United States v. Blaze

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
OCT 9 2003
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT
PATRICK FISHER
Clerk
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. No. 01-1370
(D.C. No. 99-S-1388)
JOHNNY BLAZE, (D. Colo.)
Defendant-Appellant.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before EBEL , HOLLOWAY , and MURPHY , Circuit Judges.
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously that oral argument would not materially assist the determination of
this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is
therefore ordered submitted without oral argument.
Defendant-appellant Johnny Blaze appeals the district court’s decision
denying him 28 U.S.C. § 2255 relief . In a previous order and judgment, this court
*
This order and judgment is not binding precedent, except under the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.
denied Blaze a certificate of appealability (COA) on three ineffective-assistance
claims challenging his federal racketeering and extortion convictions and
sentences. See Order & Judgment, No. 01-1370, 2002 WL 1644800 (10th Cir.
July 24, 2002). We subsequently vacated that decision, however, and granted
Blaze’s petition for rehearing, as well as COA, on his claim alleging that his trial
attorney was constitutionally ineffective for persuading the district court to
dismiss an 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) count charging Blaze with using a gun to commit
a crime of violence. In granting Blaze rehearing on this claim, we were
concerned that the counterintuitive situation may have occurred in which defense
counsel’s success in getting the § 924(c) charge dismissed actually resulted in
a lengthier sentence because it permitted the district court then to enhance Blaze’s
offense level by six, under the applicable sentencing guidelines’ weapons
enhancement, USSG § 2B3.2(b)(3)(A)(ii). 1 Blaze would not have been subject to
this weapons enhancement had the jury convicted him under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c).
See USSG § 2K2.4(a) & nn. 1, 2.
1
The sentencing guidelines in effect at the time the district court sentenced
Blaze, in February 1997, will apply, absent any ex post facto problem. See United
States v. Owens, 70 F.3d 1118, 1130 (10th Cir. 1995) (citing, e.g., 18 U.S.C.
§ 3553(a)(4), and USSG § 1B1.11(a)). Because Blaze asserts that the sentencing
guidelines effective November 1, 1995, applied at the time he was sentenced, see
Aplt. Reh’g Br. at 10 n.2, we refer to those 1995 guidelines, unless we indicate
otherwise.
-2-
When we granted rehearing, this court also appointed Steven Sklaver as
counsel to represent Blaze, who had previously been pursuing his § 2255 motion
pro se. Appointed counsel now, candidly and through good workmanship,
concedes that Blaze’s sentence would have been longer with the guidelines’
weapons enhancement, rather than under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c), only if trial counsel
could also have eliminated sentencing enhancements both for making a threat of
death or bodily harm, USSG § 2B3.2(b)(1), and for involving a vulnerable victim,
id., § 3A1.1(b). See, e.g., Aplt. Reh’g Br. at 20-21; Aplt. Reh’g Reply Br.
at 11-12. We agree with defense counsel’s calculations.
The jury convicted Blaze of racketeering and conspiring to, and interfering
with, interstate commerce by threats of violence by extortion and robbery,
see 18 U.S.C. §§ 2, 1951(a), 1952(a)(2), and making threatening interstate
telephone calls with the intent to extort, see id., § 875(b). In calculating Blaze’s
sentence, the district court grouped his convictions into five separate categories,
combining the racketeering and interference-with-commerce convictions into one
category, and the seventeen threatening-telephone-call convictions into four other
groups, based upon the dates Blaze made those calls. See generally USSG
§§ 3D1.1, 3D1.2 (setting forth rules for grouping multiple convictions). Neither
party challenges the district court’s grouping, nor the fact that the offense level
for the telephone-count groups was twenty-six. Because the racketeering group
-3-
had a much greater offense level than the telephone-count groups, those
threatening-telephone-call convictions essentially dropped out of the sentencing
calculation, and the district court based Blaze’s sentence instead solely on the
racketeering and interference-with-commerce convictions. See id., § 3D1.4(c).
Those racketeering and extortion convictions started with a base offense
level of eighteen. See id., § 2B3.2(a). The district court then further enhanced
that base offense level by two because Blaze made an express or implied threat of
death or bodily harm, see id., § 2B3.2(b)(1); two levels because the offenses
involved between $50,000 and $250,000, see id., § 2B3.2(b)(2) (referencing
id., § 2B3.1(b)(6)); six levels for using a firearm, see id., § 2B3.2(b)(3)(A)(ii);
four levels because Blaze abducted an individual during the course of these
criminal events, see id., § 2B3.2(b)(5)(A); two levels because these offenses
involved a vulnerable victim, nine-year-old Vincent Scotti, see id., § 3A1.1(b);
and four more levels because Blaze was a leader and organizer of this criminal
conduct, see id., § 3B1.1. Blaze’s resulting total offense level, then, was
thirty-eight. Combined with his criminal history category of I, the resulting
sentencing range was 235 to 293 months, see USSG Ch. 5, Pt. A, which easily
accommodated the district court’s sentencing Blaze to the statutory maximum
240 months’ imprisonment, see 18 U.S.C. § 1952(a)(3)(B).
