United States v. Tso

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
• Decided: September 30, 2025
• Docket: 24-2081
• Status: Published

Opinion

Appellate Case: 24-2081 Document: 47-1 Date Filed: 09/30/2025 Page: 1 FILED United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit PUBLISH September 30, 2025 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS Christopher M. Wolpert FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT Clerk of Court _________________________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v. No. 24-2081

TOM TSO,

Defendant - Appellant. _________________________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of New Mexico (D.C. No. 1:22-CR-01858-KWR-1) _________________________________

Amanda Skinner, Assistant Federal Public Defender (Margaret A. Katze, Federal Public Defender, with her on the briefs), Las Cruces, New Mexico, for Defendant-Appellant.

Margaret P. Tomlinson, Assistant United States Attorney (Alexander M.M. Uballez, United States Attorney, and Alexander F. Flores, on the brief), Albuquerque, New Mexico, for Plaintiff-Appellee. _________________________________

Before TYMKOVICH, CARSON, and FEDERICO, Circuit Judges. _________________________________

FEDERICO, Circuit Judge. _________________________________

This appeal concerns whether a defendant can be charged and

convicted of a crime that was alleged to have been committed more than Appellate Case: 24-2081 Document: 47-1 Date Filed: 09/30/2025 Page: 2

twenty years in the past. In January 2024, Tom Tso entered a guilty plea to

abusive sexual contact of a minor in Indian Country – conduct that ended

in the year 2000, per the charge. Prior to entering a guilty plea, Tso moved

to dismiss the superseding indictment, arguing the prosecution violated the

statute of limitations. The district court denied the motion, finding that the

superseding indictment was not barred by the statute of limitations, which

led to Tso’s conditional guilty plea and conviction.

In this appeal, we must review and consider the applicability of the

extended statute of limitations for sexual offenses against a child under the

age of 18 years contained in 18 U.S.C. § 3283. We agree with the district

court that the statute of limitations had not expired and that the case

brought against Tso was not time-barred. Thus, exercising jurisdiction

under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm.

I

In 2021, Jane Doe reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigation

that when she was under eighteen years of age, Tso sexually abused her

while she was asleep on the couch in his living room. The sexual abuse

occurred between August 1998 and October 2000 in the Navajo Nation and

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within the District of New Mexico. 1 Doe noted that she had previously

reported the sexual abuse to a therapist at a rape crisis center, and no

action was taken. She reported that she was approximately 15 or 16 when

the sexual abuse occurred.

In May 2023, Tso was charged in a superseding indictment with

sexual abuse in Indian Country, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1153,

2242(2)(B), and 2246(2)(C). 2 Tso filed several pretrial motions attacking the

legality of the prosecution against him. Relevant to this appeal, Tso moved

to dismiss the superseding indictment as time-barred by the statute of

limitations and thereby challenged the applicability of the extended statute

of limitations for sexual offenses against a child under the age of 18 years.

Under 18 U.S.C. § 3283, “[n]o statute of limitations that would

otherwise preclude prosecution for an offense involving the sexual or

1 Tso does not challenge on appeal that he is an enrolled member of

the Navajo Nation or that the sexual abuse occurred in Indian Country within the District of New Mexico. See 18 U.S.C. § 1152; United States v. Simpkins, 90 F.4th 1312, 1314 (10th Cir. 2024) (“[18 U.S.C. § 1152] extends the general laws of the United States to Indian [C]ountry, yet it applies only if either the victim or the defendant—but not both—is an Indian.”).

2 Tso was initially indicted by a grand jury on November 9, 2022. On

April 7, 2023, he filed a motion to dismiss the indictment. Before the district court ruled on the motion, the Government filed a superseding indictment on May 9, 2023, adding the phrase “a child under the age of 18 years[.]” R. I at 19.

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physical abuse, or kidnaping, of a child under the age of 18 years shall

preclude such prosecution during the life of the child, or for ten years after

the offense, whichever is longer.” Tso argued that the district court should

apply the categorical approach 3 to find that his offense of conviction did not

“necessarily entail” the abuse of a minor. Op. Br. at 6. And so, he argued,

the five-year statute of limitations for noncapital offenses, under 18 U.S.C.

