United States v. Sesley Williams ( 2023 )

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FEB 23 2023
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, No. 16-10015
Plaintiff-Appellee, D.C. No.
2:13-cr-00221-APG-CWH-2
v.
SESLEY WILLIAMS, MEMORANDUM*
Defendant-Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Nevada
Andrew P. Gordon, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted December 21, 2018
Submission Vacated January 3, 2019
Resubmitted February 22, 2023
San Francisco, California
Before: GOULD and BERZON, Circuit Judges, and MÁRQUEZ,** District Judge.
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
**
The Honorable Rosemary Márquez, United States District Judge for
the District of Arizona, sitting by designation.
Sesley Williams was convicted by a jury of aiding and abetting 13 robberies
between December 28, 2012 and March 30, 2013. She was also convicted of five
counts of aiding and abetting the brandishing of a firearm in connection with the
robberies.
Williams appeals her convictions, challenging the sufficiency of the
evidence used to convict her. She argues that there was insufficient evidence to
support her convictions for: 1) aiding and abetting robberies on December 28 and
29, 2012 and January 3, 2013 and aiding and abetting the brandishing of a firearm
in those robberies; and 2) aiding and abetting robberies in February and March
2013 and aiding and abetting brandishing a firearm in those robberies.1
In reviewing a sufficiency of the evidence challenge, we ask whether “after
viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational
trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a
reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979).2
1
Williams raised additional issues on appeal, which she later withdrew after the
district court granted her motion for compassionate release and reduced her 121-
year sentence to time served. We do not address the withdrawn issues.
2
The “plain error” standard applies because Williams did not renew her motion for
a judgment of acquittal at the close of all the evidence. See United States v. Cruz,
554 F.3d 840, 844 (9th Cir. 2009). Where sufficiency of evidence is at issue and
the evidence is, as here, patently insufficient, the requisites for finding plain error
are met. Id. at 844–45.
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1. We hold that there was insufficient evidence to convict Williams of the
robberies and related gun charges from December 28 and 29, 2012 and January 3,
2013.
The only evidence that the government presented linking Williams to the
first three robberies were cell phone records indicating that her cell phone
communicated with cell towers in the vicinity of the robberies and that, during the
time of the robberies, her cell phone communicated with Anthony Jordan’s cell
phone. The government did not offer any proof that Anthony Jordan was involved
in these three robberies. In fact, the salesclerk working at the time of the robbery
on January 3 testified that she personally knew Jordan and that he was not the
person who robbed the store.
The government contended that these first three robberies followed a similar
“pattern” to the later robberies, as to which Marquee Munerlyn testified that he
entered the stores, while Jordan acted as lookout and Williams acted as the
getaway driver. Munerlyn also testified that Williams gave him a small gray .22
pistol with a pearl handle, which Munerlyn used in some of the robberies. During
all thirteen robberies, a man demanded money from a cashier and displayed a gun.
During some of the robberies, witnesses testified, the man appeared to be talking
on the phone via a headset or had earbuds in during the robbery. Some, but not all,
of the robberies were of U.S. Banks within grocery stores.
3
Munerlyn was not present at the first three robberies on December 28 and
29, 2012 and January 3, 2013 because he was in custody during that time. He did
not testify about those robberies.
In the December 28 robbery, a man robbed the U.S. Bank branch located in
an Albertsons grocery store. The teller working there then testified that the man
brandished a “dark gray or black” gun. In the December 29 robbery, a man robbed
a Nautica clothing store. The sales clerk working at Nautica at the time said that
the man displayed “a small silver handgun” with a handle that “looked white-ish.”
In the January 3 robbery, a man robbed a Michael Kors store. The sales clerk
working at Michael Kors at the time testified that the man passed a note across the
counter demanding money and then brandished a “very small” gun that was “flat
silver” in color.
We conclude that no rational trier of fact could find beyond a reasonable
doubt that Williams was involved in these three robberies based on her cell phone
being in the vicinity of the robberies. Las Vegas is a large city, and mere
proximity to crime is not enough to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a person
committed the crime. The “pattern” here is unremarkable, as the types of places
robbed and their locations varied, as did the man who had the gun. Further, the
varying descriptions of the handgun used in the three robberies is not sufficient to
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link Williams to the firearm. We reverse the convictions associated with these
three robberies.
2. Conversely, we hold that there was sufficient evidence to convict
Williams of the other ten robberies. A rational trier of fact could find beyond a
reasonable doubt based on Munerlyn’s testimony that Williams aided and abetted
Munerlyn in robbing the stores by acting as the getaway driver and aided and
abetted the brandishing of a firearm in connection with those robberies by
supplying Munerlyn with the gun. We affirm these convictions.
REVERSED IN PART, AFFIRMED IN PART.
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