[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT FILED
________________________ U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
No. 08-16072 MARCH 24, 2009
Non-Argument Calendar THOMAS K. KAHN
CLERK
________________________
D. C. Docket No. 08-00129-CR-ORL-31-DAB
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
FRANK GONZALEZ,
Defendant-Appellant.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
_________________________
(March 24, 2009)
Before BLACK, CARNES and PRYOR, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Frank Gonzales appeals the sophisticated means sentence enhancement that
was imposed on him after he pled guilty to eleven counts of mail fraud, in violation
of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1341 and 2. On appeal, Gonzales argues he did not engage in the
complex or intricate conduct necessary for a sophisticated means enhancement
because he set up two shell companies merely as a method of stealing money from
his employer, and “[h]e did not try to disguise or launder the money in any way.”
The Sentencing Guidelines provide for an enhancement of two levels if the
offense in question “involved sophisticated means.” U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1(b)(9)(C).
Application Note 8(B) to that guideline states that:
“sophisticated means” means especially complex or especially
intricate offense conduct pertaining to the execution or concealment of
an offense. For example, in a telemarketing scheme, locating the
main office of the scheme in one jurisdiction but locating soliciting
operations in another jurisdiction ordinarily indicates sophisticated
means. Conduct such as hiding assets or transactions, or both,
through the use of fictitious entities, corporate shells, or offshore
financial accounts also ordinarily indicates sophisticated means.
U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1, App. n. 8(B). We review for clear error the finding and
imposition of a sophisticated means enhancement. United States v. Robertson, 493
F.3d 1322, 1329-30 (11th Cir. 2007).
The district court did not commit clear error by finding that a sophisticated
means enhancement should be imposed on Gonzales because he set up two shell
companies and falsified his employer's internal paperwork so that his employer
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would ultimately wind up paying more than $185,000 to those companies. See id.
(upholding a sophisticated means enhancement for a defendant who used shell
entities to take advantage of his victim and switched entities every 30 days to avoid
detection). Accordingly, we hereby affirm the district court’s decision.
AFFIRMED.
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