-4-
Had the jury convicted Blaze under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) for using a firearm
to commit a crime of violence, the sentencing court could not have enhanced
Blaze’s racketeering and extortion offense level by six for using a firearm. See
USSG § 2K2.4(a) & nn. 1, 2. That would have left his offense level for the first
group of offenses at thirty-two. However, this would also have reduced the
discrepancy between the offense level for this first group of racketeering offenses
and the offense levels for the other four groups involving the threatening
telephone calls. Therefore, the four threatening-telephone-call groups would have
reentered the sentencing calculation, adding three more levels to Blaze’s total
offense level. See id. § 3D1.4. Blaze’s total offense level, then, with an
18 U.S.C. § 924(c) conviction, would have been thirty-five, resulting in a
sentencing range of 168-210 months. See USSG Ch. 5, Pt. A. In addition,
however, the 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) conviction would have required an additional
five-year, or sixty-month, 2 consecutive sentence tacked on to that guideline range.
See USSG § 2K2.4(a). The actual sentencing range, therefore, with the 18 U.S.C.
§ 924(c) conviction, would have been 228-270 months, see USSG Ch. 5, Pt. A,
2
The government, before the district court, and the district court calculated
Blaze’s 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) sentence to be 120 months. The parties now agree,
however, and we concur, that Blaze would have faced only a sixty-month
consecutive sentence had the jury convicted him under § 924(c).
-5-
which again would have permitted the district court to impose the statutory
maximum 240-month sentence.
If defense counsel had been able to eliminate either the vulnerable-victim
or the threat enhancement, the first group’s offense level would have been only
thirty. But the grouping rules would have required four additional levels for the
telephone convictions, see USSG § 3D1.4, raising Blaze’s total offense level to
thirty-four. The sentencing range, then, would have been between 151 and 188
months. See id., Ch. 5, Pt. A. But to that, the district court, again, would have
had to tack on the consecutive sixty-month 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) sentence, resulting
in a total sentencing range of 211 to 248 months. That range, then, still would
have accommodated the statutory maximum 240-month sentence the district
court did impose.
It is only if defense counsel could have eliminated both the
vulnerable-victim and threat enhancements, thus reducing Blaze’s first group’s
offense level by four, that the sentencing range, after considering the relevant
grouping rules, would have reduced Blaze’s total offense level to such an extent
that, even tacking on the sixty-month 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) sentence, the sentencing
range would not have permitted the district court to impose the statutory
-6-
maximum 240 months’ imprisonment. 3 And defense counsel concedes that it is
only at this point that trial counsel’s persuading the trial court to dismiss the
§ 924(c) charge would have produced a lengthier sentence than had the jury
convicted him under § 924(c). Counsel, therefore, now also challenges the
sentencing court’s application of both the vulnerable-victim and the threat
enhancements, though he does not make those arguments in terms of ineffective
assistance of counsel. 4
3
In sentencing Blaze, the district court decided to impose “the statutory
maximum penalty” because “[t]hat would give effect to the congressional intent
with regard to this matter and give effect to the seriousness of the offense.”
Sentencing Hr’g Tr. at 80. Defense counsel’s concession, therefore, that Blaze
cannot prevail unless his trial counsel could have lowered his sentencing range
below that which would have supported a statutory maximum twenty-year
sentence, is appropriate. Cf. United States v. Horey , 333 F.3d 1185, 1188 (10th
Cir. 2003) (granting § 2255 relief and remanding for resentencing, where defense
counsel’s error resulted in district court sentencing defendant under improperly
elevated sentencing range; although proper sentencing range would also have
included length of sentence district court had originally imposed, this court noted
that sentencing court had originally chosen to sentence defendant at lower end of
guidelines, and might again choose to do so under proper sentencing range). By
contrast, as noted above, here the district court expressed an intent to sentence at
the statutory maximum if supported by the Guidelines.
4
Although we specifically granted Blaze COA only on his claim that trial
counsel was ineffective in requesting the district court dismiss the 18 U.S.C.
