Prewett ex rel. J.W. v. Weems

749 F.3d 454

Teresa PREWETT, Mother of minor and next friend of J.W.; J.W., Plaintiffs–Appellees,

v.Stanley WEEMS, Defendant–Appellant.

No. 12–6489.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

April 14, 2014.

ON BRIEF:Jessica Chambers McAfee, Greeneville, Tennessee, for Appellant. Duncan Cates Cave, Greeneville, Tennessee, for Appellee. Sonja Ralston, United states Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., for Amicus Curiae.

Before: MERRITT, SUTTON and STRANCH, Circuit Judges.

OPINION

SUTTON, Circuit Judge.

Stanley Weems pleaded guilty to one count of producing child pornography. See18 U.S.C. § 2251(a). His victim, J.W., filed this civil action against Weems to obtain compensation for the abuse. See id. § 2255(a). The district court awarded $1 million, a figure reached by multiplying the presumed-damages floor in the civil-remedies statute ($150,000) by the number of videos Weems produced (seven) and by capping the damages at the relief sought in J.W.'s complaint ($1 million). This accounting raises an interesting question: Does the civil-remedies statute set a presumptive floor of $150,000 for each criminal violation or a presumptive floor of $150,000 for each cause of action without regard to the number of alleged violations? As we see it, the text, structure and context of the statute, together with the structure of related civil-remedy laws, establish that the $150,000 figure creates a damages floor for a victim's cause of action, not for each violation. We therefore reverse the district court's contrary conclusion.

I.

From 2007 until 2011, J.W., then a minor, spent time with Weems at his Tennessee home. While there, J.W. frequently had sex with prostitutes hired by Weems. Weems apparently got a kick out of watching the encounters and filming them.

In July 2011, J.W. told the police what had happened. The police searched Weems' home, where they found a cellular phone containing seven videos of J.W. having sex with the prostitutes as well as some audio tapes recording the voices of Weems, J.W. and various prostitutes. In a three-count indictment, the government charged Weems with producing, possessing and persuading a minor to create child pornography. Weems pleaded guilty to the production count, and the district court sentenced him to 180 months.

Soon after the government filed these charges, J.W. filed an action of his own. Invoking 18 U.S.C. § 2255, he sought $1 million in damages for his injuries. He offered some proof of harm—the affidavits of two psychologists identifying the impact of the abuse and describing the likely futuretreatment needed to recover from it. But he never attempted to prove the extent of his actual damages. He instead relied on the presumptive damages created by the statute ($150,000) and requested that the district court multiply the damages floor by the number of times Weems violated the criminal statute. Over Weems' objection, the district court adopted J.W.'s theory of recovery. It concluded that Weems violated the criminal production statute seven times—one violation for each video found on his cellular telephone—multiplied the $150,000 presumed-damages floor in the statute by seven, and reduced the total ($1,050,000) to reflect the $1 million award requested in J.W.'s complaint.

II.

Before considering the merits of this challenge, we pause to address whether Weems filed an untimely notice of appeal, depriving us of jurisdiction over the case. J.W. reasons that the thirty-day clock for filing an appeal began running the minute the district court issued an opinion on his motion for summary judgment, even though the district court did not enter final judgment against Weems for another month. If the filing deadline ran from the date of the district court's opinion, as opposed to the date of judgment, this notice of appeal indeed would be untimely. But that is not how it works. Rule 4 of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure starts the clock upon “entry of the judgment” which, in the case of summary judgment (with an exception not applicable here), requires an order “set forth on a separate document.” Fed. R.App. P. 4(a)(1), (7); see alsoFed.R.Civ.P. 58. Weems filed his notice of appeal fourteen days after the district court entered judgment against him in a separate document, making his appeal timely under Rule 4. See Rubin v. Schottenstein, Zox & Dunn, 110 F.3d 1247, 1250–53 (6th Cir.1997), overruled on other grounds,143 F.3d 263 (6th Cir.1998) (en banc); see also United States v. Indrelunas, 411 U.S. 216, 93 S.Ct. 1562, 36 L.Ed.2d 202 (1973).

III.

