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Parties Involved:
Ricky Lee Sands
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

M.l~R ~ G ·1090 

~OBERT' L HOECKER 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v. No. 88- 2514 

RICKY LEE SANDS, 

Defendant-Appellant. 

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the Eastern District of Oklahoma 

(D.C. No. 88- 21-CR) 

l""l"'rl· '4.._.~, ....... \ 

Stephen J . Greubel, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Tulsa , 

Oklahoma, for Defendant- Appellant. 

Sheldon J. Sperling, Assistant United States Attorney, Muskogee, 

Oklahoma, (Roger Hilfiger, United States Attorney, wi th him on the 

brief), for Plaintiff-Appellee. 

Before McKAY, SEYMOUR, and MOORE, Circuit Judges. 

SEYMOUR, Circui t Judge . 

Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 1 
After a jury trial, Ricky Lee Sands , a Native Amer ican 

Indian, was convicted in the United States District Court for the 

Eastern District of Oklahoma of murder i n the f irst degree in 

violation of 18 U. S .C. § 11 53 {1988) and 18 U.S.C. § 111 1 (1988) . 1 

Sands file d a motion for a new trial in which he contended that he 

was denied a fa i r trial by the admission o f prejudicial evidence . 

The district court denied the motion. We reverse. 

On the evening of December 12 , 1987, Sands shot and killed 

John Maul din on Indian ~and. For several hours prior to the 

shoo ting , Sands, Mauldin, and four of Sands' cousins had been 

"riding around" in Mauldin' s car. See r e c ., vo1. II, at 26. 

During this time, Sands drank a consider a b l e quantity of beer a nd 

some rum. 2 Sands' three fema l e cousins s hared a small amount of 

the beer, but Mau ldi n did not drink any thing . Id. at 17 , 126, and 

234-35. At one point during the evening, Sands , who was in the 

front passenger seat , suddenl y pulled out a gun, point ed it at 

Mauldin's head, and "clicked it ." Id. at 27 , 96, and 240. 3 Sands 

1 Defendan t also pled gui l ty to possession by a convicted fel o n 

of a f irearm which had previo usly been transported in i n t erstate 

c ommerce i n violation of 18 U.S.C . §§ 922(g)(l), 924(a)(l)(B) 

(1988). This is not at issue on appeal. 

2 Just how much beer Sands dra nk is very unclear from the 

record. There i s testimony that he had been drinking that 

afternoon, id. at 81 , and when the five people drove to a store t o 

buy bee r , he-bought anywhere fr om twelve to thir ty-s ix cans of 

beer. Id . at 17 and 217 . 

3 The dissent contends that while pointing the gun at Mauld in ' s 

head , Sa nds threa t ened to kill both the victim and the others in 

the car . Only one of the four wit ness es so testified , however. 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 2 
then attempted to apologize to Mauldin, but Mauldin re fused to 

accept his apology and told him that they would fight when " [w]e 

get to the house." Id . at 1 20; see also id . a t 61, 216, and 251. 

Shortly after this conversation, as the car slowed down and pulled 

into t he driveway of two of the passenge rs , Sands pulled out a gun 

and shot Mauldin first on his right side and the n , as Mauldin 

opened the door and started to roll out , in his back. Sands 

orde red one of the passengers to start driving the car away. Whe n 

it stalled , Sands got out of the car and walk ed a round to the back 

where Maul d i n l ay. Testimony indicat ed that Sands kicked Maul din 

in the face and shot him three or four more times. Id . at 40. 

Before the start o f the fi rst trial, the district court 

granted Sands' Motion in Li mine t o prevent the Gove rnment from 

introduci ng evidence of his prior c,onvi ctions, as l ong as·Sands 

himself did no t testify. That trial ultimately ended in a 

Barbara Sands' testimony completely contradicts the other evidence 

of thr ea ts: 

"Q: When h e cli cked it what , if anything , did Rick y 

Sands say to John Mau ldin? 

A: He didn't say anything to him. He just held it on 

his head . 

Q. Was there any conversation be tween • . . the two of 

them about this incident? 

A. No, not at that time." 

Rec . , vo l. II, at 28. 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 3 
mistria l when the jury was unable to agree upon a verdict afte r a 

day and a half. The jury told the court that it was divided on 

the issue of premeditation. 4 

A second trial then began . Sands stipulated at the beginning 

of the trial that he shot and killed John Mauldin. Rec., vol. II , 

at 4 . Sands' defense was that the homicide was not premeditated 

but was instead the product of self-defense or, at most, voluntary 

manslaughter. 

