morning your honour's my name is todd grover i represent the appellate marshal rich my intention this morning to start out by making a few of the key points that i've made in my briefs that i will then with the court's permission that fair opportunity to defend itself i can state the problem another way and that is that the accuracy of the verdict in this case is questionable because the jury that rendered that verdict  put on some defense and the trial that we had in this case which is my client had no defense it was my client's yury of defense in what he intended to prove a trial what's that somebody else is still seated at the residence was the drug dealer who that there were other people at the residence during that period of most if not all of these other controlled by other people that the officers actually saw who knows who was actually in the house secondly after the arrest he makes these admissions in these letters to his nephew marshall richmond saying these drugs are mine these are statements against interests which have long been recognized to be reliable trustworthy something this is the most i think this is the most important point for us to take on is the statement that is really at issue here is henry johnson in his letters saying i'm sorry you're probably madder than hotter than you know he doesn't your honor and i would like to get back and finish addressing that question that you raised in your concern about harmless error but let me let me make me finish up i thought i think what else makes this real life the final point your honor that makes this reliable y my drugs because the advice of counsel and he kept his mouth shut and i suggest he did that because they were his those are the big points trying to make this libel but let me answer your question the reason that this is this is not harmless here is that as i was saying judge there were two ways that my client was attempting to demonstrate that somebody else was the dealer in question one was demonstrating that there were always other people other potential people around who could have been my name is jennifer martin an assistant united states attorney and i represent the united states in this case i want to turn to the court's questions about the trustworthiness the two documents and then i want to go back to the point i made in is that what you're trying to yes your honor anyone present at the house at that time would have known that was where the cocaine was located the admission of these two letters would have had little if any effect on the jury's deliberations in  this the trial court correctly found that they were simply not trustworthy that they didn't have sufficient corroboration to establish the trustworthiness that this court requires in admitting a statement against you know  innocence and just as in look grand versus stewart the court examined the two documents looked for evidence that both corroborated and contradicted the statements and offer the two letters even though the witness had failed to appear while the marshals were out attempting to arrest the declarant and then again on monday after the client exercise document was nor did anyone attempt to conduct any type of handwriting analysis that would have satisfied a preliminary identification of the documents so that they would be admissible turning to the concerns though about trustworthiness and examining trustworthiness the court should look at the time of the declaration party to whom it was made and the existence of corroborat upon she and slaughter in chia the defendant the declarant made four statements to law enforcement immediately after the crime at the time he was undergoing emergency surgery and in that case the surveillance while there was less evidence then and she asked the clients made statements that the government informants used drugs with the defendant the same was made months after the crime as was the case here but there was at least some corroborating evidence in the form of the defendant's testimony about what happened at that time in this case there is not yes and i believe the trial court relied upon that fact to although frankly the record does not indicate and mr johnson was even a drug user the probation officer indicated that that matter was not clear to him that's the defendants that the facts that counsel just discussed because i want to make sure that we all have a clear understanding of what the what the record looks like counsel talked about the possibility that henry johnston certainly that is a theoretical possibility but there's no evidence of that actually now there is also what i'm arguing and i think he's got an insider knowledge of the location that's in the record now the inference that i would ask