United States v. Salahmand

651 F.3d 21, 397 U.S. App. D.C. 139, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 14999, 2011 WL 2937102
CourtCourt of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
DecidedJuly 22, 2011
Docket09-3136
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 651 F.3d 21 (United States v. Salahmand) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the D.C. 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. Salahmand, 651 F.3d 21, 397 U.S. App. D.C. 139, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 14999, 2011 WL 2937102 (D.C. Cir. 2011).

Opinion

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge GARLAND.

GARLAND, Circuit Judge:

Mansour Salahmand treated hundreds of patients while falsely representing that he was a licensed physician. As part of a *22 plea agreement, Salahmand pled guilty to one count of identity theft, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1028(a)(7). In determining Salahmand’s sentence, the district court increased his United States Sentencing Guidelines offense level, pursuant to Guideline § 3Al.l(b)(l), because some of his patients were children with serious mental health conditions.

Salahmand disputes the increase in his offense level, contending that § 3Al.l(b)(l)’s 2-level adjustment for vulnerable victims applies only to victims of the defendant’s offense of conviction, who in this case would include only those victims who suffered financial loss. We disagree: the adjustment applies not only to victims of the offense of conviction, but also to victims of the defendant’s relevant conduct. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the district court.

I

On June 27, 2008, a grand jury charged Salahmand with: (a) four counts of identity theft, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1028(a)(7); (b) three counts of using another person’s DEA number to dispense a controlled substance, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 843(a)(2); and (c) four counts of forgery of medical prescriptions, in violation of 22 D.C. CODE §§ 3241(b), 3242(c). On August 14, 2009, Salahmand pled guilty to Count Three of the indictment, which charged him with identity theft based on his 2006 use of the name and DEA number of a licensed physician to distribute Schedule II controlled substances. 1 Count Three also incorporated language from Count One, which stated that Salahmand had been denied a medical license and DEA registration number and had provided false documents to the medical climes that hired him. Pursuant to the plea agreement, the remaining counts were dismissed. As part of the agreement, Salahmand stipulated to the following “Statement of the Offense”: *23 Statement of the Offense at 1-2 (Appellant’s App. 43-44).

*22 The defendant, Mansour Salahmand, was not a licensed medical doctor. He did not hold a “DEA registration number,” nor did he have a District of Columbia controlled substance license. Despite his lack of licensing and credentials, ... Salahmand worked at ... eight clinics in the District of Columbia and Maryland, purporting to treat patients (primarily children) as a psychiatrist. As a result, the defendant caused these eight clinics to fraudulently charge Medicaid, District of Columbia or other state health care programs, or private insurance companies for services which purportedly were done by a licensed medical doctor but were in fact performed by him. During the course of his scheme, ... Salahmand wrote prescriptions for controlled substances for patients in the District of Columbia or Maryland; at least 164 of these prescriptions were filled at area pharmacies for controlled substances. On these 164 prescriptions, the defendant ... forged the signatures [of] one of four doctors, Dr. D.H., Dr. M.P, Dr. T.M. or Dr. H.K. In addition, ... Salahmand used the DEA registration numbers of Doctors D.H., M.P., T.M., and H.K. ... With respect to the Identity Theft count, from in or about September 2006 to October 2006, the defendant used the name and DEA number of Dr. T.M., without the doctor’s permission, in order to distribute Schedule II controlled substances.

*23 The United States Sentencing Guideline applicable to Salahmand’s offense of identity theft is § 2B1.1. See United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual (USSG) App. A at 550 (Nov.2010); see also USSG § 1B1.2. The revised Presentence Investigative Report (PSR) prepared by the U.S. Probation Office assigned Salahmand a base offense level of 6, pursuant to § 2B1.1(a)(2); a 6-level increase because the loss amount was between $30,000 and $70,000, pursuant to § 2Bl.l(b)(l)(D); and a 4-level increase because the offense involved 50 or more (but fewer than 250) victims, pursuant to § 2Bl.l(b)(2)(B). The PSR also added a 2-level adjustment because the defendant knew or should have known that a victim of the offense was a “vulnerable victim,” pursuant to USSG § 3Al.l(b)(l). The PSR then decreased Salahmand’s offense level by 2 levels for acceptance of responsibility, see USSG § 3El.l(a), resulting in a total offense level of 16. That offense level, in combination with Salahmand’s criminal history category of II, generated a Guidelines sentencing range of 24 to 30 months’ imprisonment. USSG ch. 5, pt. A, Sentencing Table; see PSR ¶¶ 14-18, 23-24, 40, 76.

In support of the 4-level increase for “50 or more victims,” the government presented evidence that more than 50 victims suffered financial loss, including “[m]ore than 68 patients” at a single clinic who “paid money themselves, either wholly or in co-payments,” for services “they believed to have been provided by a licensed medical doctor.” Gov’t Mem. in Aid of Sentencing at 7 (Record Material (R.M.) at 7). In support of the 2-level adjustment for “vulnerable victims,” the government presented evidence of additional patients treated by Salahmand at the seven other clinics who “were exclusively or mostly children whose treatment was paid by Medicaid or other need-based public health care systems.” Id. at 7 n. 8 (R.M. 7). These victims, the government argued, were “vulnerable due to age and mental condition brought on by abuse, neglect, and crime.” Id. at 8 (R.M. 8).

The government identified five specific vulnerable patients whom Salahmand treated, including: a 12-year-old boy in foster care who was born addicted to cocaine and diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Depressive Disorder; a 12-year-old girl, suffering “from depression and crying spells,” who had been abandoned by her mother and “sexually abused by her drug-addicted father”; a 7-year-old girl with Adjustment Disorder who showed signs of psychiatric disturbance due to abuse by her father; a 15-year-old boy who had been sexually abused by his father’s girlfriend; and a 10-year-old girl, diagnosed with Adjustment Disorder with Mixed Anxiety and Depressed Mood, who had witnessed the homicide of her cousin and shooting of her father, and who had been assaulted by her brother. Id. at 8-9 (R.M. 8-9). The government proffered that these five patients were only “examples” of “the other 200 similarly situated [patient] victims” treated by Salahmand who “lacked the maturity (many of the patients were children), the ability (due to depression or mental illness), or the resources (lack of education, [or] employment) to have the fortitude to stand up to a [purported] ‘medical doctor’ to challenge his diagnoses and prescriptions.” Id. at 8,10 (R.M. 8,10).

Salahmand did not dispute any of these facts. See

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Bluebook (online)
651 F.3d 21, 397 U.S. App. D.C. 139, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 14999, 2011 WL 2937102, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-salahmand-cadc-2011.