The issue of Sands' prior criminal convictions arose, and the 

Gover nmen t agreed to advise its witnesses not to "mention the fact 

that t he defendant had been in the pen iten tiary." Rec. , vol. III, 

at 325. I t was during this second trial that the allegedly 

prejudical ma.terial .came in. The first statement at issue her e 

was made by Irene Sands, one of Sands' cousins, in response to a 

question from the Government: 

"Q: All right. During that time that you have known 

Ricky Sands, where has he lived most of the t ime? 

"A: He lived around Okfusk ee County for awh ile [sic] , 

and we nt to Tulsa , been to prison, Brok en Arrow." 

Rec., vol. III, at 310 (emphasis added) . At the c lose o f Irene 

Sands' testimony, Sands moved for a mistrial. Id. at 324. I 

4 The jury was instructed on first degree murder, and on the 

lesser included offenses of second degree murder, and voluntary 

manslaughter. The jury also was instructed that vo luntary 

intoxication may negate the existence of a specific intent. 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 4 
The court's initial response to the statement was one of 

shock: 

"I don' t even understand the purpose of the question. 

Why did you ask the quest ion? . . . (HJad you talked 

with ... your witnesses and told them they could not 

ever mention the fact that the defendant had been in 

penitentiary? 

I heard [the answer]. 

floor. I couldn't believe 

the second trial, and that 

that question." 

I almost fell through the 

that that -- here we are in 

you take a chance by asking 

Id. at 325-26. Nevertheless, the judge stated that "the fact that 

the defendant has been to the penitentiary does not, in my mind, 

affect his intent ," id. at 339, and he denied the motion. In 

making its ruling, the court also concluded that the prosecutor 

had not purposely elicited the specific response , that the answer 

had been "vague and passing in nature," and that the.evidence up 

to that point had been "overwhe l mi ng." Id. Sands then declined 

the court's offer to give the jury a cautionary i nstruct ion. 

The probl ems with this inadmissible informat ion continued 

with the very next witness, Ed Smith, an Under Sheriff in Okfuskee 

County. Smith began to discuss Sands' criminal record when he was 

cut off by Sheldon Sperling, the Gover nment attorney: 

"Q: As best you recall that conversation tell the Court 

and jury what it briefly involved. 

"A: Wel l, he had been recently released out of 

"Mr. Sperling: Just a minute. Just a minute." 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 5 
Id. at 357. Again Sands made a motion for a mistrial. The court 

asked Mr. Sperling whether he had told the witness not to refer to 

any prior criminal convictions. Mr. Sperling responded that he 

had , but that he could not recall exactly when he did so. Id. at 

358. The court observed that the witness had been cut off before 

saying anything, and denied the mistrial motion. The jury was 

instructed on first degree murder, second degree murder , and 

voluntary manslaughter. It took five hours to find Sands guilty 

of first degree murder. 

Sands argues that the district court erred by denying his 

motions for mistrial and for a new trial . Specifically, Sands 

contends that a new trial is required because it is not possible 

to "say with reasonable certainty that the reference to prior 

records 'had but very slight e ffect on the verdict of the jury.''' 

Sumrall v. Un i ted States, 360 F .2d 311 , 314 (lOth Cir. 1966); see 

also Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. 750, 764, (1946); United 

States v. Wa lton , 552 F.2d 1354, 1366 (lOth Cir.}, cert. denied, 

431 U.S. 959 (1977) (standard is whether the statement could "have 

had any appreciable effect on t he action of the jury"); United 

States v. Woodring, 446 F.2d 733, 7 37 ( l Oth Cir. 1971) (same). I n 

response , the Government argues that because Sands did not seek a 

cautionary instruction and because evidence of his guilt was so 

strong, a new trial is not required. We disagr ee with the 

Government. 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 6 
In support of its position, the Government cites United 

States v. Heath, 580 F.2d lOll (lOth Cir. 1978), cert. denied, 439 

U.S. 1075 (1979). There a non-examining attorney allegedly 

coached a witness on the stand . We held that it 

"would have been best to strike the remark made as fully 

irrelevant and to admonish the jury to ignore it .. ! • 

[A] belated motion for a mistrial is not the accepted 

procedure in this Circuit following such an incident. 11 

Id. at 1018; see also United States v. Eaton, 485 F.2d 102, 107-08 

(lOth Cir. 1973) {the proper procedure required in this circuit is 

to make a motion to strike, admonish the jury, and warn the 

witnesses not to volunteer prejudicial remarks) . 

This case differs from Heath and Eaton in several respects. 

