FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
November 10, 2011
TENTH CIRCUIT
Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
No. 10-1380
v. (D.C. No. 10-CR-00094-PAB-1)
(D. Colo.)
URIEL SANTOS-SANTOS,
Defendant - Appellant.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before KELLY, MURPHY, and HARTZ, Circuit Judges.
Defendant-Appellant Uriel Santos-Santos appeals from his sentence for
illegal reentry after deportation subsequent to an aggravated felony conviction. 8
U.S.C. § 1326(a), (b)(2). He contends that the district court erred in applying a
16-level offense adjustment pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b)(1)(A)(ii), resulting
in a 57-month sentence. Our jurisdiction arises under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and 18
U.S.C. § 3742(a), and we affirm.
*
This order and judgment is not binding precedent, except under the
doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. It may be cited,
however, for its persuasive value consistent with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th
Cir. R. 32.1.
Background
In March 2004, in the Superior Court of Santa Clara County, California,
Mr. Santos-Santos, a Mexican citizen, was convicted of (1) inflicting corporal
injury on a spouse with a specified prior conviction within seven years and (2)
assault by means of force likely to produce great bodily injury. 3 R. 10. In 2007
he was deported to Mexico, but in January 2010 immigration officials discovered
him in Arapahoe County Jail, in Centennial, Colorado. 3 R. 10; 1 R. 12. That
April, Mr. Santos-Santos pleaded guilty to the instant federal offense. 1 R. 2
(Doc. 13), 7.
The Presentence Report (“PSR”), on the basis of Mr. Santos-Santos’s
assault conviction, reflected an offense adjustment of 16 offense levels under
§2L1.2(b)(1)(A)(ii), for defendants who have unlawfully reentered after a
conviction for a “crime of violence.” This produced an advisory Guideline range
of 57-71 months’ imprisonment. Mr. Santos-Santos unsuccessfully objected to
the PSR on the grounds he argues here.
Discussion
Whether a conviction under California Penal Code § 245(a)(1) constitutes a
“crime of violence” under U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b)(1)(A)(ii) is a question of law that
we review de novo. United States v. Ruiz-Rodriguez, 494 F.3d 1273, 1275 (10th
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Cir. 2007). Section 245(a)(1), at the time of Mr. Santos-Santos’s conviction,
imposed criminal penalties on “[a]ny person who commits an assault upon the
person of another with a deadly weapon or instrument other than a firearm or by
any means of force likely to produce great bodily injury.” An “assault,” in turn,
under California Penal Code § 240, is defined as “an unlawful attempt, coupled
with a present ability, to commit a violent injury on the person of another.”
Sentencing Guideline § 2L1.2 (“Unlawfully Entering or Remaining in the
United States”), in subsection (b)(1)(A)(ii), provides for an increase of 16 offense
levels “[i]f the defendant previously was deported, or unlawfully remained in the
United States, after...a conviction for a felony that is…a crime of violence.” The
application note explains that a “crime of violence” consists in any of twelve
enumerated offenses or “any other offense under federal, state, or local law that
has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force
against the person of another.” U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2 cmt. n.1(B)(iii).
Mr. Santos-Santos argues that California Penal Code § 245(a)(1), as
construed by California courts, permits conviction of defendants whose mental
state is shown only to have been reckless, possibly even negligent. A “crime of
violence,” by contrast, requires proving that a defendant acted with a mental state
more culpable than negligence, Leocal v. Ashcroft, 543 U.S. 1 (2004), or
recklessness, United States v. Zuniga-Soto, 527 F.3d 1110 (10th Cir. 2008). The
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term “crime of violence” is defined in 18 U.S.C. § 16(a)—a definition that
informs this particular guideline, since the material language is the same in both
places—as “an offense that has as an element the use, attempted use, or
threatened use of physical force against the person . . . of another.”
In Leocal, the Supreme Court held that a Florida law that punished injury-
causing DUIs did not constitute a “crime of violence.” A crime of violence
requires the “use…of physical force”; “use,” in turn, implies the “intentional” and
“active” application of force. 543 U.S. at 8-9. But the harm inflicted by a DUI
could possibly be the result of the driver’s negligence, not any particular intent on
his part to cause injury. We distinguish in the same way between shoving a
person (intentional) and stumbling into that person (accidental or negligent). Id.
at 9. In Zuniga-Soto, this court extended Leocal to reckless conduct. Zuniga-
Soto involved a Texas statute that punished “intentionally, knowingly, or
recklessly caus[ing] bodily injury” to public servants. 527 F.3d at 1114. The
court held that a “mens rea of recklessness does not satisfy [the] use of physical
force requirement under Sentencing Guideline § 2L1.2’s definition of ‘crime of
violence.’” Id. at 1124. It reasoned that, although many convictions under the
law are obtained against defendants who acted intentionally, the prosecution need
only prove a mental state of recklessness.
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A conviction upon such a mental state is problematic, since the language of
§ 16(a) provides that crimes of violence must have this use of force “as an
element,” i.e., as a constituent part of the offense that the prosecution must
establish to convict. Courts, then, must only “look to the elements…of the
offense of conviction, rather than to the particular facts relating to petitioner’s
crime.” Leocal, 543 U.S. at 7; U.S. v. Zuniga-Soto, 527 F.3d at 1118. Because
§ 2L1.2 also contains the “as an element” limitation, the sentencing court’s
inquiry is likewise confined to examining the statutory definition of the prior
offense. The Florida and Texas statutes at issue in Leocal and Zuniga-Soto both
had the potential to punish conduct that did not necessarily (or categorically)
constitute a “crime of violence.” California Penal Code § 245(a)(1), for its part,
specifies on its face no particular state of mind requirement—an “element” of any
crime. The question of whether that law is a “crime of violence,” then, requires
us to determine what the California courts have declared the law’s mens rea to be.