Enacted as part of the Child Abuse Victims' Rights Act of 1986, § 2255 empowers victims of child sexual abuse to recover money for the harms caused by their abusers. See 100 Stat. 1783, § 703(a) (1986); 18 U.S.C. § 2255. The relevant subsection reads in relevant part:

Any person who, while a minor, was a victim of a violation of section ... 2251 [among others] ... and who suffers personal injury as a result of such violation ... may sue in any appropriate United States District Court and shall recover the actual damages such person sustains and the cost of the suit, including a reasonable attorney's fee. Any person as described in the preceding sentence shall be deemed to have sustained damages of no less than $150,000 in value.

18 U.S.C. § 2255(a). Under the statute, the victim must establish a liability predicate for the award and a damages predicate for the award. As for liability, the victim must show that his abuser violated a qualifying criminal statute. Id.; see also Doe v. Boland, 698 F.3d 877, 880–82 (6th Cir.2012). As for damages, the victim may recover either actual damages or presumed damages in an amount “no less than $150,000 in value.” 18 U.S.C. § 2255(a).

Weems claims that the district court erred on each front: (1) on liability, by holding that he violated a qualifying criminal statute seven times even though just one conviction arose from his conduct, and (2) on damages, by holding that the statute bestows a minimum $150,000 award for each violation as opposed to each cause of action.

Liability. The first question turns on the meaning of “violation” in § 2255. If a violation requires a criminal conviction, Weems may be held civilly liable only for a single violation, as he was convicted of just one qualifying child-abuse crime. But if a violation requires only proof by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant engaged in prohibited conduct, Weems may be held liable for as many qualifying violations as J.W. proved in his civil case—here seven.

The district court ruled that violations do not require convictions. On the asset side of that decision are three considerations. First, the customary meaning of violation tends toward the broad (any failure to conform to a legal standard) rather than the narrow (a criminal conviction). See, e.g., Oxford English Dictionary Online (3d ed. 2012) (“Infringement or breach, flagrant disregard or non-observance of some principle or standard of conduct or procedure, as an oath, promise, law, etc.; an instance of this.”); Black's Law Dictionary (9th ed.2009) (“An infraction or breach of the law; a transgression ... [or t]he act of breaking or dishonoring the law; the contravention of a right or duty.”); Webster's Second Int'l Dictionary 2846 (1953) (“Infringement; transgression; non-observance; as, the violation of law, covenants, promises, etc.”).

Second, terms are known by the company they keep, United States v. Shultz, 733 F.3d 616, 622 (6th Cir.2013), and the neighboring provisions of § 2255 use “violation” and “conviction” distinctively, suggesting that the different words have different meanings. Section 2255 applies when a victim shows a “violation ” of the relevant criminal provisions, but the related criminal-forfeiture statute applies only when the government shows the defendant was “convicted of an offense.” Compare18 U.S.C. § 2253, with18 U.S.C. § 2255 (emphases added). In the context of setting sentencing minimums and maximums, the criminal provisions differentiate between the “violat[ion] or attempt[ ] or conspir[acy] to violate” the statute that the government must prove in the criminal case and any “prior conviction[s]” already adjudicated that the district court must consider in sentencing the individual. See, e.g.,18 U.S.C. § 2252(b). Distinct uses of “violation” and “conviction” throughout these related statutes undermine the idea that the two words mean the same thing.

Third, precedent favors this interpretation. Addressing RICO's civil-remedies provision, which also contains a “violation” requirement, the Supreme Court held that the statute's language gave “no obvious indication that a civil action can proceed only after a criminal conviction.” Sedima, S.P.R.L. v. Imrex Co., 473 U.S. 479, 488, 105 S.Ct. 3275, 87 L.Ed.2d 346 (1985). The Court reasoned that “the term ‘violation’ does not imply a criminal conviction ... [but rather] refers only to a failure to adhere to legal requirements.” Id. at 489, 105 S.Ct. 3275. Noting that other sections of RICO, including the criminal-forfeiture provision and the sentencing-enhancement subsections, employed the term “conviction” rather than “violation,” the Court concluded that the two words captured different meanings. Id. at 489 & n. 7, 105 S.Ct. 3275. Taken together, these considerations prompted the Court to conclude that “the predicate acts” required for civil liability need not “be established beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. at 491, 105 S.Ct. 3275. Just so here.

On the debit side of this interpretation is one consideration—that it will be more burdensome to show violations than convictions. True enough. As this case well shows, there is nothing to debate about the number of Weems' criminal convictions (one) and there is a debate about the number of Weems' criminal violations (allegedly seven). See infra. But two realities more than make up for these inefficiencies: The words of the...