United States v. Garcia
| Decision Date | 18 September 2014 |
| Docket Number | No. 12–10189.,12–10189. |
| Parties | UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. Daniel Richard GARCIA, Defendant–Appellant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Timothy E. Warriner, Sacramento, CA, for Defendant–Appellant.
Michael D. Anderson (argued) and Phillip A. Talbert, Assistant United States Attorneys, Sacramento, CA, for Plaintiff–Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California, Lawrence K. Karlton, Senior District Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. 2:11–cr–00290–LKK–1.
Before: RICHARD C. TALLMAN and JOHNNIE B. RAWLINSON, Circuit Judges, and MARVIN J. GARBIS, Senior District Judge.*
Appellant Daniel Garcia (Garcia) challenges his conviction for using a pipe bomb to damage a vehicle and apartment building in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 844(i). Garcia contends that the government failed to present sufficient evidence to satisfy the Commerce Clause jurisdictional requirement of 18 U.S.C. § 844(i), because the government failed to demonstrate that Garcia's criminal conduct affected interstate commerce. Garcia also maintains that the district court erred in instructing the jury that damage to the rental apartment building and vehicle met the jurisdictional mandates, and that 18 U.S.C. § 844(i) is unconstitutional on its face. We affirm.
I. BACKGROUNDA. Indictment
In a four-count indictment, Garcia was charged with “maliciously damag[ing] and destroy[ing] and attempt[ing] to damage and destroy, by means of an explosive, a building and vehicle used in interstate commerce, and in an activity affecting interstate commerce” in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 844(i). 1 The indictment alleged that Garcia “knowingly carr[ied] and use[d] a destructive device, to wit, a pipe bomb” in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A).2
B. Garcia's Motion To Dismiss The Indictment
Prior to trial, Garcia filed a motion to dismiss the indictment. Garcia asserted that the government was unable to satisfy the Commerce Clause jurisdictional requirements of § 844(i) because there were no allegations that the privately owned vehicle, a Chevrolet Tahoe SUV, was utilized in interstate or foreign commerce by the vehicle's owner. The district court denied Garcia's motion.
C. Garcia's Proffered Interstate Commerce Jury Instruction
During the jury instruction conference, Garcia proffered an interstate commerce instruction providing that:
Used in interstate commerce means that a vehicle or a building is used in an activity substantially affecting interstate or foreign commerce if the vehicle or building is actively used for commercial purposes and the vehicle or building does not merely have a passive, passing, or past connection to interstate or foreign commerce. A vehicle or building may affect interstate commerce if it takes on economic functions unrelated to every day, non-commercial, private use. The fact that the vehicle is manufactured in a different state or is insured by an out-of-state company is insufficient to trigger federal jurisdiction under 844(i) or to fulfill the fourth element of the offense.
The district court rejected Garcia's proffered instruction, and instead instructed the jury that an apartment building “is used in interstate commerce, or in an activity affecting interstate commerce, if it contains rental units and is used as rental property,” and that “[a] vehicle is used in interstate commerce if it is transported from the state where it was manufactured into another state.”
D. Trial Testimony and Verdict
At trial, Jantina Reed (Reed) testified that she, her boyfriend, Kenneth Clark (Clark), and two children resided in Garcia's house for approximately two and a half months. Reed eventually moved from Garcia's home because of Garcia's unusual behavior. According to Reed, Garcia would “run around naked” and “stand in front of [her] doorway and breathe hard ...” Reed and her family moved to an apartment complex in Fairfield, California, and did not inform Garcia of their new address. However, Garcia came to their apartment complex on two occasions in an attempt to contact Reed and her family. During one incident, Reed called the police, and Garcia was arrested.
Reed related that she had an altercation with Garcia when she had a vehicle towed from his residence. As the vehicle was being towed, Garcia threw several items on Reed's car and threatened, “tick, tick, boom, I'm going to blow this up to pieces.” Garcia also allegedly told Reed, “you know I have the means to do it, and if I can't get it, I can go online and get it....” Reed did not hear from Garcia after the incident.
On May 26, 2011, Reed fell asleep at approximately 11:30 or 11:45 p.m. Reed subsequently “heard a giant bang noise” and “there was fire all in their window.” Reed grabbed her children and ran outside, where she saw flames coming from her Chevy Tahoe SUV, which Reed had borrowed from her mother.
