United States v. Khemall Jokhoo, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 20792

Khemall Jokhoo owned First Financial Services, a licensed debt‑collection business in Minnesota and used debtor personal information to impersonate victims, obtain checks or transfers, forge endorsements, and deposit funds into FFSI accounts.
Minnesota Department of Commerce (DOC) revoked FFSI’s license in Nov. 2009 and revoked Jokhoo’s collector registration in Apr. 2011 after administrative findings that he caused institutions to send funds without authorization and violated debt‑collection laws.
A federal jury convicted Jokhoo of 33 counts including bank, mail, and wire fraud; aggravated identity theft; and impersonating a federal officer. He was sentenced to a total of 175 months (151 months on main counts, plus a consecutive 24 months for identity‑theft counts).
The PSR applied enhancements for intended loss, number of victims, vulnerable victims, sophisticated means, violation of an administrative order, and abuse of a position of trust; the district court held an evidentiary sentencing hearing and adopted those enhancements (reducing the victim count enhancement by 2 levels). The court found intended loss of $711,965.82.
At the sentencing hearing the government introduced an unrebutted spreadsheet of transactions (including reversed transactions) and investigator testimony tying those transactions to the scheme; hearsay was relied on at sentencing and Jokhoo did not present rebuttal evidence.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether district court erred in calculating total loss	Jokhoo: loss should be limited to amounts proved at trial and spreadsheet evidence was unreliable/hearsay	Gov.: court may use intended loss and unrebutted investigator testimony to include transactions not charged at trial	Held: No clear error — intended loss of $711,965.82 reasonably found; hearsay admissible at sentencing and relevant conduct need not be charged
Whether administrative‑order enhancement applied	Jokhoo: DOC sanctions did not justify enhancement	Gov.: prior administrative sanctions warned against the same conduct; enhancement proper	Held: Enhancement appropriate because DOC orders directed him to stop and he continued fraud
Whether vulnerable‑victim enhancement applied	Jokhoo: court relied on two elderly/disabled victims without proof he knew of their vulnerability	Gov.: victims were financially distressed, which makes them vulnerable to financial crimes	Held: No error — court based enhancement on victims’ financial distress; challenge waived for not contesting that finding
Whether sentence was substantively unreasonable	Jokhoo: overall 175‑month sentence is excessive	Gov.: within guidelines for main counts; consecutive statutory 24 months required for identity theft	Held: Sentence reasonable; 151 months within guideline range and presumptively reasonable; consecutive 24 months required by statute

United States v. Callaway, 762 F.3d 754 (8th Cir.) (procedural then substantive sentence review framework)
United States v. Hodge, 588 F.3d 970 (8th Cir.) (loss need not be determined with precision at sentencing)
United States v. McIntosh, 492 F.3d 956 (8th Cir.) (reasonableness of loss calculation standard)
United States v. Brown, 430 F.3d 942 (8th Cir.) (hearsay admissible at sentencing; no confrontation right at sentencing)
United States v. Radtke, 415 F.3d 826 (8th Cir.) (relevant conduct may include uncharged acts in same course of conduct)
United States v. Nash, 729 F.3d 400 (5th Cir.) (administrative order need not expressly enjoin to support enhancement)
United States v. Johns, 686 F.3d 438 (7th Cir.) (financial distress can establish vulnerability to financial crimes)
United States v. Miner, 544 F.3d 930 (8th Cir.) (abuse of discretion standard for substantive reasonableness)