§ 3282, applied and that the applicable statute of limitations had expired

before the Government indicted him. In June 2023, the district court found

that the categorical approach was not applicable to its analysis, denied the

motion, and thus permitted the prosecution to move forward because the

charge was not time-barred.

3 As will be discussed, the categorical approach is an elements-based

analysis that has thus far been “confined to the post-conviction contexts of criminal sentencing and immigration deportation cases.” Weingarten v. United States, 865 F.3d 48, 59 (2d Cir. 2017); see also United States v. Titties, 852 F.3d 1257, 1265 (10th Cir. 2017). Under the categorical approach, a court looks “only to the fact of conviction and the statutory definition of the prior offense, . . . without inquiring into the specific conduct of this particular offender.” United States v. Serafin, 562 F.3d 1105, 1107– 08 (10th Cir. 2009) (internal quotation marks omitted).

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In January 2024, Tso entered a conditional guilty plea 4 to a one-count

information charging him with a lesser offense – abusive sexual contact in

Indian Country, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1153, 2244(a)(2), 5 and 2246(3)

– and thereafter was sentenced to three years of imprisonment. On appeal,

Tso solely contests the district court’s denial of his motion to dismiss the

superseding indictment, 6 wherein he argued that § 3283’s extended statute

of limitations does not apply to his case so he could not be prosecuted for

the offense charged.

4 Under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(a)(2), “a defendant may enter a conditional plea of guilty or nolo contendere, reserving in writing the right to have an appellate court review an adverse determination of a specified pretrial motion. A defendant who prevails on appeal may then withdraw the plea.”

5 The parties both note that the information improperly referenced 18 U.S.C. § 2244(a)(5) rather than § 2244(a)(2). The plea agreement and judgment, however, properly reference § 2244(a)(2) as the relevant statute of conviction. Tso does not raise any arguments on appeal pertaining to this typographical error, and we do not find that this raises any issues that must be addressed in this appeal.

6 In the plea agreement, Tso reserved his right to appeal matters addressed in the district court’s June 2023 order on any grounds that he had previously argued. We note, however, that Tso is challenging the denial of a motion to dismiss the superseding indictment when he instead pleaded guilty to a single count charged by information. Because we affirm the district court’s denial of the motion, we do not need to analyze this potential issue further.

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II

Tso raises one multi-faceted issue on appeal: “should [we] vacate Tso’s

guilty plea and conviction because the applicable statute of limitations

expired before the Government indicted him?” Op. Br. at 5. To answer that

question, we must necessarily examine whether the categorical approach or

a case-specific analysis applies when determining whether the § 3283’s

statute of limitations applies to a charge under §§ 2242 and 2244.

We review de novo a challenge to the statute of limitations and the

district court’s “interpretation and application” of the statute of limitations.

United States v. Piette, 45 F.4th 1142, 1159 (10th Cir. 2022); see also

generally United States v. Berres, 777 F.3d 1083, 1089 (10th Cir. 2015) (this

court reviews statutory interpretation issues de novo). In applying the de

novo standard of review, we acknowledge that the question before us has

not yet been answered in a published opinion in this circuit.

Two points explain and narrow the scope of this appeal. First, the

parties agree that the general statute of limitations for noncapital offenses

is five years. 18 U.S.C. § 3282(a). That is, if the § 3283 extended statute of

limitations does not apply, then the charges against Tso would be time-

barred because he wasn’t charged within the five-year time frame of the

§ 3282 general statute of limitations.

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Second, Tso does not challenge the retroactive application of § 3283’s

extended statute of limitations. See Piette, 45 F.4th at 1162 (holding that as

a matter of first impression, § 3283’s statute of limitations did not have an

impermissible retroactive effect because the relevant charging period had

not yet expired). So, if we were to find that the § 3283 extended statute of

limitations applies, then Tso does not argue that there was an improper

retroactive effect against him.

For reasons explained below, we hold that the § 3283 extended statute

of limitations applies in this case. But first, because it is central to Tso’s

argument, we begin with a brief discussion of the categorical approach. We

then explain why and how we reach our conclusion about the applicability

of § 3283.

A

Federal courts have used the categorical approach in criminal and

immigration cases to have a standardized method of classifying prior

convictions for sentencing enhancements or deportation purposes. See

Moncrieffe v. Holder, 569 U.S. 184, 191 (2013); Mathis v. United States,

579 U.S. 500, 504 (2016); United States v. Harris, 844 F.3d 1260, 1268 n.9

(10th Cir. 2017).

