United States v. Hymas, No. 13-30239 (9th Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CasePursuant to plea agreements, Aaron and Tiffany Hymas were each convicted of one count of wire fraud in connection with making false statements in a mortgage loan application. The Fourth Circuit (1) vacated Aaron’s sentence of twenty-four months’ imprisonment, holding that the district court in sentencing should have applied the clear and convincing standard of proof, rather than the preponderance of the evidence standard, to determine the extent of losses that were not the subject of Aaron’s conviction, and the error was not harmless; and (2) the district court did not err calculating the defendants’ respective restitution amounts.
Court Description: Criminal Law. The panel vacated Aaron Hymas’s sentence, and affirmed the district court’s restitution order as to Aaron and Tiffany Hymas, in a case in which Aaron and Tiffany each pled guilty to one count of wire fraud in connection with making false statements in a mortgage loan application. The panel held that there were no serious due process concerns that required application of a clear and convincing evidence standard, rather than a preponderance of the evidence standard, to determine the extent of loss attributable to the loan that was the subject of Aaron’s conviction, where Aaron admitted the facts of the fraud that caused the loan to be made and knew the size of the loan, which defined the potential extent of the loss. The panel held that before applying an 8-level increase that more than doubled the Sentencing Guidelines range of imprisonment, the district court should have applied the clear and convincing standard to determine the amount of the losses from loans that were not the subject of Aaron’s conviction, where Aaron was not charged with a conspiracy, pled guilty only to one count of fraud regarding a specific loan transaction, and had neither need nor opportunity to contest the alleged conspiracy. The panel could not say that the error was harmless. UNITED STATES V. HYMAS 3 The panel rejected Aaron’s arguments regarding calculation of losses from the loans. The panel held that the district court correctly calculated the losses by taking the principal amount of the loan and subtracting any credits from the subsequent sale of the property, and did not err by considering the losses submitted by successor lenders who had purchased the loans. The panel held that the district court did not err in calculating Aaron’s and Tiffany’s respective restitution amounts. The panel held that the record supports (1) holding Aaron responsible for losses resulting from loan applications submitted under the names of Tiffany and his brother-in-law in addition to the loans in his name, and (2) determinations that the lenders listed in the presentence report suffered losses that were directly and proximately caused by the Hymases’ conduct. The panel rejected as foreclosed by Robers v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 1854 (2014), the Hymases’ argument that the amount of restitution is too high because the drop in the market, not the fraud on the loan applications, was responsible for the lenders’ losses. The panel remanded for further proceedings.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.