§ 924(c) count, we will also address Blaze’s additional arguments challenging
the vulnerable-victim and threat enhancements. Because these arguments
are inextricably linked to the weapons enhancement at issue in the
ineffective-assistance claim for which we already granted COA, we deem that
grant to be broad enough also to encompass these additional arguments.
-7-
We address first, then, Blaze’s contention that the sentencing court erred in
applying the two-level vulnerable-victim enhancement, USSG § 3A1.1(b), to
calculate his sentence. The government, in its response brief, asserts Blaze has
procedurally defaulted this claim. We agree, concluding that Blaze is now
procedurally barred from challenging this enhancement, for three reasons.
First, he procedurally defaulted this claim by not raising it on direct appeal.
See United States v. Frady, 456 U.S. 152, 162, 167-68 (1982); see also Bousley v.
United States, 523 U.S. 614, 621, 622 (1998). And Blaze, in his reply brief, does
not attempt to excuse his default by asserting cause and prejudice. 5
See, e.g.,
Massaro v. United States, 123 S. Ct. 1690, 1693 (2003). Nor could he. Cause is
established by proof that some objective factor, external to the defendant and not
fairly attributable to him, impeded his efforts to comply with a procedural rule.
See Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 753 (1991). Cause may be shown,
for example, by ineffective representation at trial or on appeal, or that the factual
or legal basis of a habeas claim was not reasonably available earlier. See, e.g.,
id. at 753-54.
The specific issue Blaze now presents through his vulnerable-victim claim
is whether the sentencing court could have deemed nine-year-old Vincent Scotti
5
The fundamental-miscarriage-of-justice exception to procedural default
does not apply to noncapital sentencing claims. See United States v. Richards ,
5 F.3d 1369, 1371 (10th Cir. 1993).
-8-
to be a vulnerable victim, for sentencing purposes, without proof that Blaze
specifically targeted the child to victimize. See, e.g., Aplt. Reh’g Br. at 9-14.
Sentencing guidelines § 3A1.1(b) provides a two-level enhancement “[i]f the
defendant knew or should have known that a victim of the offense was unusually
vulnerable due to age, physical or mental condition, or that a victim was
otherwise particularly susceptible to the criminal conduct.” At the time Blaze
committed these crimes, 6
in August and September 1995, § 3A1.1’s application
note further included language suggesting “this adjustment applie[d] to offenses
where an unusually vulnerable victim is made a target of criminal activity by the
defendant.” USSG (1994) § 3A1.1 n.1. In light of this application note’s
targeting language, other circuit courts were, at that time, divided as to whether
§ 3A1.1 required the government to prove that the defendant specifically targeted
a victim because of his special vulnerability, before the sentencing court could
apply the vulnerable-victim enhancement. See, e.g., United States v. Smith ,
6
Although this court would ordinarily apply the guidelines in effect at the
time the district court sentenced Blaze, because he asserts that to do so here
would amount to an e x post facto violation, we consider, instead, the state of the
law at the time Blaze committed these crimes. See, e.g., Owens , 70 F.3d at 1130.
At that time, in August and September 1995, the vulnerable-victim enhancement
was designated § 3A1.1, rather than § 3A1.1(b). The enhancement’s language,
however, remained the same under both versions, although as pointed out in the
text, the commentary language changed somewhat.
-9-
39 F.3d 119, 122-23 (6th Cir. 1994) (discussing split among circuits). This court,
however, had not yet expressly addressed this issue.
After Blaze had committed these offenses, but before his trial and
sentencing, the Sentencing Commission, in November 1995, amended § 3A1.1’s
commentary “to clarify that there is no targeting requirement.” United States v.
Zats , 298 F.3d 182, 188 (3d Cir. 2002). It was soon after this amendment took
effect that Blaze’s trial counsel persuaded the district court, during Blaze’s trial,
to dismiss the 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) charge. And, just before Blaze’s sentencing,
in February 1997, this circuit held that it would not rely on the earlier application
note’s targeting language when applying the pre-amended 1994 version of USSG
§ 3A1.1. See United States v. Hardesty , 105 F.3d 558, 558-60 (10th Cir. 1997).
At Blaze’s sentencing, then, the district court, relying on Hardesty , rejected
Blaze’s argument that the government had to prove first that he had specifically
targeted nine-year-old Vincent Scotti because of his vulnerability, before the
court could apply this enhancement to calculate Blaze’s sentence. We cannot say,
then, Blaze’s appellate counsel was constitutionally deficient, see Strickland v.
Washington , 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984), for not later asserting the same argument
on direct appeal that this court had rejected in Hardesty .