In Taylor v. United States, the Supreme Court established the “formal

categorical approach” to resolve the conflict among the appellate courts

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regarding the definition of a violent felony – in this case, burglary – as it

applied to the sentencing enhancement under the Armed Career Criminal

Act (ACCA), 18 U.S.C. § 924(e). 495 U.S. 575, 579–80 (1990). The core of the

conflict was that there was no single, accepted definition of the word

“burglary” by state courts, and it was not apparent if Congress intended the

definition to be restricted to the state’s definition or “some uniform

definition” (whether that be a common-law definition, or a broader generic

definition derived from the Model Penal Code) that would be applicable to

all cases. Id. at 580.

After reviewing the text and history of § 924(e), the Court determined

that the crime of burglary “must have some uniform definition independent

of the labels employed by the various States’ criminal codes.” Id. at 592.

The Court concluded Congress “meant by ‘burglary’ the generic sense in

which the term is now used in the criminal codes of most States.” Id. at 598.

There remained the question whether, when state law defined burglary

more broadly than the generic definition, a court could look to the particular

facts of a defendant’s conviction to see whether he or she had, in fact, been

convicted of generic burglary. In creating the categorical approach, the

Court resolved this question by instructing sentencing courts to look “only

to the statutory definitions of the prior offenses, and not to the particular

facts underlying those convictions.” Id. at 600. Following Taylor, the

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Supreme Court explained again that courts must consider “statutory

elements, charging documents, and jury instructions to determine whether

an earlier conviction after trial was for generic burglary.” Shepard v. United

States, 544 U.S. 13, 16 (2005); see also United States v. Titties, 852 F.3d

1257, 1265 (10th Cir. 2017).

In Shepard, the Court further held that the district court could not

look at “police reports or complaint applications to determine whether an

earlier guilty plea necessarily admitted, and supported a conviction for,

generic burglary.” Shepard, 544 U.S. at 16. Indeed, the Court narrowed the

scope of examination to “the statutory definition, charging document,

written plea agreement, transcript of plea colloquy, and any explicit factual

finding by the trial judge to which the defendant assented.” Id. At bottom,

“if the statute sweeps more broadly than the generic crime, a conviction

under that law cannot count as an ACCA predicate, even if the defendant

actually committed the offense in its generic form. The key, [the Court]

emphasized, is elements, not facts.” Descamps v. United States, 570 U.S.

254, 261 (2013).

The Supreme Court later promulgated the modified categorical

approach for “divisible statutes” where the statute “sets out one or more

elements of the offense in the alternative.” Id. at 257. When the modified

categorical approach is used, it establishes the relevant elements for the

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comparison under the categorical approach and “allows a court to peer

around the statute of conviction and examine certain record documents

underlying the defendant’s prior offense, but this is done only for a limited

purpose,” such as to determine which elements of a divisible statute were

used to convict the defendant. Titties, 852 F.3d at 1266.

As previously noted, the categorical approach has been applied almost

exclusively to evaluate past criminal convictions and their implication for

sentencing enhancement or deportation. See Moncrieffe, 569 U.S. at 191

(noting that the “categorical approach has a long pedigree in our Nation’s

immigration law” and its use in post-conviction deportation analysis);

United States v. Davis, 588 U.S. 445, 461, 470 (2019) (using the categorical

approach to determine if a prior conviction qualified as a “crime of violence”

under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) and holding that the residual clause definition of

violent felony was unconstitutionally vague). With this brief history in

mind, we now turn to whether the § 3283 extended statute of limitations

applies to Tso’s case.

B

The district court examined § 3283’s text, context, and legislative

history to determine that the categorical approach should not be used and,

under the facts of the case charged against Tso, the § 3283 extended statute

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of limitations applied. We analyze these same factors de novo. Davis,

588 U.S. at 455.

We first examine the language of § 3283 to determine whether a case-

specific or categorical approach is used to determine whether the case

involves the sexual abuse of a child. The statute states: “[n]o statute of

limitations that would otherwise preclude prosecution for an offense

involving the sexual or physical abuse, or kidnaping, of a child under the

age of 18 years shall preclude such prosecution during the life of the child,

or for ten years after the offense, whichever is longer.” 18 U.S.C. § 3283

(emphasis added).

