United States v. Darrell Lussier, 844 F.3d 1019

In Feb 2015, Darrell Alan Lussier lived temporarily in Gregory Maxwell’s duplex on the Red Lake Indian Reservation; Maxwell prohibited drugs in the home but believed Lussier and his then-girlfriend Cristy Sumner had brought drugs in.
On Feb 7, 2015, Lussier and Sumner assaulted Maxwell, David Roy, and Nancy Roy: victims were beaten, choked, thrown through a trap door into a cold, dimly lit crawl space, and left there until discovered two days later.
Victims sustained serious injuries: Maxwell suffered hemopneumothorax, rib fractures, carotid dissection causing a stroke, traumatic brain injury; Nancy Roy had subdural hematoma and facial fractures; David Roy had brain hemorrhaging and facial fractures.
Lussier was convicted by a jury of three counts of kidnapping (18 U.S.C. § 1201) and three counts of assault resulting in serious bodily injury (18 U.S.C. § 113(a)(6)); district court sentenced him to 360 months’ imprisonment.
On appeal Lussier challenged (1) the jury instruction for assault resulting in serious bodily injury, (2) the district court’s conditional ruling to admit a prior assault conviction for impeachment if he testified, and (3) sufficiency of the evidence on kidnapping.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Jury instruction on assault resulting in serious bodily injury	Instruction failed to require that the assault actually caused the serious bodily injury; it defined assault only as attempt or threat	Instruction, read with requirement that victim suffered serious bodily injury, sufficiently required harmful touching and causation	Court: Instructions read as whole adequately conveyed law; even if error, not plain error because evidence showed actual physical beatings and no prejudice
Conditional admission of prior conviction for impeachment	Ruling to admit prior assault conviction if he testified violated Fifth Amendment due process and Sixth Amendment right to jury trial	Failure to testify waived the issue under Luce; defendant did not preserve claim	Court: Claim not preserved; Luce requires defendant to testify to raise improper-impeachment claim
Sufficiency of evidence for kidnapping	Evidence insufficient to show Lussier "held" victims or intended to hold them (trap door not locked; no guard)	Throwing injured victims into crawl space, closing trap door, and leaving them in isolated, hard-to-find space supports an intent to confine and prevent discovery/reporting	Court: Evidence sufficient; jury reasonably inferred willful confinement to prevent reporting/discovery; conviction affirmed

United States v. Bordeaux, 84 F.3d 1544 (8th Cir. 1996) (standard for viewing evidence on sufficiency review)
United States v. Whitefeather, 275 F.3d 741 (8th Cir. 2002) (instruction-as-a-whole principle for assault instructions)
United States v. Davis, 237 F.3d 942 (8th Cir. 2001) (plain-error review for unobjected jury instructions)
Luce v. United States, 469 U.S. 38 (1984) (defendant must testify to preserve claim of improper impeachment by prior conviction)
Chatwin v. United States, 326 U.S. 455 (1946) (elements and intent requirement for federal kidnapping statute)
United States v. Stands, 105 F.3d 1565 (8th Cir. 1997) (sufficiency of evidence for kidnapping where victim taken to isolated location to avoid interruption)
United States v. Vanover, 630 F.3d 1108 (8th Cir. 2011) (prejudice standard for plain-error review)
United States v. Dominguez-Benitez, 542 U.S. 74 (2004) (definition of prejudice standard in plain-error context)