UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Fatih SONMEZ, Defendant-Appellant.
No. 13-4577.
United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.
Argued: Dec. 11, 2014. Decided: Feb. 2, 2015.
777 F.3d 684
IV.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court is
AFFIRMED.
ARGUED: Hassan Minhaj Ahmad, HMA Law Firm, PLLC, Herndon, Virginia, for Appellant. Paul Michael Cunningham, Office of the United States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Rod J. Rosenstein, United States Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee.
Before NIEMEYER, SHEDD, and KEENAN, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by published opinion. Judge KEENAN wrote the opinion, in which Judge NIEMEYER and Judge SHEDD joined.
In this appeal of a conviction for marriage fraud, we consider whether the district court abused its discretion in instructing the jury on the elements of the crime under
Upon our review, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion when it rejected Sonmez‘s proposed jury instructions and charged the jury by tracking the actual language of Section 1325(c). Therefore, we affirm the district court‘s judgment.
I.
Sonmez is a Turkish national who entered the United States legally in November 2000 on a tourist visa, which allowed him to stay in this country until May 2001. However, Sonmez remained in the United States beyond this authorized period.
In November 2008, Sonmez married Tina Eckloff, a United States citizen. With Eckloff‘s assistance, Sonmez filed an application for immigration benefits with the Baltimore, Maryland office of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), seeking to obtain a “green card” granting him permanent residency as a result of his marriage to a
Around the time that the USCIS issued the above notice, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), a division of the United States Department of Homeland Security, was conducting an investigation into an alleged scheme concerning United States citizens marrying persons from the Middle East for the purpose of favorably changing their immigration status. The HSI investigation led to Tina Albrecht who admitted that, in exchange for financial compensation, she had married a Turkish national to aid him in obtaining a green card. Albrecht cooperated with the HSI investigation and identified other persons engaged in similar conduct, including her friend Eckloff whom Albrecht had introduced to Sonmez.
The HSI investigation culminated in an indictment alleging that Sonmez and Eckloff committed marriage fraud in violation of
Under her plea agreement with the government, Eckloff testified at Sonmez‘s trial. According to Eckloff, Albrecht proposed an arrangement whereby Eckloff would marry Sonmez, who needed a green card, in exchange for Eckloff receiving an agreed amount of money. Albrecht introduced Eckloff to Sonmez at a restaurant, and the pair were married around two weeks later.
Eckloff testified that she married Sonmez because she “needed financial help with a lawyer.” Eckloff stated that she received about $2,000 for entering into the marriage and for helping Sonmez in his efforts to obtain a green card. She explained that she signed documents for submission to USCIS for that purpose, and that the couple moved into the same residence after their USCIS interview “in case [government agents] came looking.” Eckloff also testified that she did not have a sexual relationship with Sonmez, and that at the time of the marriage she had no romantic feelings for Sonmez because she “didn‘t know him.”
Sonmez testified in his defense and presented a vastly different story concerning the nature of his relationship with Eckloff. In contrast to Eckloff‘s testimony that they were married less than two weeks after meeting, Sonmez stated that he and Eckloff began dating in April 2008, more than six months before their marriage in
At the close of trial, the parties disputed the content of certain proposed jury instructions. As relevant to this appeal, Sonmez proposed three instructions addressing the elements required for a conviction under Section 1325(c). Sonmez‘s first proposed instruction stated that the government was required to prove four elements:
First, that [the] defendant knowingly entered into a marriage with a U.S. citizen,
Second, that the only reason the marriage was entered into was to obtain an immigration benefit,
Third, that the defendant and his U.S. citizen spouse had no intent to establish a life together [,] [and]
Fourth, that [the] defendant knew the said purpose for the marriage and knew or had reason to know that his conduct was unlawful.
(Emphasis added.) Sonmez also sought an instruction expounding on the second element of his proposed test, to have the court instruct the jury that “[i]f you find there was any reason the defendant entered into the marriage besides obtaining an immigration benefit, you must find the defendant not guilty.” Similarly, Sonmez proposed an additional instruction explaining the third element of his proposed test, to have the court instruct the jury that “[i]f you find that defendant and his U.S. citizen spouse did intend to establish a life together, you must find the defendant not guilty.”
