Crime of Violence – Sentencing

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: UInited States of America v. Ramon E. Rivera

Case No.: 16-1322

Officials: RIPPLE, KANNE, and ROVNER, Circuit Judges

Focus: Crime of Violence – Sentencing

On December 23, 2014, Rivera and three others robbed a Milwaukee bar called the Brew City Tap. They all wore masks; and three of them were armed, two with BB guns and one with a .40‐caliber handgun. They left with $857.25 Four days later, they robbed the Sky Zone Indoor Trampoline Park. This robbery was more successful than the prior one, netting them over $12,000. Nearly fifty businesses throughout the Milwaukee area suffered similar armed robberies between October 2013 and January 2015. Although various cooperating witnesses implicated Rivera in thirty of those robberies, the government sought a reckoning for only five of them. To that end, the government charged Rivera with five counts of Hobbs Act robbery under 18 U.S.C. §§ 1951(a) and 2. The government also took the position that Hobbs Act robbery constitutes a “crime of violence” as defined under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3). So in addition to the five Hobbs Act robbery counts, the government tacked on five counts of brandishing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence under 18 U.S.C. §§ 924(c) and 2. Rivera agreed to plead guilty to two of the crime‐of‐ violence counts in exchange for the government dropping the other charges. Judge Stadtmueller accepted Rivera’s guilty plea on November 12, 2015. On February 4, 2016, Judge Stadtmueller sentenced Rivera to the mandatory minimum of thirty‐two years’ imprisonment.1 He also imposed a five‐year term of supervised re‐ lease, which he said he was “obliged” to do. (R. 196 at 24.)   Rivera timely appealed his convictions and sentence, raising two issues: (1) whether Hobbs Act robbery qualifies as a “crime of violence” under § 924(c); and (2) whether Judge Stadtmueller committed procedural error by saying he was “obliged” to impose a five‐year supervised‐release term. With respect to the first issue, we have recently decided that Hobbs Act robbery indeed qualifies as a “crime of violence” under § 924(c) because it “has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person or property of another.” United States v. Anglin, No. 15‐3625, 2017 WL 359666, at *6–7 (7th Cir. Jan. 25, 2017) (quoting 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)(A)). The Hobbs Act defines robbery in relevant part as “the unlawful taking or obtaining of personal property from the person or in the presence of another, against his will, by means of actual or threatened force, or violence, or fear of injury, immediate or future, to his person or property.” 18 U.S.C. § 1951(b)(1). Because one cannot commit Hobbs Act robbery without using or threatening physical force, we held that Hobbs Act robbery qualifies as a predicate for a crime‐of‐violence conviction. Anglin, 2017 WL 359666, at *7.

Affirmed

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.