Case ID: f-appx_639/html/0710-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Edgar ENCARNACION-LAFONTAINE, Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 15-1223.
    United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.
    Feb. 16, 2016.
    
      Natali J.H. Todd, Brooklyn, NY, for Appellant.
    Emil J. Bove III, Michael A. Levy, Assistant United States Attorneys, for Preet Bharara, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, New York, NY, for Appellee.
    PRESENT: Pierre N. Leval, Barrington D. Parker, Susan L. Carney, Circuit Judges.
   SUMMARY ORDER.

Following a jury trial, Defendant-Appellant Edgar Encarnacion-Lafontaine (“En-carnación”) was convicted of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute marijuana in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841, 846; conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841, 846; conspiracy to commit extortion in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371; extortion in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 875(b); and conspiracy to commit witness tampering in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1512(k). Encarnación was sentenced principally to concurrent terms of 60 months’ imprisonment on the extortion conspiracy count and 180 months’ imprisonment on all other counts, as well as concurrent five-year terms of supervised release on all counts. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts and the procedural history of this case, to which we refer only as necessary to explain our decision to affirm.

Encarnación challenges several of the District Court’s evidentiary rulings. We review evidentiary challenges for abuse of discretion. United States v. Nehtalov, 461 F.3d 309, 318 (2d Cir.2006). Any such error will be disregarded if it is harmless. See Fed.R.Crim.P. 52(a).

Encarnación first contends that threatening Facebook messages and a letter left at Rafael Goris’s mother’s house should not have been admitted because they were (1) hearsay and (2) inadequately authenticated. His hearsay challenge is easily dismissed because the messages and the letter were not admitted for the truth of the matters asserted in them. See Fed. R.Evid. 801(c)(2); see also United States v. Bellomo, 176 F.3d 580, 586 (2d Cir.1999) (“Statements offered as evidence of ... threats ... rather than for the truth of the matter asserted, therein, are not hearsay.”).

His authentication contentions are also unavailing. Evidence may be admitted on a showing “sufficient to support a finding that the item is what the proponent claims it is.” Fed.R.Evid. 901(a). “The ultimate determination as to whether the evidence is, in fact, what its proponent - claims is thereafter a matter for the jury¡” United States v. Vayner, 769 F.3d 125, 130 (2d Cir.2014).

As to the Facebook messages, the Government introduced evidence that (1) the Facebook accounts used to send the messages were accessed from IP addresses connected to computers near Encarna-cion’s apartment; (2) patterns of access to the accounts show that they were controlled by the same person; (3) in addition to the Goris threats, the accounts were used to send messages to other individuals connected to Encarnación; (4) Encarna-ción had a motive to make the threats, and (5) a limited number of people, including Encarnación, had information that was contained in the messages. This evidence made it reasonably likely that, as the Government contended at trial, the letters and Facebook messages were written by En-camación, and it was not error to admit them. See United States v. Pluta, 176 F.3d 43, 49 (2d Cir.1999).

Our decision in Vayner, in which we vacated a conviction because we found social media evidence was improperly admitted at trial, does not require a different result: In that case, the only evidence suggesting that the defendant was the owner óf a social media account opened in his name was the fact that the account included his photograph and basic biographical information about him that was known to many others. 769 F.3d at 131-33. Here, there was significantly more evidence from which a jury could reasonably infer that Encarnación controlled the Facebook accounts used to threaten the Goris family.

The letter to Mrs. Goris was also properly authenticated. To support its assertion that Encamación was the author of the letter, the Government introduced testimony and cell site data showing that Encarnación traveled to the, neighborhood of Mrs. Goris’s home on two occasions in the week before the letter was discovered, and cell site data confirmed that he returned to that area on the day the letter was discovered. Additionally, Rafael Goris admitted to stealing $30,000 from Encar-nación, which indicates that Encarnación had a motive to make the threat made in the letter. And in a recorded telephone call, Rafael Goris and Encarnación discussed the letter in a manner that suggests the inference that Encarnación was responsible for it. Under these circumstances, the District Court did not abuse its discretion in admitting the letter.

