at 914. Although Sogbein and Adebimpe presented some evidence at trial that Medicare commonly pays between 50-80% of the total amount of submitted claims, other evidence showed that the defendants were able to recover much of the remaining amount from Medi-Cal and private insurers. The district court’s finding that Sogbein and Adebimpe intended to cause losses in the full amount that they billed Medicare was not clearly erroneous. See United States v. Santos, 527 F.3d 1003, 1009 (9th Cir.2008) (holding that district court did not clearly err in rejecting defendants’ testimony and finding defendants intended to take the full value of the counterfeit checks they produced).

In calculating the amount of the intended loss, the district court was not required to discount the value of any wheelchairs that happened to be medically necessary, because the medical examinations mandated to determine medical necessity were not performed.

Adebimpe also argues that her intended loss amount should not include losses caused by Sogbein. However, in a conspiracy, an individual defendant’s intended loss is the amount of loss caused by the conspiracy that was reasonably foreseeable to the defendant. United States v. Treadwell, 593 F.3d 990, 1003 (9th Cir.2010). Whether losses were reasonably foreseeable to a defendant is a factual determination reviewed for clear error. Popov, 742 F.3d at 917. The district court did not clearly err in determining that all losses intended by Sogbein were foreseeable to Adebimpe once she joined the conspiracy. Adebimpe and Sogbein were married for 20 years, they relied on the same doctor to write the fraudulent prescriptions, and Sogbein sent many patient referrals to Adebimpe’s company and was significantly involved in its operations.

4. For a fraud offense, the district court is required to order restitution in the amount of the victim’s actual loss. 18 U.S.C. §§ 3663A(c)(1)(A)(ii), 3664(f)(1)(A). In a conspiracy, restitution may be ordered against each defendant to the extent the victim’s losses were reasonably fore *453 seeable to that defendant. United States v. Riley, 335 F.3d 919, 932 (9th Cir.2003). Here, as with the intended loss amount discussed above, the Medicare losses caused by Sogbein were reasonably foreseeable to Adebimpe, because the two were married for 20 years, they both relied on Dr. Calaustro to write the fraudulent prescriptions, Sogbein sent many patients to Dignity, and he was significantly involved in Dignity’s operations. The district court did not abuse its discretion by ordering restitution in the amount that Medicare actually paid that was reasonably foreseeable to each defendant. See id.

5. It is improper to consider a defendant’s nationality as a sentencing factor. U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual § 5H1.10; United States v. Borrero-Isaza, 887 F.2d 1349, 1352 (9th Cir.1989). Here, the district court did not improperly consider Sogbein’s status as an immigrant, but instead, while crediting Sogbein for overcoming initial hurdles when he moved to the United States, found that Sogbein had committed significant fraudulent activity that warranted a high sentence.

6. The district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding Adebimpe’s medical records under Federal Rule of Evidence 403. See United States v. Gonzalez-Flores, 418 F.3d 1093, 1098 (9th Cir.2005). Rule 403 allows the court to exclude evidence if “its probative value is substantially outweighed by” a risk of unfair prejudice. The probative value of the records was minimal, and Adebimpe was able to present her defense — that she was too distracted to participate in the conspiracy — through other means.

Nor did exclusion of the records violate Adebimpe’s constitutional right to present a complete defense.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

United States v. Adebola Adefunke Adebimpe, 649 F. App'x 449 (9th Cir. 2016).

649 F. App'x 449 (United States v. Adebola Adefunke Adebimpe) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

People v. Mixon CA2/4
California Court of Appeal, 2020
United States v. Sylvia Walter-Eze
869 F.3d 891 (Ninth Circuit, 2017)