United States v. Roger Bitsinnie, 680 F. App'x 574

Background

In July 2014 Roger Bitsinnie stabbed Linda Smallcanyon multiple times; he pled guilty in March 2015 to assault causing serious bodily injury in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1153 and 113(a)(6).
The district court calculated a Total Offense Level of 22 (including a seven-level enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3) for serious bodily injury) and Criminal History Category III, yielding a 51–63 month range.
The court granted an upward departure under U.S.S.G. § 4A1.3(a) for underrepresented criminal history, raising the offense level to 24 and the guideline range to 63–78 months, and sentenced Bitsinnie to 70 months’ imprisonment and three years’ supervised release.
On appeal Bitsinnie challenged (1) the seven-level enhancement for serious bodily injury, (2) the manner of effectuating the § 4A1.3 departure, and (3) eight supervised-release conditions.
The Ninth Circuit affirmed the sentence except it found two supervised-release conditions improper: a vague geographic-limitation condition and a dependent-support condition where the defendant had no dependents; the case was remanded to vacate the latter and allow the court to tailor the former.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether seven-level enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2A2.2(b)(3) was improper	Enhancement improper because seven levels require permanent or life-threatening injury	Government relied on district court’s finding of serious bodily injury and facts of multiple stabbings	Error was not plain: sentence fell within both correct and incorrect ranges and district court’s rationale supported the sentence; affirmed
Whether the § 4A1.3 upward departure must be effected by increasing offense level rather than criminal-history category	Departure should have increased Criminal History Category per § 4A1.3(a)(4)(A)	District court’s method was reasonable; result was substantively reasonable and produce same guidelines range	Affirmed: no substantive-unreasonableness shown and range unchanged
Whether Geographic Limitation Condition (cannot leave judicial district/other geographic area without permission) is unconstitutionally vague as applied	Vague because defendant will reside on Navajo Nation spanning multiple federal/state/tribal districts	Government proposed interpreting phrase to mean District of Arizona/Navajo Nation	Reversed as plain error: condition is impermissibly vague as applied; remanded to permit tailored geographic condition
Whether Dependent Support Condition should be imposed when defendant has no dependents	Improper because defendant has no dependents and condition unrelated to defendant’s circumstances	Government argued it was a standard condition and generally suitable	Reversed as plain error: condition bears no relation to defendant or offense; must be vacated

Key Cases Cited

United States v. Rosales-Gonzales, 801 F.3d 1177 (9th Cir.) (Sentencing Guidelines offense-level and criminal-history framework)
United States v. Guzman-Mata, 579 F.3d 1065 (9th Cir.) (plain-error standard for unpreserved sentencing objections)
United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725 (U.S.) (burden of showing prejudice under Rule 52(b))
United States v. Munoz-Camarena, 631 F.3d 1028 (9th Cir.) (harmlessness of guideline-calculation errors)
United States v. Ali, 620 F.3d 1062 (9th Cir.) (guideline calculation and harmless-error discussion)
Molina-Martinez v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 1338 (U.S.) (instances where erroneous Guidelines range does not create reasonable probability of prejudice)
United States v. Ellis, 641 F.3d 411 (9th Cir.) (review standard for § 4A1.3 departures)
United States v. LaCoste, 821 F.3d 1187 (9th Cir.) (requirements for supervised-release conditions under § 3553(a))
United States v. Wolf Child, 699 F.3d 1082 (9th Cir.) (plain-error review of supervised-release conditions)
United States v. Hugs, 384 F.3d 762 (9th Cir.) (vagueness analysis: ordinary person must not be left to guess meaning)