U.S. v. Miranda

• Decision Date: 26 October 2007
• Docket Number: No. 06-4195.,06-4195.
• Citation: 505 F.3d 785
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Luis MIRANDA, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

505 F.3d 785

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Luis MIRANDA, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 06-4195.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued June 1, 2007.

Decided October 26, 2007.

Tyler Murray (argued), Office of the United States Attorney, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Gareth G. Morris (argued), Chicago, IL, for Defendant-Appellant.

Before FLAUM, MANION and ROVNER, Circuit Judges.

ROVNER, Circuit Judge.

Luis Miranda pled guilty to one count of bank robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a). Miranda has a history of severe mental illness, and at sentencing, he presented considerable evidence of diminished capacity. Miranda also presented evidence in support of an argument that his criminal history category overstated the nature of his prior criminal history. He argued to the district court for a below-guidelines sentence based on several factors listed in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a). The district court did not directly address these non-frivolous arguments and sentenced Miranda to fifty months of imprisonment, a sentence greater than the government requested. Because the district court did not address Miranda's principal, non-frivolous arguments before sentencing, we vacate and remand for resentencing.

I.

On September 12, 2005, Miranda walked into the Amcore Bank in Carpentersville and handed the teller a note. The note warned the teller not to activate the silent alarm and threatened that she had a limited number of seconds to hand over the money. The note also indicated that Miranda had a gun pointed at the teller and that he had a bomb.¹ The teller handed Miranda all of the cash in her drawer, approximately $4,045.00. Miranda placed the money in his backpack and walked out of the bank. The next day, his wife saw a picture of the robber in a local newspaper and immediately recognized the man in a baseball cap and sunglasses as her husband. She called him, told him about the newspaper photo and then called the police.

This was not the first time that Melissa Miranda had been compelled to call the police regarding her husband's strange behavior. Miranda had been telling his wife for years that he heard voices and that he saw reflections in her eyes of people lurking behind him. He believed that these people wanted to hurt him. The voices he heard sometimes directed him to do specific things, and sometimes told him to hurt himself. Miranda also thought that others could hear his thoughts. He saw shadows that told him things about his wife. Miranda had twice attempted suicide, once with a gun and once by dousing himself in gasoline and attempting to light himself on fire. During the incident with the gun, Melissa Miranda called the police, fearing for her husband's life. The police officers took Miranda to a hospital where he was admitted for a psychotic disorder. Because his firearm owner's identification card had expired, the police later returned to arrest him for illegal possession of the gun he used in his suicide attempt. When the police arrested Miranda for this offense, they discovered a crack pipe and a small amount of cocaine on his person and charged him with both unlawful possession of a firearm and possession of a controlled substance. Miranda pled guilty to both of these offenses, which comprised the entirety of his criminal history prior to the bank robbery.

Miranda pled guilty to the bank robbery as well. In light of Miranda's earlier mental health issues, his counsel petitioned the district court to appoint a psychiatrist to examine him. The court appointed Dr. Daniel Yohanna, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Chicago. Dr. Yohanna, who is board certified, has vast experience in psychiatric practice, teaching and publishing. Dr. Yohanna reviewed Miranda's prior medical records and prior extensive psychiatric records. He examined Miranda and also reviewed both the Presentence Investigation Report ("PSR") prepared by a probation officer and Miranda's plea agreement. He wrote his initial report from these sources but prior to the sentencing hearing, he also had an opportunity to speak with Melissa Miranda about her husband's behavior.

In the initial report, Dr. Yohanna concluded that Miranda suffers from Schizoaffective Disorder and that he suffered from that disorder at the time he committed the offense of conviction. Dr. Yohanna noted that Miranda had a history of depression and other mental health conditions since he was a child but had not received any treatment until 2003.² At that time, he was hospitalized for auditory hallucinations and substance abuse. Miranda was hospitalized five more times for psychiatric conditions in the next two years, including two hospitalizations for suicide attempts. Miranda was treated on an outpatient basis for the three years prior to the bank robbery, and was taking six medications relating to his mental health and medical conditions at the time Dr. Yohanna examined him. He had taken other psychiatric medications over the years as well. His medications included antipsychotic agents, mood stabilizers, anti-anxiety medications, pain medication, antidepressants, and drugs that served as substitutes for heroin. The record does not indicate which medications Miranda was taking at the time of the robbery. Miranda's history of substance abuse (cocaine and heroin) was extensive, but by the time Dr. Yohanna examined him, no illegal drugs had been detected in his system for more than a year.