The district court rejected Sonmez‘s proposed instructions and charged the jury on the elements of the offense as follows:
First, that the defendant acted knowingly[,] [t]hat the defendant ... knowingly entered into a marriage with a United States citizen.
Second, that the marriage was entered into for the purpose of evading a provision of the United States immigration laws.
And third, that the defendant knew of said purpose of the marriage[,] [a]nd had reason to know that his conduct was unlawful.
(Emphasis added.)3 The district court allowed Sonmez to argue to the jury that he intended to establish a life with Eckloff and, thus, that his purpose in entering the marriage lacked any intent to evade the immigration laws.
The jury returned a verdict finding Sonmez guilty of violating
II.
Sonmez‘s arguments on appeal pertain solely to the district court‘s failure to give his proposed jury instructions addressing the elements of the offense under
Any individual who knowingly enters into a marriage for the purpose of evading any provision of the immigration laws shall be imprisoned for not more than 5 years, or fined not more than $250,000, or both.
Sonmez contends that the jury should have been instructed that he could not be convicted unless the jury found that his “sole” purpose in entering into the marriage was to evade the immigration laws. He maintains that the common meaning of the statutory phrase “the purpose” connotes a single purpose and does not encompass multiple purposes. Sonmez also contends that the jury should have been instructed that the government was required to prove that he had no intent to establish a life with Eckloff, and asserts that the majority of courts addressing this issue have stated that such intent is an important factor in determining whether an individual has violated
We review for abuse of discretion the district court‘s denial of Sonmez‘s proposed jury instructions. United States v. Bartko, 728 F.3d 327, 343 (4th Cir.2013). To establish an abuse of discretion in this regard, a defendant must demonstrate that his proposed instructions (1) were “correct,” (2) were “not substantially covered by the charge that the district court actually gave to the jury,” and (3) “involved some point so important that the failure to give the instruction[s] seriously impaired the defendant‘s defense.” Id.; see also United States v. McFadden, 753 F.3d 432, 443-44 (4th Cir.2014) (same).4
We first address the district court‘s decision declining to instruct the jury that the government had to prove that the ”only reason the marriage was entered into was to obtain an immigration benefit.” (Emphasis added.) We conclude that the district court properly refused to give this instruction because it is not a correct statement of law.
As stated above, the marriage fraud statute applies to any individual who knowingly enters into a marriage “for the purpose of evading any provision of the immigration laws.”
We observe that the great majority of our sister circuits that have considered the language of
We also observe that Sonmez‘s “sole purpose” argument is not supported by any decisions of our sister circuits. We decline his request that we issue the first such decision interpreting the statute contrary to its plain language. Accordingly, we hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in rejecting Sonmez‘s request for an instruction that would have required the government to show that the sole reason he entered into the marriage was to obtain an immigration benefit.
For similar reasons, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to instruct the jury that the government had the burden of proving that Sonmez did not “intend to establish a life” with Eckloff. Like Sonmez‘s “sole purpose” instruction, this instruction was properly refused because it is an incorrect statement of law. See McFadden, 753 F.3d at 443-44. As noted by some of our sister circuits, the text of
We are not persuaded by the Ninth Circuit‘s contrary decisions requiring the government to prove under
These decisions do not rely on the text of
In reaching this conclusion, we nevertheless recognize that the intent to establish a life with one‘s spouse is a relevant consideration in determining whether a defendant‘s purpose in entering into a marriage was to evade the immigration laws. Therefore, defendants charged with violating
In the present case, the district court did not preclude Sonmez from developing evidence concerning his intent to establish a life with Eckloff, and Sonmez‘s counsel in fact relied on such testimony given by Sonmez in making closing argument to the jury. Thus, the district court provided Sonmez ample opportunity to present the defense that, in marrying Eckloff, he simply intended to establish a life with her and did not have the purpose of evading the immigration laws. Accordingly, we hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in declining to instruct the jury that the government had the burden
III.
In conclusion, we hold that because Sonmez‘s proposed jury instructions are not correct statements of law, the district court did not abuse its discretion in declining to give those instructions to the jury. We affirm the district court‘s judgment.
AFFIRMED