United States v. Ankerpont

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
MAY 8 1998
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT
PATRICK FISHER
Clerk
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. No. 97-4033
(D.C. No. 95-CR-249)
KELLY ROYJA ANKERPONT, (D. Utah)
Defendant-Appellant.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. No. 97-4035
CHARLES KENNETH HEADDRESS,
Defendant-Appellant.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before PORFILIO, BARRETT, and HENRY, Circuit Judges.
*
This order and judgment is not binding precedent, except under the
doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. The court
generally disfavors the citation of orders and judgments; nevertheless, an order
and judgment may be cited under the terms and conditions of 10th Cir. R. 36.3.
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously to grant the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs without oral
argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. These cases are
therefore ordered submitted without oral argument.
Defendants-appellants Kelly Royka Ankerpont and Charles Kenneth
Headdress pled guilty to second-degree murder in Indian Country, in violation of
18 U.S.C. §§ 1111, 1153(a), and aiding and abetting the murder, in violation of 18
U.S.C. § 2. They appeal the district court’s determination to make a six-level
upward adjustment of their sentences, based on U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8, which permits
upward departure in offense level for extreme conduct. Ankerpont also appeals
the imposition of an $8,000 fine. We exercise jurisdiction pursuant to 18 U.S.C.
§ 3742(a) and 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and affirm.
BACKGROUND
On the night of the murder, Ankerpont, Headdress, Thomas James
Sowsonicut (a juvenile), and the victim were drinking beer and driving around in
a car owned by Ankerpont’s mother. After 3:30 a.m., a disagreement arose
between Sowsonicut and the victim. Sowsonicut attempted to strangle the victim
while both were seated in the car. Ankerpont then stopped the car on a dirt road.
The victim was dragged out of the car and knocked to the ground, where he was
kicked, beaten, stabbed with a screwdriver, and choked with jumper cables.
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Ankerpont then used the cables to drag the victim behind the moving car for
approximately 744 yards. When these actions did not result in the death of the
victim, he was placed in the trunk of the car and driven to another location.
Throughout these events, the victim was screaming, moaning, and asking for help.
Ankerpont, Headdress, and Sowsonicut took the victim out of the trunk, pushed or
kicked him into a creek bed, and then threw rocks at him until he died. They
moved the body into a culvert and left it lying face down in the water.
The next day, Ankerpont led authorities to the body. An autopsy showed
that the immediate cause of the victim’s death was blunt-force injury to the head
and that strangulation was a significant factor in the death. The victim, who was
intoxicated when he died, also had multiple abrasions, lacerations, and puncture
wounds.
Ankerpont, Headdress, and Sowsonicut were arrested and questioned. All
made statements giving the same general account of the murder, but furnishing
different versions of their own participation in it. Ankerpont and Headdress
entered guilty pleas to second-degree murder. Prior to sentencing, the district
court held an evidentiary hearing, at which Headdress, Sowsonicut, law
enforcement officials, and the deputy medical examiner testified about the crime,
and autopsy photographs were entered into evidence.
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The calculation under the United States Sentencing Guidelines was the
same for both defendants. The base offense level was 33, see U.S.S.G. § 2Al.2,
with a three-level downward adjustment for acceptance of responsibility, pursuant
to U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1, and a two-level upward adjustment for restraint of the
victim, pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 3A1.3. The result was an offense level of 32 and,
for their criminal history category, a sentencing range of 121 to 151 months.
Based on the nature of the offense, however, the court determined that an
upward departure for extreme conduct, under U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8, was warranted. 1
It made express findings that the conduct of both Ankerpont and Headdress “was
unusually heinous, cruel, brutal and degrading,” in that they each engaged in
torturing the victim and prolonging his pain. Ankerpont R., Vol. IV. at 23-24;
Headdress R., Vol. V. at 49. In deciding the extent of the departure, the court
used by analogy the guideline for aggravated assault, U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2, which
provides for a six-level increase in cases of permanent or life-threatening bodily
injury. With the upward departure, the total offense level was 38, with a
1
U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8 provides:
If the defendant’s conduct was unusually heinous, cruel, brutal, or
degrading to the victim, the court may increase the sentence above
the guideline range to reflect the nature of the conduct. Examples of
extreme conduct include torture of a victim, gratuitous infliction of
injury, or prolonging of pain or humiliation.
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sentencing range of 235 to 293 months. The district court sentenced Ankerpont
and Headdress to 240 months’ imprisonment.
DISCUSSION
United States v. Ankerpont, No. 97-4033
On appeal, Ankerpont argues that his crime was within the guideline
heartland for second-degree murder and that the departure was unreasonable in
degree. He also appeals the imposition of the fine.
A district court’s decision to depart from the sentencing guidelines is
reviewed for abuse of discretion. See Koon v. United States, 518 U.S. 81, 116
S. Ct. 2035, 2043 (1996). On appeal, we consider the following issues:
(1) whether the factual circumstances supporting a departure are
permissible departure factors[,] (2) whether the departure factors
relied upon by the district court remove the defendant from the
applicable Guideline heartland thus warranting a departure, (3)
whether the record sufficiently supports the factual basis underlying
the departure, and (4) whether the degree of departure is reasonable.