Dr. Yohanna's primary diagnosis was, as we noted, Schizoaffective Disorder. He also diagnosed cocaine dependance, in remission, and opiate dependence, in remission. Schizoaffective Disorder is marked by an uninterrupted period of illness during which, at some time, there is a Major Depressive Episode, a Manic Episode or a Mixed Episode concurrent with symptoms of Schizophrenia.³ Dr. Yohanna opined that Miranda met the criteria for Schizophrenia because Miranda experienced auditory hallucinations and displayed a blunted affect. Miranda also met the criteria for Major Depression because he suffered from a depressed mood, diminished interest and pleasure in his activities, psychomotor agitation, decreased sleep, and suicide attempts. According to Dr. Yohanna:

Mr. Miranda understands the nature of his crime and has pleaded guilty to the charges; however he was hallucinating at the time of the crime. This symptom has been persistent since its onset in 2003 and the description of the hallucination that is being intermittent throughout the day, being an unrecognizable but discernable, single, male voice, is consistent with real disease as well as the partial response to medication. The evidence against the diagnosis of schizophrenia is that there are no corresponding delusions which occur in most patients with hallucinations. It is also then my opinion with the necessary degree of psychiatric certainty that Mr. Miranda is not malingering.

R. 55, at 7. After speaking to Melissa Miranda, Dr. Yohanna supplemented his report. This conversation confirmed for Dr. Yohanna that his original diagnosis was correct and removed any doubt caused by the absence of any reported delusions:

[Melissa Miranda] stated that Mr. Miranda began to experience delusions and auditory hallucinations beginning in February 2001. She describes a significant disturbance where he believed that people were talking from under or in the bed. She would come home to find that he emptied drawers or tore open the mattress looking for the source of voices. He also was paranoid[,] complaining that people were out to harm him and seeing people behind him in the reflection of her eyes. This made it clearer that Mr. Miranda suffered from not only auditory hallucinations but delusions, which is more common in the diagnosis of schizophrenia. This confirms my opinion with the necessary degree of medical certainty that Mr. Miranda suffers from Schizoaffective Disorder. Also that he was suffering from this disorder at the time of the offense in September of 2005 displaying symptoms including auditory hallucinations and delusions.

R. 57. Both the original report and the supplement were presented to the district court prior to the sentencing hearing.

In addition, Dr. Yohanna testified at the sentencing hearing, where he explained that, at the time of the robbery, Miranda was experiencing auditory command hallucinations. In other words, Miranda heard a voice telling him that "we need money" and that he should rob a bank. Dr. Yohanna described schizophrenia as a disease of the brain and explained that when a person with schizophrenia hears voices, it is because the area of the brain that processes hearing is stimulated even though there is no external stimulus. As a result, that person "hears" a voice in the same manner another person would hear a voice when someone actually speaks. To a schizophrenic, an auditory hallucination sounds no different than normal speech. As Dr. Yohanna framed the issue, "[T]here's no real sound happening but your brain is actually firing like there is a sound." R. 68-1, at 15-16. After receiving treatment in prison while awaiting sentencing, Miranda began to understand that his visual and auditory hallucinations were part of a brain disease, but before that time, he experienced the hallucinations as real events. Dr. Yohanna also testified that the auditory hallucinations were caused not by drug use but by the separate medical condition of schizophrenia. R. 68-1, at 17. Moreover, Dr. Yohanna opined that Miranda was responding to command hallucinations at the time he committed this crime. R. 68-1, at 18. Finally, Dr. Yohanna testified that, as between drugs use and schizophrenia, "the primary thing [Miranda] was responding to were the hallucinations but drugs will also reduce your inhibitions and may contribute to impulsive acts." R. 68-1, at 19. See also r. 68-1, at 20 ("I thought that what was driving him was the schizophrenia more than...