Blaze further contends now, however, that Hardesty is actually contrary to
earlier Tenth Circuit authority essentially adopting and applying the earlier
-10-
application note’s pre-amendment targeting language. See, e.g., Aplt. Reh’g Br.
at 12-13. Hardesty itself, however, indicated that its holding was “in general
accord” with this circuit’s earlier law. 105 F.3d at 560. And two other circuits
have rejected similar arguments where their earlier case law, while using targeting
language, never specifically addressed whether § 3A1.1 required the government
to prove the defendant specifically targeted a victim because of his or her
vulnerability. See United States v. Burgos , 137 F.3d 841, 843-44 (5th Cir. 1998);
United States v. Gill , 99 F.3d 484, 488 (1st Cir. 1996). In any event, while this
argument was available to Blaze’s counsel to raise on direct appeal, see Bousley ,
523 U.S. at 622, we cannot say that counsel was ineffective for not raising
this issue there, see, e.g., Upchurch v. Bruce , 333 F.3d 1158, 1164, 1166-67
(10th Cir. 2003) (28 U.S.C. § 2254); Hickman v. Spears , 160 F.3d 1269, 1273-75
(10th Cir. 1998) (same).
Nor can Blaze now assert, as cause excusing his procedural default, any
ineffective representation in pursuing his § 2255 motion because there is no
constitutional right to counsel in a § 2255 proceeding, cf. Coleman, 501 U.S. at
752-53 (28 U.S.C. § 2254), and, in any event, Blaze was, initially, representing
himself. See Klein v. Neal, 45 F.3d 1395, 1400 (10th Cir. 1995) (petitioner’s
assertion that he was not an attorney and was unaware of existence of state statute
was insufficient, as a matter of law, to establish cause).
-11-
For these reasons, then, we conclude Blaze has procedurally defaulted his
vulnerable-victim claim. Blaze’s only response is that the government, having
never before raised this affirmative procedural-bar defense, cannot now assert it
for the first time in its response brief filed after we granted rehearing. See Aplt.
Reh’g Reply Br. at 4. This court, however, can raise a procedural-bar defense
sua sponte. See, e.g., United States v. Barajas-Diaz, 313 F.3d 1242, 1247
(10th Cir. 2002). Additionally, in this case, we cannot fault the government
for not raising this procedural-default defense earlier because Blaze never
specifically raised his vulnerable-victim claim before the district court in his
§ 2255 proceeding. He did assert, in his § 2255 motion, that the sentencing court
should not have treated Louis Scotti as a vulnerable victim, because he “was only
forty year[s] old at the time of the crime, he was an ex-marine trained in
hand-to-hand combat, he is about 6 feet 2 inches in height[h] and weighs 220
pounds.” Section 2255 Mot. at 8. The sentencing court, however, had never
deemed Louis Scotti to be the vulnerable victim. Rather, the sentencing court
clearly based this enhancement on nine-year-old Vincent Scotti’s presence at the
time Blaze invaded the Scotti home. Even liberally construing Blaze’s pro se
pleadings, then, see Haines v. Kerner , 404 U.S. 519, 520-21 (1972), we still
cannot stretch his claim specifically arguing that Louis Scotti was not a
vulnerable victim to challenge, instead, Vincent Scotti’s status as a vulnerable
-12-
victim. The fact that Blaze did not adequately raise this claim before the district
court, therefore, provides an additional procedural reason precluding us from
reviewing the merits of his vulnerable-victim claim. See, e.g., Hill v. Kan. Gas
Serv. Co. , 323 F.3d 858, 865-66 (10th Cir. 2003).
Further, to permit Blaze to raise this new claim at this point in his § 2255
proceedings would also improperly allow him to circumvent § 2255’s one-year
limitations period. See 28 U.S.C. § 2255; cf. United States v. Espinoza-Saenz ,
235 F.3d 501, 504-05 (10th Cir. 2000) (holding § 2255 movant could not assert
new claims in motion to amend § 2255 motion filed after AEDPA’s one-year
time limit had expired).
These three procedural reasons, therefore, preclude us from considering the
merits of Blaze’s vulnerable-victim claim. And, because Blaze concedes that, to
obtain § 2255 relief, he must eliminate both the vulnerable-victim and threat
enhancements, his ineffective-assistance claim fails. Therefore, we need not
address whether the district court should have applied the threat enhancement in
calculating Blaze’s sentence. Were we to address that claim, however, we would
note that there are similar grounds for deeming Blaze to have procedurally
defaulted that claim as well.