Tso argues that the statute’s use of the term “involve” or “involving”

mandates the use of the categorical approach and that “the offense in

question must ‘necessarily entail’ that conduct.” Op. Br. at 12. Ergo, using

the categorical approach, Tso’s charged offense does not involve or

necessarily entail the sexual abuse of a minor – thus, § 3283’s extended

statute of limitations cannot apply to the charge against him. Id. at 14–15.

The language “involving” certainly could be consistent with the use of

the categorical approach. After all, to determine whether the § 3283 statute

of limitations applies, a court must consider whether the charged offense is

one that is “involving the sexual or physical abuse, or kidnaping, of a child.”

On its face, it is a plausible argument that a court would look solely to the

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elements and statutory definitions of the charged offense to reach this

finding, which is consistent with the categorical approach.

That said, the Supreme Court has never announced that a statute

using the word “involving” or “involve” always requires the application of

the categorical approach (and especially not in this context). And this court

has rejected the argument that the word “involving” requires the categorical

approach when determining whether a criminal defendant is “accused of a

sexual assault” to allow for the admission of certain evidence under Federal

Rule of Evidence 413. United States v. Clay, 145 F.4th 1181 (10th Cir. 2025).

Tso relies primarily upon two cases to support his argument:

Kawashima v. Holder, 565 U.S. 478 (2012) and Shular v. United States,

589 U.S. 154 (2020). These cases, however, ultimately fail to convince us

that the phrase “involve” or “involving” mandates the use of a categorical

approach.

In Kawashima, one petitioner had pleaded guilty to willfully making

and subscribing a false tax return in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(1), and

the spouse pleaded guilty to one count of aiding and assisting in the

preparation of a false tax return in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(2). 565 U.S.

at 480. On appeal, the petitioners argued that they could not be deported

for having committed an aggravated felony because (1) their convictions did

not “involv[e] fraud or deceit” as required by the Immigration and

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Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43)(M) and (2) “fraud or deceit” were not

formal elements of their convictions. Id. at 482. The Supreme Court

employed the categorical approach, as it has traditionally done in

deportation cases, to analyze both petitioners’ convictions and determined

that both were felonies that involved “deceit”. Id. at 483–85; see Moncrieffe,

569 U.S. at 191. The Court noted that:

[a]lthough the words “fraud” and “deceit” are absent from the text of § 7206(1) and are not themselves formal elements of the crime, it does not follow that his offense falls outside of Clause (i). The scope of that clause is not limited to offenses that include fraud or deceit as formal elements. Rather, Clause (i) refers more broadly to offenses that “involv[e]” fraud or deceit— meaning offenses with elements that necessarily entail fraudulent or deceitful conduct.

Kawashima, 565 U.S. at 483–84.

The Court held that because Mr. Kawashima knowingly and willfully

submitted a false tax return and Mrs. Kawashima knowingly and willfully

assisted her spouse in the filing of a materially false tax return, their

convictions under § 7206(1) and (2) constituted felonies that necessarily

entailed deceit and were deportable offenses even though “fraud” and

“deceit” were neither listed in the text of the statute nor elements of the

crime. Id. at 484–85. However, Kawashima was a case on familiar ground

for the categorical approach because it involved the determination whether

a criminal conviction had certain immigration consequences. It says

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nothing that would require a court to apply the categorical approach to

decide whether a charged offense (not proven) necessarily entailed sexual

abuse of a minor to trigger § 3283’s expanded statute of limitations.

Similarly, Tso’s reliance upon Shular is unavailing. In Shular, the

Supreme Court examined the methodology courts use to define a “serious

drug offense” as it applies to state offenses and the ACCA, 18 U.S.C.

§ 924(e). 589 U.S. at 156. In Shular, however, neither party contested the

use of the categorical approach as the starting point for the analysis (nor

would they, as the categorical approach was historically employed in ACCA

cases to see if a sentencing enhancement was triggered). Id. at 156–57; see

also Taylor, 495 U.S. at 579–80, 602.

Indeed, Tso concedes that the Supreme Court has only “employed the

categorical approach in cases involving [the] ACCA, the Immigration and

Nationality Act (INA), and the statutory interpretation of 18 U.S.C.