United States v. Collins, 122 F.3d 1297, 1303 (10th Cir. 1997). Departure under
U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8 is appropriate “when the defendant’s actions are heinous, cruel,
or brutal beyond the characteristics inherently associated with the crime being
sentenced.” United States v. Kelly, 1 F.3d 1137, 1143 (10th Cir. 1993).
We have reviewed the entire record and agree with the district court that
Ankerpont’s crime was unusually brutal within the universe of second degree
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murders. The district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that an
upward departure was warranted.
Next we evaluate the reasonableness of the court’s departure. “When
departing from the Guidelines, the court should look to the Guidelines for
guidance in characterizing the seriousness of the aggravating circumstances to
determine the proper degree of departure.” United States v. Jackson, 921 F.2d
985, 990 (10th Cir. 1990). The court may use “an analogy to other closely related
conduct or circumstances that are addressed by the guidelines.” Id. at 990-91(quotation omitted). That is precisely what the district court did in this case. It
was entirely reasonable to determine the proper degree of departure by
analogizing the conduct at issue to aggravated assault.
The last issue we must address concerns the court’s imposition of an $8,000
fine, based on the determination that Ankerpont could pay a fine through the
Bureau of Prison’s Inmate Financial Responsibility Program, during his lengthy
term in custody. See Ankerpont R., Vol. IV at 26. We review this decision for
plain error because Ankerpont failed to object to the fine during the district court
proceedings. See United States v. Ballard, 16 F.3d 1110, 1114 (10th Cir.1994).
Under the sentencing guidelines, a fine is to be imposed in all cases unless
the defendant establishes that he is unable to pay or is not likely to ever become
able to pay a fine. See U.S.S.G. § 5E1.2(a). In United States v. Williams, 996
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F.2d 231, 231-32 (10th Cir. 1993), we upheld a $13,000 restitution order where
the defendant had no current financial resources, but had been sentenced to
twenty years in prison. The district court reasoned that the defendant would be
able to use money earned in prison to pay the restitution. Id. at 232. We held that
the district court did not abuse its discretion. Id. at 235. The facts of this case
fall within the Williams holding. Therefore, we cannot say the district court
committed plain error in assessing the $8,000 fine. 2
United States v. Headdress, No. 97-4035
Headdress appeals his sentence, asserting that the district court abused its
discretion in applying the six-level upward adjustment for extreme conduct. He
claims that (1) the crime was not unusually heinous; (2) he was too intoxicated to
intend the crime to be unusually heinous; (3) he cannot be held responsible for
acts of codefendants; and (4) the upward departure, coupled with the enhancement
for restraint of the victim, constituted impermissible double counting. None of
these contentions has merit.
As we have stated above, the facts of this case warrant upward departure, in
that the treatment of the victim was “unusually heinous, cruel, [and] brutal,”
U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8, even when compared with other second-degree murders. There
2
The normal range for a fine under offense level 38 is $25,000 to $250,000.
See U.S.S.G. § 5E1.2(c)(3).
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is no requirement of specific intent in the plain language of section 5K2.8 and
Headdress provides us with no reason to superimpose one. In any event, we note
the district court’s finding that, although Headdress was intoxicated, he “certainly
knew what he was doing.” Headdress R., Vol. V. at 48.
Similarly, there is no support in the record for the contention that the
district court based the upward departure on the conduct of codefendants, rather
than Headdress himself. At the sentencing hearing, the district court made it clear
that it was considering Headdress’s own conduct. The court found that Headdress
was involved in the attempted strangling, id. at 47; the kicking of the victim while
he was lying down, id. at 48; “the prolonging of the pain and humiliation that was
suffered” by the victim, id. at 49, and the final events at the creek bed, id. at 47.
Finally, Headdress argues that since he received a two-level enhancement
for restraint of the victim under U.S.S.G. § 3A1.3, he may not receive a six-level
upward departure for extreme conduct under U.S.S.G. § 5K2.8. This argument is
misplaced. “Impermissible double counting or cumulative sentencing ‘occurs
when the same conduct on the part of the defendant is used to support separate
increases under separate enhancement provisions which necessarily overlap, are
indistinct, and serve identical purposes.’” United States v. Fisher, 132 F.3d 1327,
1329 (10th Cir. 1997) (quoting United States v. Blake, 59 F.3d 138, 140 (10th
Cir. 1995)).
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Here, the sentence was increased under U.S.S.G. § 3A1.3 because the
victim was physically restrained in the trunk of a car while being taken from the
roadside, where he was kicked and tortured, to the creek bed, where he was
stoned. See Headdress R., Vol. V at 48. The events at the two separate crime
scenes are more than sufficient to justify the upward departure for extreme
conduct, without consideration of restraint during transportation. The district
court properly applied both increases.
CONCLUSION
The judgments of the United States District Court for the District of Utah
are AFFIRMED.
Entered for the Court
James E. Barrett
Senior Circuit Judge
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