Clark testified that he heard “a little noise like tink, tink, and then boom” before the apartment's window was engulfed in flames. Clark went outside and extinguished the flames around the vehicle with a fire extinguisher.
Officer Christopher Grimm of the City of Fairfield Police Department responded to a police dispatch “just after 1:00 a.m. on May 27, 2011” to an apartment complex. When he arrived, Officer Grimm noticed a blue Chevy Tahoe with “what appeared to be a steel galvanized pipe below it and several blue propane canisters around it.” Officer Grimm “collected ... pieces of cardboard around the vehicle, approximately 20 feet or so in a kind of circular circumference around the vehicle, along with several blue propane canisters, the galvanized pipe and cap, and several pieces of duct tape and other materials that were found in the area.”
Officer Grimm also measured the time and distance between the site of the explosion and a 24 Hour Fitness gym. According to Officer Grimm, it took “[a]pproximately five minutes and two seconds” at 2:45 a.m. to drive the 2.2 miles from the gym to the site of the explosion.
Detective William Shaffer of the City of Fairfield Police Department investigated the components of the explosive device. Detective Shaffer testified that the device was attached to five Worthington brand propane cylinders—a commonly available type of propane canister. Detective Shaffer related that the device was “a 2–inch by 12–inch piece of galvanized steel pipe ... with Mueller brand end caps on both ends.” Detective Shaffer believed that the device utilized smokeless or black powder, but he was unable to recover any materials indicating how the device was detonated. Detective Shaffer observed that the end cap had a drill hole that may have served as “an ignition source into the interior of the pipe.” Detective Shaffer did not recover any timing devices or fuses.
Detective Shaffer also found damage from the explosion to the nearby apartment building. According to Detective Shaffer, there were impact marks approximately two to three feet from the ground in the stucco wall near the children's bedroom. Detective Shaffer opined that the impact marks were created by metal fragments from the pipe bomb or from the propane cylinders.
Detective Shaffer observed that the pieces from a cardboard box contained a model number. Detective Shaffer determined that the cardboard box served as the container for the pipe bomb and that the model number was for a “3,000 watt power inverter.”
Detective Shaffer also participated in the search of Garcia's residence. During the search, the officers found a receipt for an AIMS 3,000 watt power inverter; a pipe bomb wrapped in a sheet in the garage; and a set of gopher gassers with fuses similar to the one on the pipe bomb. According to Detective Shaffer, the pipe bomb found in Garcia's garage was similar to the one used in the apartment complex explosion because both bombs were “constructed out of a length of galvanized steel pipe, both of them had cast metal end caps on each end, both of them had paper towel or some type of a paper wadding, [and] both of them had gunpowder as a filler or combustible material inside.”
Matthew Rainsberg (Rainsberg), a forensic chemist for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), determined that the two pipe bombs contained similar smokeless gunpowder, and that the fuse on the pipe bomb found in Garcia's garage was visually and physically similar to the fuses on the gopher gassers. Although Rainsberg could not conclusively determine if the fuses were the same, he opined that the fuses were “visually and physically similar, and ... contain[ed] the similar fuse core powder.”
Tania Kapila, an ATF fingerprint specialist, testified that Garcia's latent fingerprints and palm print were found on the gopher gasser control devices.
Robert Krause (Krause), a friend of Garcia's, testified that he drove Garcia to an apartment complex where Garcia identified a Chevy Tahoe as belonging to a friend. According to Krause, Garcia complained that he had problems with roommates who had taken “quite a few of his possessions.” Garcia indicated that the roommates were “a mother and father and child ...” Krause related that, a few weeks after driving Garcia to the apartment complex, Garcia showed Krause a pipe bomb that Garcia stored in an ice chest in his garage. Garcia did not inform Krause what he intended to do with the pipe bomb.
Leonard Duprez, a General Motors district manager for after sales, testified that, based on the vehicle identification number, the SUV damaged in the explosion was manufactured in Jamesville, Wisconsin.
Maricela Avila, a property manager, testified that the apartment complex in which the explosion occurred advertised apartment rentals online and that some of the residents who signed lease agreements came from out of state.
Sean Nichols (Nichols), the vice-president of sales for Aims Power, testified that the cardboard box...
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