§ 924(c)” and that in each circumstance, the courts were utilizing the

categorical approach to examine prior convictions. Reply. Br. at 4. Again,

we see no mandate that the statutory use of “involve” or “involving”

warrants the categorical approach in every circumstance, let alone to

conduct an analysis of a charged crime at the pre-trial, pre-conviction stage.

Also, as we consider the plain meaning of “involving” in § 3283, we

find the word “offense” immediately precedes the word “involving” in the

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statute. United States v. Ansberry, 976 F.3d 1108, 1126 (10th Cir. 2020)

(“The plainness of statutory language is determined by reference to the

language itself, the specific context in which that language is used, and the

broader context of the statute as a whole.” (internal quotation marks

omitted)). “In ordinary speech,” the word “offense” could refer to a “generic

crime” “or it can refer to ‘the specific acts in which an offender engaged on

a specific occasion.’” Davis, 588 U.S. at 456 (quoting Nijhawan v. Holder,

557 U.S. 29, 33-34 (2009)). Construing “offense” to refer to a generic crime

may favor the categorical approach, while examining the offender’s specific

acts may point to a factual approach.

Given the multiple potential meanings of the word “offense” in this

statutory language and the absence of Supreme Court precedent that

requires that we read this language as Tso suggests we must, we simply

cannot conclude that statute’s use of “offense involving the” language is so

clear that we can resolve this inquiry purely on a textual basis. We then

must look to “the legislative history” and consider the “practical difficulties

and potential unfairness of a factual approach” in applying this statute.

Taylor, 495 U.S. at 601.

There is a clear legislative trend to expand the statute of limitations

to prosecute child sex crimes. Congress “has made several modifications to

th[e] charging period [in § 3282(a)] for sexual offenses against minors” and

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expanded the charging period with each modification, ultimately creating

an unlimited statute of limitations for certain offenses. Piette, 45 F.4th

at 1159. The following chart illustrates this trend:

Act Year Code Charging Period

Until the child Victims of Child 1990 § 3509(k) turned twenty- Abuse Act five.

Violent Crime Until the child Control and Law 1994 § 3283 turned twenty-five Enforcement Act (recodification).

Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end The life of the 2003 § 3283 the Exploitation of child. Children Today (PROTECT) Act Violence Against The life of the Women and child or ten years Department of 2006 § 3283 after the offense Justice (whichever is Reauthorization longer). Act

Adam Walsh Child Protection and 2006 § 3299 Any time. Safety Act

Id.

Congress has clearly intended to sweep up more conduct and to

prosecute more cases with child victims. See United States v. Dodge,

597 F.3d 1347, 1355 (11th Cir. 2010) (noting that the use of expansive

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statutory language evinces the Legislature’s intent to “cast a wide net to

ensnare as many offenses against children as possible.”) Indeed, “§ 3283 has

no . . . restrictive language or legislative history suggesting congressional

intent to limit its application to a specific subset of circumstances.” United

States v. Schneider, 801 F.3d 186, 196 (3d Cir. 2015). Tso does not point this

Court to anything within the legislative history that demonstrates that

Congress favored using the categorical approach or that such an approach

would even be applicable to pre-conviction issues. See Weingarten v. United

States, 865 F.3d 48, 59 (2d Cir. 2017) (“Even if the categorical approach does

apply outside of the sentencing and immigration contexts, it was and is not

clear that § 3283 calls for it.”).

As for the practical difficulties and potential unfairness, Tso argues

that using a case-specific analysis rather than the categorical approach will

create “serious practical difficulties and result[] in potential unfairness

because the expanded statute of limitations would apply to any federal

statute so long as the Government alleged a form of abuse against a minor,

whether the abuse was perpetrated by the defendant or not.” Reply Br. at 6.

During oral argument, Tso argued that using a case-specific approach would

“open[] the floodgates for the Government to charge any crime so long as

somewhere in the factual allegation – whether it was an element of the

offense or not – involved the sexual abuse, physical abuse, or kidnapping of

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a child.” Oral Arg. at 01:53–02:09. Tso expanded the argument to include a

hypothetical where the Government could sweep in state crimes against

children because they occurred on a special maritime or territorial

jurisdiction. Id. at 2:10-3:26. We are not convinced by practical difficulties

or by the “floodgates” argument and hypotheticals of potential prosecutorial

overreach.

