Case ID: f-appx_270/html/0371-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "PER CURIAM: \n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Toney HOUSTON, Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 05-60507
    Summary Calendar.
    United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.
    March 25, 2008.
    John Marshall Aexander, Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Mississippi, Oxford, MS, for Plaintiff-Appellee.
    Aired E. Harlow, Jr., Harlow & Harlow, Grenada, MS, Toney Houston, Federal Medical Center Lexington, Lexington, KY, for Defendant-Appellant.
    Before SMITH, BARKSDALE, and ELROD, Circuit Judges.
   PER CURIAM:

Toney Houston challenges his convictions of conspiring to make false and fictitious oral and written statements in connection with the acquisition of firearms, and aiding, abetting, and inducing another to make false statements in connection with acquisition of a firearm. He does not challenge his conviction of being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Athough the indictment is plainly erroneous because it fails to charge the “intended or likely to deceive” element of 18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(6), the error did not seriously affect the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. The evidence that the false statements were “intended or likely to deceive” was overwhelming and uncontroverted, and the jury was instructed before and at the end of trial that the government was required to prove that element beyond a reasonable doubt; the instruction largely mitigated the eiTor. See United States v. Cotton, 535 U.S. 625, 632-34, 122 S.Ct. 1781, 152 L.Ed.2d 860 (2002); United States v. McGilberry, 480 F.3d 326, 330-31 (5th Cir.2007).

AFFIRMED. 
      
       Pursuant to 5th Cir. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5th Cir. R. 47.5.4.