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United States v. Leon Henry, 3rd Cir. (2011)
United States v. Leon Henry, 3rd Cir. (2011)
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On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. No. 06-cr-00033-02)
District Judge: Honorable Jan E. Dubois
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Submitted Under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
April 26, 2011
Before: BARRY, HARDIMAN and NYGAARD, Circuit Judges.
(Filed: April 26, 2011)
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OPINION OF THE COURT
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HARDIMAN, Circuit Judge.
Leon Henry (Leon or Henry) appeals his judgment of sentence following a jury
trial. Because the District Court committed no error, we will affirm.
I
Because we write for the parties, who are well acquainted with the case, we review
only briefly the essential facts and procedural history.
In 2003, Leon and his brother Andre Henry (Andre) wanted to purchase firearms,
but could not do so directly because they were convicted felons. Accordingly, they
recruited two women, Tameka Niblack and Starlene Herbert, to act as straw purchasers.
In their first attempt to purchase an assault rifle for the Henrys, the women were rebuffed
by a gun store clerk because they did not know how to operate the weapon. Undaunted
by this rejection, the Henrys drove Niblack the next day to a different gun store, where
she successfully purchased a Bushmaster AR-15 rifle, ammunition, and a gun cleaning
kit. During the following week, in two separate transactions, Niblack purchased two
Glock 9mm handguns. Niblack gave all three weapons and accessories to the Henrys.
At trial and during sentencing, the Government introduced evidence that prior to
Niblacks purchases, Leon had helped Andre conceal evidence and launder money from
Andres earlier crimes, which included eight robberies of fast food restaurants with a fake
firearm, two robberies of the Pulaski Savings Bank with an AK-47 rifle, and two
attempted carjackings, during one of which Andre shot at a police officer. The
Government also introduced evidence that the Henrys and two conspirators were planning
a third bank robbery at which Leon was to stay outside the bank and act as a sniper if
police arrived, although Leon was eventually acquitted of this conspiracy. Fortunately,
Andre was arrested for violating his parole before a third bank robbery could occur.
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Leon was arrested after Andre and was charged with one count of conspiracy to
make false statements to a federal firearm licensee, and two counts of making such
statements. Andre and five other conspirators were also charged in the indictment, but
those charges are not germane to this appeal. A superseding indictment was filed,
followed by a second superseding indictment charging twenty-eight counts against the
seven defendants. Leon was charged with: (1) being a felon in possession of a firearm in
violation of 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1); (2) conspiring to make false statements to a federal
firearm licensee in violation of 18 U.S.C. 371; (3) making false statements to a federal
firearms licensee in violation of 18 U.S.C. 924(a)(1)(A); and (4) conspiracy to commit
armed bank robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 371. Following a successful motion to
sever, Leon was tried alone, and the jury found him guilty of the firearms offenses but
acquitted him of conspiracy to commit bank robbery. After a four day sentencing
hearing, the District Court sentenced Leon to 106 months imprisonment.
At sentencing, the Government sought sentencing enhancements under the United
States Sentencing Guidelines (USSG) for, inter alia, obstruction of justice (USSG
3C1.1) and possessing or transferring a gun with knowledge, intent or reason to believe it
would be used in a felony offense (USSG 2K2.1(b)(5)). The Government also moved
for upward departures because Henry engaged in multiple acts of obstruction of justice
and because he threatened a prosecutor. The Government proffered multiple witnesses to
testify in support of these enhancements. The District Court did an admirable job
weighing the voluminous evidence and determining whether each alleged act supported
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justice and found that because Henry took deliberate steps, with knowledge of an
investigation, to conceal the weapons [it] amount[ed] to obstruction of justice. Id. at
332; see USSG 3C1.1 cmt. n. 4(d) (2002).
Fifth, the Government presented evidence that, once he was incarcerated, Henry
spoke to co-defendant and potential witness Herbert through the prisons plumbing
system. When Herbert declined to speak with Henry, he told her not to testify and
threatened to poison everyone on her floor in the prison. The District Court found that
this threat constituted obstruction of justice. Supp. App. 336; USSG 3C1.1 cmt. n. 4(a)
(2002).
