In United States v. Scott, --- F.4th ---, No. 21-30128 (9th Cir. 2023), the Court (1) affirmed Luke Scott’s conviction for felony child abuse under the Major Crimes Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1153, and Mont. Code Ann. § 45-5-212; and (2) affirmed the district court’s application of a serious bodily injury enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2A3.1(b)(4)(B) to Scott’s sentence for aggravated sexual abuse by force or threat in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2241(a).
These were consolidated appeals arising from separate prosecutions for acts against different victims.
In the first case, the Court held that government properly charged Scott with felony child abuse under the Major Crimes Act and the Montana statute. The Major Crimes Act provides federal jurisdiction for the prosecution of Native Americans for discrete crimes, including “felony child abuse.” It also provides that, when an enumerated offense is not defined and punished by federal law, it shall be defined and punished in accordance with the laws of the state in which such offense was committed.
The Court rejected Scott’s argument that Congress’s 2013 amendments to the Major Crime Act—including its addition of “a felony assault under section 113”—displaced the crime of felony child abuse under the Major Crimes Act such that the government may no longer use state law to define the crime.
In the second case, the Court rejected Scott’s argument that the district court’s imposition of the serious bodily injury enhancement under § 2A3.1(b)(4)(B) for his conviction for aggravated sexual abuse resulted in improper double counting. This issue is a bit complicated. But ultimately, The Court adopted the Tenth Circuit’s analysis, which reasoned that (1) § 1B1.1 provides different definitions of “serious bodily injury”—a Harm Definition and a Conduct Definition; (2) the Conduct Definition cannot be used when applying the Sexual Abuse Guideline; (3) nothing precludes a sentencing court from considering whether the victim’s injuries “resulting directly from the sexual abuse as well as those suffered during relevant conduct surrounding that offense” qualify as serious bodily injury under the Harm Definition; and (4) the serious-bodily injury enhancement can apply to a sexual abuse offender convicted under convicted under § 2241, but it must be based on the fact that the victim’s injuries meet § 1B1.1’s Harm Definition.
