Child enticement; 18 USC § 2422(b); Relevant conduct; USSG § 1B1.3(a)(1); Cross-reference to sex-abuse guideline; § 2G1.3(c)(3); Aggravated sexual abuse; § 2241(a); Sexual act; § 2246(2)(C); Forced sexual act enhancement; § 2A3.1(b)(1); Double counting; Pattern of activity; § 4B1.5(b)(1); Separate occasions; Wooden v United States; Substantive reasonableness; § 3553(a)

The court held that the district court properly treated defendant-Neal's two sexual assaults as relevant conduct to his child-enticement offense and reasonably imposed a bottom-of-guidelines sentence. Defendant pled guilty to attempting to entice a minor over Facebook Messenger during a nearly two-year period, and he admitted that during that period he twice sexually assaulted the same victim. The district court treated the assaults as relevant conduct, applied the sex-abuse guideline cross-reference and related enhancements, and sentenced him to 292 months. On appeal, the court first held that the assaults “occurred during [Neal’s] commission of” the enticement offense because he admitted to a “continuing” two-year violation, and each assault occurred “at some point in the course of” that effort. It rejected his reliance on cases involving different or later victims because his indictment did not “cabin[]” the offense to a specific day, and the assaults occurred in the charged time frame against the same victim. The court next held that there was no impermissible double counting because the cross-reference and forced-sexual-act enhancement addressed “distinct aspects” of the conduct: “sexual abuse” triggered the cross-reference, while the “aggravated nature” of the abuse triggered the enhancement. It also held that the pattern-of-activity enhancement applied because the two assaults of the same child occurred more than a year apart and in different counties, which “compel[led] the conclusion” they occurred on separate occasions even under Wooden. Finally, the court held that the sentence was substantively reasonable because the district court balanced the seriousness of abuse of “a very young victim” over “a pretty lengthy period of time” against defendant’s limited criminal history and family relationships before selecting the bottom of the range. Affirmed.