Finally, the Government presented evidence that Henry told another prisoner that
he was planning to kill the Assistant United States Attorney prosecuting his case.
Specifically, Henry told the prisoner (1) that he had read a transcript of his trial during
which, at sidebar, the prosecutor had requested time to take her daughter to the hospital,
and (2) that he intended to use the Bushmaster AR-15 rifle, which the Government had
never found, to kill the prosecutor and her family. Henrys prison confidante informed
the prosecutor and testified against Henry at sentencing, and this testimony was
corroborated by another prisoner. Defense counsel argued that because the threat had not
been communicated by Henry to the prosecutor it could not constitute a real threat or an
attempted obstruction of justice. The District Court disagreed. Supp. App. 339.
In sum, the District Court found four acts that could constitute obstruction of
justiceurging Niblack to file a false police report, concealing and re-concealing the
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Cir. 2007). Accordingly, if the asserted procedural error is purely factual, our review is
highly deferential and we will conclude there has been an abuse of discretion only if the
district courts findings are clearly erroneous. Wise, 515 F.3d at 217.
A
Henry argues that the District Court erred by using the threats to the prosecutor as
the basis for an obstruction of justice enhancement under USSG 3C1.1. We disagree.
In fact, the District Court did not impose an enhancement for obstruction of justice
under USSG 3C1.1 based on Henrys threat against the prosecutor. Instead, it imposed
a two-level upward departure under USSG 5K2.0 for that threat. The District Court
explicitly predicated the obstruction of justice enhancement on Henrys attempt to
convince Niblack to file a false police report. Supp. App. 339, 343. This was not error.
Nonetheless, Henry argues that the District Court erred because it found that the threat
against the prosecutor could support an obstruction of justice enhancement, even absent
evidence that Henry intended it to be communicated to the prosecutor, thereby
influencing or obstructing her prosecution of him.
We have not addressed whether USSG 3C1.1 requires a threat to be
communicated to the intended victim or the related question of what constitutes evidence
of intent for the enhancement. Other circuit courts of appeals are split on the issue. See
United States v. Brooks, 957 F.2d 1138, 1150-51 (4th Cir. 1992) (holding that the
enhancement requires that the defendant either threaten the codefendant, witness, or
juror in his or her presence or issue the threat in circumstances in which there is some
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likelihood that the codefendant, witness, or juror will learn of the threat.); United States
v. Searcy, 316 F.3d 550, 552-53 (5th Cir. 2002) (joining the Second, Eighth, Ninth, and
Eleventh Circuits in holding that a threat need not be directly communicated to the victim
to support an enhancement). In this appeal, where the enhancement was not even applied
based on the threat, we have no occasion to resolve these questions.
B
Second, Henry argues that the District Court imposed the enhancement for the
threat based on the same conduct which formed the basis of another enhancement, namely
the four-level enhancement for possess[ing] or transferr[ing] any firearm or ammunition
with knowledge, intent, or reason to believe that it would be used or possessed in
connection with another felony offense. USSG 2K2.1(b)(5). This argument fails for
three reasons, two of which are fact-based and one of which is a question of law. First,
the District Court imposed the 2K2.1 enhancement both because of the threat to the
prosecutor and because Henry had reason to believe that the weapons would be used in
connection with another felony offense, namely another robbery with or by Andre. Supp.
App. 315. Second, possessing or transferring a weapon with knowledge that it will be
used in a felony is not the same conduct as making a threat to use that weapon. Finally,
[o]nly when the Guidelines explicitly prohibit double counting will it be impermissible
to raise a defendants offense level under one provision when another offense Guideline
already takes into account the same conduct. Fisher, 502 F.3d at 309. Accordingly, the
District Court did not err in imposing a two-level upward departure under USSG 5K2.0
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for Henrys threat to the prosecutor along with the other enhancements.1
III
For the foregoing reasons, we will affirm the District Courts judgment of
sentence.
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