Case: 14-15596 Date Filed: 02/28/2019 Page: 1 of 42 [DO NOT PUBLISH] IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT ________________________ No. 14-15596 ________________________ D.C. Docket No. 0:14-cr-60080-JEM-1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, versus JESSE LEWIS, Defendant - Appellant. ________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida ________________________ (February 28, 2019) Before MARCUS, JILL PRYOR and SILER, * Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: * The Honorable Eugene E. Siler, Jr., Senior United States Circuit Judge for the Sixth Circuit, sitting by designation. Case: 14-15596 Date Filed: 02/28/2019 Page: 2 of 42 A jury convicted Jesse Lewis of two counts of sex trafficking by force, threats of force, fraud, and/or coercion, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1591(a), and one count of using, carrying, and possessing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence and brandishing that firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A), (c)(3)(B). On appeal, Lewis challenges the impanelment of a juror and the admission of various of items of evidence. He also argues that the district court abused its discretion by denying him a continuance to present a witness, that the government’s improper remarks in its closing argument deprived him of a fair trial, that his conviction under § 924(c) is invalid on statutory and constitutional grounds, and that cumulative error tainted his trial. Finally, he argues that the district court made numerous errors in sentencing him. Having thoroughly reviewed the record, and with the benefit of oral argument, we affirm. I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND A. Lewis’s Trafficking of Tracie Bertie (Counts 1 and 3) Lewis met Tracie Bertie in July 2010, shortly after she lost her job as a nanny. At the time, Bertie was a Brazilian national present in the United States who had overstayed her visa. She and Lewis soon entered a relationship, and she moved in with him. Lewis told Bertie he could get her a dancing job. Bertie did not realize that Lewis wanted her to prostitute herself until he drove her to a client’s house. Lewis gave Bertie condoms and told her to have sex with the client. 2 Case: 14-15596 Date Filed: 02/28/2019 Page: 3 of 42 Bertie, though afraid, did what she was told. Lewis arranged additional prostitution appointments for Bertie; after initially allowing her to keep the earnings, he later began to pocket them himself, telling Bertie he was saving the money for her. Lewis set the prices for Bertie’s prostitution appointments. Lewis booked Bertie a room at a Red Roof Inn in Broward County, Florida, where for about two months she met clients and spent time alone. Lewis and an associate of his named Sadé Patterson arranged prostitution appointments for Bertie. A Red Roof employee named Fausto Silva, whom Bertie befriended, once observed a bruise on Bertie’s arm, but never asked her about it. Bertie and Silva spoke regularly, but when Lewis’s car approached, Bertie would tell Silva that she had to leave and would run up ...
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