United States v. Brenda Laws

819 F.3d 388, 2016 WL 1013084
Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit·Decided March 15, 2016·No. 14-3636, 14-3639, 14-3640, 14-3642·Published·Cited by 7 cases

Opinion

KELLY, Circuit Judge.

Brenda Laws, Lareka Laws, Milton Laws, and Jameel Laws were charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States by falsely claiming tax refunds in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 286, and making false claims to the IRS in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 287. These charges arose from a scheme in which the defendants filed more than 200 tax returns claiming first-time homebuyer tax credits to which the named taxpayer was not entitled. The tax refunds, including the falsely-claimed credit, were then deposited into one of 17 bank accounts owned or controlled by a member of the Laws family. The total amount of the refunds fraudulently' claimed was $1,730,086, and the total amount of the refunds issued was $1,364,171.

Following a jury trial, the four defendants were found guilty on all counts. 1 On November 6, 2014, the district court entered judgment and sentenced the defendants to terms of imprisonment ranging between 30 and 64 months. On appeal, Brenda Laws challenges the district court’s calculation of the applicable Guidelines sentencing range; Milton Laws challenges the court’s denial of his motion to suppress; Lareka Laws challenges the denial of her motion for acquittal; and Jam-eel Laws challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction. We address each argument in turn.

I. Brenda Laws

In sentencing Brenda Laws, the district court overruled her objection to three sentencing enhancements, which collectively raised her total offense level from 22 to 32. Based on the total offense level of 32, the court sentenced Laws to 64 months on the conspiracy count and 30 months on the false claims count, to run concurrently. Laws appeals the application of the three enhancements, arguing that they were erroneously applied given the facts and circumstances of her offense. We review the district court’s interpretation and application of the Sentencing *393 Guidelines de novo, and review findings of fact for clear error. United States v. Ault, 598 F.3d 1039, 1040 (8th Cir.2010).

The first sentencing enhancement Laws challenges is the 2-level sophisticated means enhancement under USSG § 2Bl.l(b)(10)(C). That enhancement applies when the offense involved “especially complex or especially intricate ... conduct.” USSG § 2Bl.l(b)(10)(C), Application Note 9(B) (2013). The relative sophistication of a scheme of fraudulent conduct is “viewed in light of the fraudulent conduct and differentiated, by assessing the intricacy or planning of the conduct, from similar offenses conducted by different defendants.” United States v. Hance, 501 F.3d 900, 909 (8th Cir.2007). Thus, for the enhancement to apply, the government must show that the offense conduct at issue was notably more complex or intricate than the garden-variety version of that offense. Id. The question is not whether the offense is generally com sidered a sophisticated one — for instance, securities fraud as compared to simple assault. Rather, the question is whether the particular offense conduct was more than usually sophisticated when compared to the offense in its basic form. Id. at 909-11 (holding that renting a post office box under an assumed name and using that box to carry out a fraud scheme was not distinguishable “from the multitude of other mail fraud cases”).

Here, the district court concluded that the “repetitive and coordinated conduct” involved in the offense made its means sophisticated. Even if any single part of the offense was not particularly complicated, “repetitive and coordinated conduct can amount to a sophisticated scheme.” United States v. Sethi 702 F.3d 1076, 1079 (8th Cir.2013) (quoting United States v. Fiorito, 640 F.3d 338, 351 (8th Cir.2011)). Importantly, however, mere repetition is not sufficient to make- an offense sophisticated. Instead, the sophistication of the offense conduct is associated with the means of repetition, the coordination required to carry out the repeated conduct, and the number of repetitions or length of time over which the scheme took place. See, e.g., Fiorito, 640 F.3d at 351 (scheme required coordinating sale or refinancing of multiple homes, took place over the course of three years, and involved at least 11 victims); United States v. Bistrup, 449 F.3d 873, 883 (8th Cir.2006) (scheme required repeatedly lying 'to victims, was maintained by using later-acquired funds to make partial payments to earlier victims, required the use of multiple financial accounts, and took place over almost five years); United States v. Finck, 407 F.3d 908, 915 (8th Cir.2005) (scheme to obtain vehicles required obtaining multiple false confirmations that money had been transferred and coordinating sale of multiple vehicles in different states).

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

United States v. Brenda Laws, 819 F.3d 388, 2016 WL 1013084 (8th Cir. 2016).

819 F.3d 388 (United States v. Brenda Laws) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

United States v. Tyler Denby
Eighth Circuit, 2026
United States v. Justin Treanton
57 F.4th 638 (Eighth Circuit, 2023)
State v. Lovell
Superior Court of Delaware, 2022
United States v. Adan Flores-Lagonas
993 F.3d 550 (Eighth Circuit, 2021)
United States v. Kehinda Mitchell
914 F.3d 581 (Eighth Circuit, 2019)
United States v. Sienemah Gaye
902 F.3d 780 (Eighth Circuit, 2018)
United States v. Sean Meadows
866 F.3d 913 (Eighth Circuit, 2017)