UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, No. 23-1034 D.C. No. Plaintiff - Appellee, 2:04-cr-00173- MKD-1 v. RONALD BRUCE MYERS, AKA OPINION Rick LNU, AKA Rick Curtis,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Washington Mary K. Dimke, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted December 3, 2024 Seattle, Washington

Filed May 6, 2025

Before: Danny J. Boggs, * M. Margaret McKeown, and Ryan D. Nelson, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge R. Nelson; Dissent by Judge McKeown * The Honorable Danny J. Boggs, United States Circuit Judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, sitting by designation. 2 USA V. MYERS

SUMMARY **

Criminal Law/Restitution

The panel affirmed the district court’s order granting the government’s motion to turn over certain funds in Ronald Myers’s inmate trust account and apply them to Myers’s restitution obligation, in a case that presented the question whether a provision of the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3664(n), applies to the gradual accumulation of cash deposits from family and friends in an inmate’s trust account. Section 3664(n) requires an inmate who “receives substantial resources from any source, including inheritance, settlement, or other judgment” to put such resources toward unpaid restitution. The government disclaimed any efforts to target Myers’s prison wages. Rejecting Myers’s argument that § 3664(n) covers only “one-time, lump-sum windfalls and sudden financial injections” from a single source, the panel held that § 3664(n) applies not just to one-time financial windfalls, but also to substantial aggregated sums from multiple sources—like family and friends—that gradually accrue in an inmate’s trust account. Thus, the district court properly invoked § 3664(n) to turn over deposits from family and friends that accrued to form a substantial sum in Myers’s inmate trust account.

** This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader. USA V. MYERS 3

The panel rejected Myers’s argument that the district court’s turnover order contravenes the judgment’s restitution provisions. The panel held that the district court did not abuse its discretion in declining to hold an evidentiary hearing on the composition of Myers’s trust account—i.e., to determine which of the funds could be “specifically identified” as prison wages. Dissenting, Judge McKeown wrote that § 3664(n) applies only to resources that are substantial at the time of receipt. Because the district court assessed whether Myers’s trust account was a substantial amount in total, rather than analyzing individual transactions for substantiality, she would vacate the order authorizing payment and remand for the district court to conduct a transaction-by-transaction analysis.

COUNSEL Brian M. Donovan (argued), Timothy M. Durkin, and Ian L. Garriques, Assistant United States Attorneys; Vanessa R. Waldref, United States Attorney; Office of the United States Attorney, United States Department of Justice, Spokane, Washington; for Plaintiff-Appellee. W. Miles Pope (argued), Goddard Pope PLLC, Boise, Idaho, for Defendant-Appellant. 4 USA V. MYERS

OPINION R. NELSON, Circuit Judge:

The Mandatory Victims Restitution Act requires an inm