Mr. Santos-Santos maintains that, in California, he could be found “guilty
of an assault under § 245(a)(1) without intending to use physical force against
another,” Aplt. Br. 10; thus the “mens rea for committing the offense does not
satisfy the active-employment test of Leocal and this court’s precedent.” Aplt.
Br. 13. He points to People v. Williams, 29 P.3d 197 (Cal. 2001), the California
Supreme Court’s controlling opinion on the mental state required to convict for
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assault. Mr. Santos-Santos selects a phrase from that decision—namely, that a
defendant “must be aware of the facts that would lead a reasonable person to
realize that a battery would directly, naturally and probably result from his
conduct,” Williams, 29 P.3d at 203—and contends that such a standard “sounds
largely in recklessness.” 1 Aplt. Br. 14. But Williams explicitly held otherwise:
“As explained below…assault is a general intent crime,” id. at 200; “Assault is
still a general intent crime,” id. at 203; “mere recklessness or criminal negligence
is still not enough,” id.; “assault…requires an intentional act,” id. at 204.
Degrees of culpability are notoriously elusive of firm definition. Not only
do they involve fine psychological and metaphysical distinctions, but courts over
time have given them varied and overlapping meanings. The mens rea required
for California Penal Code § 245, in particular, has been the “subject of a long,
tortured, and ongoing set of explanations in the California courts.” United States
1
The Williams court stated:
a defendant is only guilty of assault if he intends to commit an act “which
would be indictable [as a battery], if done, either from its own character or
that of its natural and probable consequences.” Logically, a defendant
cannot have such an intent unless he actually knows those facts sufficient
to establish that his act by its nature will probably and directly result in
physical force being applied to another, i.e., a battery. In other words, a
defendant guilty of assault must be aware of the facts that would lead a
reasonable person to realize that a battery would directly, naturally and
probably result from his conduct. He may not be convicted based on facts
he did not know but should have known. He, however, need not be
subjectively aware of the risk that a battery might occur.
Williams, 29 P.3d at 202-03 (internal citations omitted).
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v. Grajeda, 581 F.3d 1186, 1189-92 (9th Cir. 2009). Mr. Santos-Santos attempts
to re-open the question. He characterizes Williams in a way that, to him, suggests
that a defendant can be convicted for acts that directly, naturally, and probably
lead to battery (though stopping short of it) without any finding of intent to cause
injury. The opinion, however, read as a whole, makes clear that what the statute
punishes are intentional acts that, if completed, would have resulted in
battery—i.e., acts that have battery as their natural but unfulfilled consequence.
As Williams explained, because “assault criminalizes conduct based on what
might have happened—and not what actually happened—the mental state for
assault incorporates the language of probability, i.e., direct, natural and probable
consequences.” 29 P.3d at 202. Mr. Santos-Santos echoes the dissent’s
conclusion in Williams. (“I do not agree that the majority's formulation requires
a mental state more culpable than criminal negligence or recklessness,” id. at 207
(Kennard, J., dissenting)).
What constitutes a “crime of violence” under Sentencing Guideline § 2L1.2
is a question of federal law. But what elements (among them a mens rea) must be
proved to sustain a conviction under California Penal Code § 245(a)(1) is a
question of state law; here, the California Supreme Court’s determination is
conclusive. See Johnson v. United States, 130 S.Ct. 1265, 1269 (2010) (“We
are...bound by the Florida Supreme Court’s interpretation of state law, including
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its determination of the elements of Fla. Stat. §784.03(2).”). Our inquiry is
limited only to considering whether California Penal Code § 245(a)(1), measured
by its elements, constitutes a “crime of violence” under Sentencing Guideline
§ 2L1.2. Mr. Santos-Santos cites intermediate appellate court decisions that he
claims are “contrary to the language of the guideline and to the reasoning of
Leocal,” Aplt. Br. 15, but even if we accepted his characterization of them, they
cannot overrule the holding of a superior court. Thus, we hold that California
Penal Code § 245(a)(1) is a “crime of violence” under Sentencing Guideline
§ 2L1.2. 2 We agree with the conclusion of the Ninth Circuit in Grajeda, 581 F.3d
at 1189-92. Because the district court did not err in enhancing Mr. Santos-
Santos’s sentence based on his assault conviction in California, the judgment is
AFFIRMED.
Entered for the Court
Paul J. Kelly, Jr.
Circuit Judge
2
The government argues that the sentencing enhancement can also be
upheld because § 245(a)(1) is a form of “aggravated assault,” an enumerated
“crime of violence” under Sentencing Guideline §2L1.2. See cmt n. 1(B)(iii). It
contends that the law “‘roughly corresponds’ to the definition of aggravated
assault in a majority of California’s criminal codes” and in the Model Penal Code.
Aplee. Br. 10. We note that the Fifth Circuit so held in United States v. Sanchez-
Ruedas, 452 F.3d 409, 414 (5th Cir. 2006), but we have no occasion to reach this
question today.
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