United States v. Jamie Goad

788 F.3d 873, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 9732, 2015 WL 3622269
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
DecidedJune 11, 2015
Docket14-3070
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 788 F.3d 873 (United States v. Jamie Goad) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Jamie Goad, 788 F.3d 873, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 9732, 2015 WL 3622269 (8th Cir. 2015).

Opinion

RILEY, Chief Judge.

The second time the district court 1 revoked Jamie Goad’s supervised release, it sentenced him to five months in prison and ordered him to reside in a residential reentry center for 120 days after his release from prison. Within two months of his residency at the Gerald R. Hinzman Residential Reentry Center (Hinzman Center), Goad absconded. Goad was soon arrested and indicted for escaping from custody in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 751(a). Goad moved to dismiss the indictment under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 12(b)(3)(B), contending § 751(a) does not criminalize his abscondence because he was not in “custody” while residing at the Hinzman Center. . The district court denied his motion. Goad conditionally pled guilty, reserving the right to appeal the denial of his motion to dismiss the indictment. Only that issue is before us.

Goad’s appeal raises a straightforward question of statutory interpretation: whether “residency in a residential reentry center as a condition of supervised release constitutes ‘custody’ under § 751(a).” We review this challenge to, the *875 indictment de novo. See United States v. Sewell, 513 F.3d 820, 821 (8th Cir.2008) (explaining the sufficiency of an indictment is reviewed de novo); see also United States v. Smith, 756 F.3d 1070, 1073 (8th Cir.2014) (stating questions of statutory interpretation are reviewed de novo). We begin our interpretation, as always, with the statute’s text, “ ‘giv[ing] words their ordinary, contemporary, common meaning’ ” wherever a- statutory definition is absent. Smith, 756 F.3d at 1073 (alteration in original) (quoting Hennepin Cnty. v. Fed. Nat’l Mortg. Ass’n, 742 F.3d 818, 821 (8th Cir.2014)). If the text’s “meaning is unambiguous when ‘read in its proper context,’ ” as it is here, we look no further. Id. (quoting McCarthy v. Bronson, 500 U.S. 136, 139, 111 S.Ct. 1737, 114 L.Ed.2d 194 (1991)).

Section 751(a) condemns those who

eseape[] or attempt[] to escape from the custody of the Attorney General or his authorized representative, or from any institution or facility in which he is confined by direction of the Attorney General, or from any custody under or by virtue of any process issued under the laws of the United States by any court, judge, or magistrate judge, or from the custody of an officer or employee of the United States pursuant to lawful arrest, ... if the custody or confinement is by virtue of an arrest on a charge of felony, or conviction of any offense.

“[A] person may be in custody for purposes of § 751(a) even though the physical restraints upon him are minimal and even though the custody be deemed constructive, rather than actual.” United States v. Cluck, 542 F.2d 728, 736 (8th Cir.1976). And “it is not necessary ... that the escape be from a conventional penal housing unit such as a cell or cell block.” Id. at 731. “Specifically, the escape may be from a hospital,” id., or a pre-release “halfway house,” McCullough v. United States, 369 F.2d 548, 549-50 (8th Cir.1966), “in which the escapee was properly confined,” Cluck, 542 F.2d at 731. See also United States v. Sack, 379 F.3d 1177, 1179-80 (10th Cir.2004) (holding pretrial detainee’s court-ordered residency at a halfway house was “custody” under § 751(a)); United States v. Rudinsky, 439 F.2d 1074, 1076-77 (6th Cir.1971) (“[I]t is apparent that the Treatment Center’s restrictions [on a pre-re-lease detainee] deprived [the detainee] of his freedom of movement and association. He was therefore in custody within the purview of 18 U.S.C. § 751.” (citing McCullough, 369 F.2d 548)).

Goad contends his case is different because “the conditions [of residency at the Hinzman Center were] far less restrictive than prison or jail ... and [he was] subject only to the non-penological supervision of the United States Probation Office.” Distinguishing his case from the pretrial and pre-release detention cases Cluck and Sack, Goad stresses the “non-penological, transitional purposes of supervised release,” apparently believing his confinement was “ ‘much more analogous to probation than ... to imprisonment.’ ” (Quoting United States v. Burke, 694 F.3d 1062, 1064 (9th Cir.2012)). Goad relies on the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Burke to propose, “[A]n individual is not in ‘custody’ when he (1) has completed a term of imprisonment and no longer is in the custody of the Attorney General and/or the [Bureau of Prisons], and instead is subject only to the supervision of the United States Probation Office, and (2) is subject to conditions of supervised release that are less restrictive than those in a prison or jail setting.” (Emphasis added).

We are unmoved by Goad’s attempt to contrast the conditions of his residency with those of a prison or jail. His conditions were no less custodial than those in *876 Cluck and McCullough. It is enough that (1) Goad was court-ordered to reside for 120 days at the Hinzman Center and obey its rules; (2) the Hinzman Center prohibited departures without authorization; and (3) Goad left early without obtaining authorization and failed to return. 2 See, e.g., McCullough, 369 F.2d at 550 (finding a § 751(a) violation where, “[i]n clear violation of the expressed rules of the Center[, defendants] failed to return at the proper time and fled from ... custody”); cf. Cluck, 542 F.2d at 733, 736 (finding defendant was in “custody” at a hospital, but noting his minimal restraints and “observing] that in the course of his testimony the defendant did not indicate that he ever thought that he was free to leave the institution”).

Given this starting point, we see no reason to employ a different standard of custody based solely on subtle differences in the identity of the custodian. The statute broadly covers

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Bluebook (online)
788 F.3d 873, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 9732, 2015 WL 3622269, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-jamie-goad-ca8-2015.