The practical difficulties that resulted in the categorial approach in

Taylor are absent here. As Taylor explained, when examining whether “the

defendant’s actual conduct would fit the generic definition of burglary, the

trial court would have to determine what the conduct was.” 495 U.S. at 601.

In some cases, “only the . . . actual proof at trial would indicate whether the

defendant’s conduct constituted generic burglary.” Id. The use of the

categorical approach to examine prior criminal convictions “preclude[s] the

relitigation of past convictions in minitrials conducted long after the fact.”

Moncrieffe, 569 U.S. at 200-01.

But faced with a statute of limitations challenge pretrial, a court can

more easily use a case-specific approach to understand the nature of the

charge against the defendant, through the language of the charge, the

elements of the charged offense, and any facts or evidence submitted by the

parties as part of the pretrial litigation. Which is to say, practical concerns

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do not mandate or favor the use of the categorical approach in a statute of

limitations challenge.

We hesitate – and with good reason – to expand the use of the

categorical approach to the pre-trial, pre-conviction stage. In Davis, the

Supreme Court voided the residual clause defining a violent felony under

18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)(B) as unconstitutionally vague, as there was no

reliable way to determine under that definition which offenses qualified as

crimes of violence. 588 U.S. at 448. The dicta in Davis counsels against the

use of the categorical approach in the context of pre-conviction issues. Id.

at 454. The Supreme Court observed:

By contrast, a § 924(c) prosecution focuses on the conduct with which the defendant is currently charged. The government already has to prove to a jury that the defendant committed all the acts necessary to punish him for the underlying crime of violence or drug trafficking crime. So it wouldn’t be that difficult to ask the jury to make an additional finding about whether the defendant’s conduct also created a substantial risk that force would be used.

Id. at 454. Conversely, requiring a judge, not a jury, to make findings of fact

“about that underlying conduct would [raise] serious Sixth Amendment

concerns,” id., if it went “beyond merely identifying a prior conviction.”

Descamps, 570 U.S. at 269.

It is uncertain and likely unknowable to what extent Tso’s

“floodgates” argument raises a valid concern. But regarding fairness, a

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counterargument in the government’s favor is the unfairness that would

result from applying the categorical approach to strike down a prosecution

as time-barred against a defendant who is alleged to have sexually abused

a child, given some of the challenges that may arise from children bringing

forth allegations of sexual abuse and for authorities to evaluate the merits

of these types of allegations. Given the uncertainties on the arguments for

both sides, we decline to rely upon a fairness argument to guide our

decision.

Finally, in rejecting Tso’s argument that the term “involving” triggers

the application of the categorical approach, rather than a fact-specific

analysis, we also join every circuit court that has to date considered this

same question. Weingarten, 865 F.3d at 58–59 (holding that the categorical

approach did not apply and affirming the denial of the defendant’s habeas

petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 for transportation of a minor in foreign

commerce for purpose of engaging in criminal sexual activity); see also

United States v. Maxwell, 118 F.4th 256, 265–66 (2d Cir. 2024) (“In

Weingarten, we explained that Congress intended courts to apply § 3283

using a case-specific approach as opposed to a ‘categorical approach.’ We see

no reason to depart from our reasoning in Weingarten.” (footnote omitted)),

petition for cert. filed, (U.S. Apr. 14, 2025) (No. 24-1073); Schneider,

801 F.3d at 196 (holding that a violation of § 2423(b) for “travel[ing] in

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foreign commerce . . . for the purpose of engaging in any sexual act . . . with

a person under 18 years of age that would be in violation of chapter 109A,

. . . involves the sexual abuse of a person under age 18.”). Finding ourselves

in good company with the Second and Third Circuits, we take comfort that

Tso’s argument is not on solid footing.

* * *

We decline Tso’s invitation to require the application of the

categorical approach to resolve his statute of limitations challenge in his

favor. Rather, a case-specific approach must be applied to a § 3283

challenge, with a focus on the charge(s) brought against the defendant.

Jane Doe was under the age of 18 when Tso sexually abused her. Tso was

charged with an offense that squarely falls within § 3283’s statute of

limitations. Accordingly, the district court was correct to deny Tso’s

motion to dismiss the superseding indictment.

AFFIRMED.