Encarnación also challenges the Government’s use of certain demonstrative exhibits created by the government, in the form of maps depicting historical cell site data and the location of Mrs. Goris’s apartment, and showing the dates a particular MetroCard linked to Encarnación was used to access the New York City subway. The maps were shown to the jury, but not received into evidence. Encarnación now contends that the maps .somehow misled the jury. Since he does not contend that the maps contained information not in evidence, his citation to United States v. Groysman does not support his claim that the maps should not have been shown to the jury. See 766 F.3d 147, 151, 159 (2d Cir.2014). Nor has he demonstrated that their design and layout made the maps in any way misleading. The District Court did not abuse its discretion in allowing the maps to be shown to the jury.

Last, Encarnación contends that there were a number of evidentiary errors which collectively called for reversal of his conviction, even if no one individually would require it. We find no errors.

Separate from his evidentiary challenges, Encarnación contends that there was insufficient evidence to convict him on any of the charges lodged against him. This Court reviews sufficiency of the evidence challenges de novo. United States v. Anderson, 747 F.3d 51, 59 (2d Cir.2014). Sufficiency challenges are subject to an “exceedingly deferential standard of review,” in which a conviction must be upheld if “any rational trier of fact could have found the. essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. (emphasis in original) (internal quotation marks omitted).

Wiretapped telephone calls provided substantial evidence to support the jury’s verdict that Encamación conspired to distribute and possess with intent to distribute marijuana. “In order to convict a defendant of the crime of conspiracy, the government must show that two or more persons entered into a joint enterprise for an unlawful purpose, with awareness of its general nature and extent.” United States v. Torres, 604 F.3d 58, 65 (2d Cir.2010). It is true that the Government adduced no evidence tending to prove that Encarna-ción actually handled marijuana for the conspiracy. But in the recorded calls, En-carnación and Manuel Rodriguez, the head of the marijuana distribution ring, discussed Eneamacion’s planned trip to California to pick up a marijuana load, his expected arrival, and, eventually, the fact that he was diverted from his intended route by FedEx. This sufficed to support the marijuana conspiracy conviction. As to the route change, the jury was entitled to disbelieve Encamacion’s testimony that he was lying to Rodriguez and giving him “the runaround,” App’x at 388, and instead to credit Encarnacion’s recorded statement to Rodriguez that FedEx had surprised him by sending him on a different route.

Similarly, Rafael Goris’s testimony supported Encarnacion’s conviction on the cocaine conspiracy. Goris testified that he observed Encarnación transport packages from California to New York on their FedEx truck, and that-Encarnación admitted to him that the packages contained cocaine. Another Government witness, the special agent who interrogated Encarna-ción after his initial arrest, also testified that Encarnación, had admitted that “beginning a few months ago and then as recently as two weeks [ago], he had transported cocaine from California to New Jersey.” App’x at 142. The jury’s verdict suggests that they believed the testimony of Goris and the special agent rather than that of Encarnación. That credibility determination was the jury’s to make. See United States v. O’Connor, 650 F.3d 839, 855 (2d Cir.2011).

Finally, Encarnación challenges the evidence presented on the charges of conspiracy to commit extortion, extortion, and conspiracy to commit witness tampering. Each of those charges required the Government to prove that Encarnación or a co-conspirator made threats of physical harm to Rafael Goris, a potential witness and the alleged thief of some of Encarna-cion’s drug proceeds, or to Goris’s family. Encarnacion’s sufficiency argument largely reiterates his claim, discussed above, that the Facebook messages and letter to Mrs. Goris should not have been admitted into evidence because there is insufficient evidence to support the Government’s contention that he wrote them. For the reasons given above, the circumstantial evidence adduced at trial about the nature and origin of the messages was sufficient for the jury to infer that Encarnación authored them, and that he intended to threaten the Gorises with physical harm.

'H* H»

We have considered Encarnacion’s remaining arguments on appeal and find them to be without merit. For the reasons set out above, the judgment of the District Court is

AFFIRMED.