-13-
Blaze, again, never asserted this specific argument in his § 2255 pleadings
to the district court. 7 See, e.g., Hill , 323 F.3d at 865-66; see also 28 U.S.C.
§ 2255. Nor did he challenge this threat enhancement on direct appeal.
See Frady, 456 U.S. at 162, 167-68; see also Bousley, 523 U.S. at 621, 622.
And, again, it does not appear that Blaze can assert cause and prejudice excusing
this default. 8 Although this claim was available, we could not conclude that
Blaze’s appellate counsel was constitutionally ineffective for failing to raise this
claim on direct appeal because the correct application of this enhancement was
sufficiently in doubt at the time of Blaze’s sentencing and direct appeal. At the
time the district court sentenced Blaze in this case, three other circuits had held
that, to avoid double counting, USSG § 2K2.4 precluded enhancing an offense
level for making an express threat of death or bodily harm, when a jury had also
convicted the defendant of using a firearm to commit a crime of violence, under
18 U.S.C. § 924(c). These courts, however, reached this conclusion in a robbery,
not an extortion, context. See United States v. Triplett, 104 F.3d 1074, 1081
(8th Cir. 1997) (considering § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F)’s enhancement for making express
7
Blaze did unsuccessfully assert a separate claim alleging that Apprendi v.
New Jersey , 530 U.S. 466 (2000), required a jury, instead of the district court, to
find the existence of all relevant sentencing enhancements.
8
If this apparent procedural default did provide the basis for this court’s
denying Blaze relief, then this court would have had first to provide Blaze an
opportunity to address that issue before sua sponte denying § 2255 relief on this
basis. See, e.g., Barajas-Diaz, 313 F.3d at 1247 n.7.
-14-
threat of death during robbery); see also United States v. Duran, 4 F.3d 800, 804
(9th Cir. 1993); United States v. Smith, 981 F.2d 887, 893-94 (6th Cir. 1992).
These cases, then, involved enhancing offense levels for discrete incidents
involving using a firearm to make a threat during an armed robbery, rather than as
part of an ongoing extortion scheme like the one at issue here. And it appears
that no circuit court has yet extended this reasoning to preclude a threat
enhancement under circumstances similar to this case. But cf. United States v.
Corrado, 304 F.3d 593, 597-98, 614-15 (6th Cir. 2002) (enhancing defendant’s
offense level for racketeering and extortion convictions, because defendant made
threat to further extortion, where jury had also convicted defendant of using
firearm under § 924(c), but without addressing whether this might amount to
impermissible double counting), cert. denied, 123 S. Ct. 1366 (2003). And this
court has not yet specifically addressed whether a § 924(c) conviction would
preclude enhancing either a robbery or an extortion sentence based upon a threat
of death or bodily harm. In light of that, while the claim Blaze makes now was
not so novel as to have been unavailable to Blaze’s appellate attorney, see, e.g.,
Bousley, 523 U.S. at 622, we cannot say the attorney was constitutionally
ineffective for having failed to challenge the district court’s applying this threat
enhancement in Blaze’s case, see, e.g., Upchurch , 333 F.3d at 1164, 1166-67;
Hickman , 160 F.3d at 1273-75. It does not appear, therefore, that Blaze would
-15-
have been able to establish cause and prejudice excusing his procedural default
of this threat-enhancement claim.
In any event, Blaze has procedurally defaulted his challenge to the
vulnerable-victim enhancement. And Blaze concedes he cannot establish that he
would have received a shorter prison sentence if the jury had convicted him under
18 U.S.C. § 924(c) unless he can eliminate both the vulnerable-victim and threat
enhancements. Blaze, therefore, cannot show that he was prejudiced by his trial
attorney’s successfully moving the trial court to dismiss that § 924(c) count. His
ineffective-assistance claim challenging that dismissal, therefore, fails. See
Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687. In light of that, we AFFIRM the district court’s
decision denying § 2255 relief on that claim, though for different reasons than
those upon which the district court relied.
Although, when we granted rehearing, we vacated our previous order and
judgment denying Blaze COA on two other ineffective-assistance claims, we did
not grant Blaze COA on those two additional issues. Nor did we request that the
parties brief those other claims, alleging that Blaze’s trial counsel was ineffective
for mistakenly stipulating that Blaze possessed the cell phone used to make the
threatening telephone calls and for withdrawing a motion to suppress alleging
government officials unlawfully tapped calls Blaze made on that cell phone.
We, therefore, simply reiterate here that COA is denied on those two claims,
-16-
for the same reasons stated in this court’s original order and judgment, dated
July 24, 2002.
Entered for the Court
David M. Ebel
Circuit Judge
-17-