United States v. Darin Kaufmann


In the United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ No. 18-2742 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. DARIN KAUFMANN, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Indiana, Fort Wayne Division. No. 15-cr-59 — Theresa L. Springmann, Chief Judge. ____________________ ARGUED SEPTEMBER 6, 2019 — DECIDED OCTOBER 9, 2019 ____________________ Before EASTERBROOK, KANNE, and BRENNAN, Circuit Judges. KANNE, Circuit Judge. For certain federal crimes involving sexual exploitation of minors, a federal statute— 18 U.S.C. § 2252(b)—increases the mandatory minimum sen- tence when the defendant has a prior conviction “under the laws of any State relating to,” among other things, “posses- sion … of child pornography.” Darin Kaufmann pled guilty to two federal crimes involving sexual exploitation of a minor. 2 No. 18-2742 The district court imposed an enhanced mandatory minimum sentence under § 2252(b) because Kaufmann has prior convic- tions for possession of child pornography under an Indiana statute. Kaufmann challenged his sentence, arguing that his prior state convictions do not support a § 2252(b) enhance- ment because the Indiana statute of his convictions criminal- ized conduct broader than the federal version of possession of child pornography. In United States v. Kraemer, we held that a § 2252(b) en- hancement does not require the state statute of conviction to be the same as or narrower than the analogous federal law. 933 F.3d 675 (7th Cir. 2019). Rather, the words “relating to” in § 2252(b) expand the range of enhancement-triggering con- victions. Id. at 679–83. Under Kraemer, Kaufmann’s Indiana convictions are ones “relating to … possession … of child por- nography” and thus support the mandatory minimum en- hancement. Adhering to our decision in Kraemer, we affirm Kaufmann’s sentence. I. BACKGROUND Kaufmann arranged to care for an elderly man in ex- change for room and board. The living arrangement ended when police arrested Kaufmann for stealing money from the man. As the man’s family packed Kaufmann’s belongings, they discovered child pornography. A grand jury indicted Kaufmann on charges of receiving and possessing materials involving sexual exploitation of a minor, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(2) and (a)(4), and Kaufmann pled guilty to both offenses without a plea agreement. The mandatory minimum sentence for this pair of convic- tions is enhanced to fifteen years if the defendant has a prior No. 18-2742 3 conviction “under the laws of any State relating to aggravated sexual abuse, sexual abuse, or abusive sexual conduct involv- ing a minor or ward, or the production, possession, receipt, mailing, sale, distribution, shipment, or transportation of child pornography.” 18 U.S.C. § 2252(b)(1) (emphases added).1 The district court concluded that this enhancement applies because Kaufmann has prior convictions for possession of child pornography in violation of Indiana Code § 35-42-4-4 (2007). The court accordingly sentenced Kauf- mann to an aggregate fifteen-year term of imprisonment, fol- lowed by five years of supervised release. Kaufmann ap- pealed that sentence, contesting the district court’s determi- nation that his Indiana convictions trigger the enhancements ...

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