First, the motions for mistrial made here were not "belated" as in 

Heath; the initial motion was made just after Irene Sands' 

testimony, and the l ater one immediately a fter the next witness 

uttered the "rel eased out of --" statement. Second, in Heath we 

emphasized that the trial court there "did not regard [the 

incident at issue] as important" and that "there was no 

prosecutorial misconduct." Heath, 580 F.2d at 1017 . Here, by 

contrast, the trial judge stated that when he heard Irene Sa nds 

refer to defendant's prison time , he "almost fell through the 

floor," rec"~ vol. III, at 326, and he added that " I don't see how 

it can be cured." Id. at 329. Additionally, whil e the 

Government's conduct in this case may not rise to the level of 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 7 
"misconduct," it certainly borders on negligence. As the trial 

court noted: 

"[Y]ou [the Government attorney] just didn't give it 

enough though t, didn't think out what you we re going to 

do, ... didn't prepare your case well enough, didn't 

think about what you were going to ask and the . . . 

kind of answer that it might bring . " 

Id. at 327. 

Finally, the Government's stress on the fact that Sands did 

not want a cau tionary instruction is somewhat disingenuous since 

the Government itself recognized that "[s)ometimes the defense 

would chose (sic ] not to request anything so as not to emphasize 

[the reference to defendant's record]." Id. at 326 . A cautiona ry 

instruction is generally preferred, but we do no t wish to prevent 

a defendant's defense counsel from making a tactical decision that 

such an instr.uction would do "more damage than good . " Id. at 3·.J9. 

We recognized i n Maestas v. United States, 341 F.2d 493, 496 {lOt h 

Cir. 1965), tha t a cautionary instruction is not suf ficient to 

cure the error where the error i s likely to make a sufficiently 

strong impression on the jury that it will be unable to disregard 

it. See a lso Un i ted States v . Murray, 784 F.2d 188 , 189 (6th Ci r . 

1986) (cautionary i nstruction unde r such circumstances i s "very 

close to an instruction to .unring a bell"). 

The Governmen t also contends that where "the shee r volume of 

evidence against the defendan t was so great as to make 

insignificant an isolated commen t that he had been in prison 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 8 
before, the defendant has suffered no significant prejudice" that 

would warrant a new trial. Government Brief at 10. As we 

observed in Sumrall: 

"[T]he question is not whether the appellants have been 

proven guilty, but whether guilt was established 

acco rding to the procedura l safeguards to insure trial 

before a fair and unprejudiced jury. . . . The question 

we must decide i s whether the jury was more prone to 

convict these appellants knowing they had previ ous 

records than without such knowledge." 

360 F.2d at 314. In assessing this question, it is significant 

that the issue in this case is not whether Sands killed Mauldin, 

since he conceded that point, but what his state of mind was. We 

cannot agree with the district court 's conclusion that the 

evidence of intent was "overwhelming'' and that the references to 

Sands' past incarceration were so "vague and passing in nature" 

that they did not make the jury more prone to convict him of first 

degree murder. In fact, the evidence that Sands killed with 

premeditation and malice aforethought was not ove rwhe l ming. 

Contrary evidence as to his state of mind included the great 

quantity of alcohol he had consumed and Mauldin's threats of a 

fight. Several witnesses testified that Mauldin had a hunting gun 

in the backseat of the car, rec., vol. II, at 40 - 41, 117, and 212, 

and that Sands was present at a fight in which Mauldin had beaten 

up his opponent. 5 Id. at 126-27. This evidence, combined with 

5 We do not pass judgment on the weight or accuracy of this 

evidence. We merely note that a jury uninfluenced by improper 

information migh t have found this evidence in the recor d 

sufficient to negate the existence of the intent needed for 

first-degree murder . 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 9 
the fact that the jury in the first trial could not agree upon the 

issue of premeditation, and that the second jury took five hours 

to reach its decision on Sands' intent, prevent us from saying 

"with reasonable certainty that the reference to prior records 

'had but very slight effect on the verdic t of the jury.'" 

Sumrall, 360 F. 2d at 314. 

We conclude t hat the d istrict court erred in denying Sands ' 

motions for mistrial, and we reve rse and remand for a new trial. 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 10 
No. 88-2514 - United States v. Sands 

MOORE, Circu i t Judge , dissent ing : 

I must respec tfully diss en t becaus e I bel ieve with reasonable 

certainty that the verdict · of the jury was not affected by 

references to the defendant 's prior record. I disagr ee with the 

court 's anal ysis for two reasons. First, in my view, the 

testimony of Sheriff Smit h was not a re fere nce to the defendant's 

prior record. Second , I cannot concur in the suggestion that t he 

inability o f the first jury to reach a ve rdict can be used in 

accessing the effect o f the questioned rema rks on the jury in t his 

case. 

The basis f or the court's reversal lies within statements 

made by two witnesses. Irene Sands volunteered the defendan t had 

" been to' prison ." 1 Even accepting that the jury might have fi xed 

upon this statement wi thi n the contex t in wh ich it was made , it 

stands as t he only reference to defendant's prio r inca rceration. 

The second statement upon which the court focuses i s that of 

Sheriff Smith who offered the incomplet e statement: "Wel l , he 

[the defendant] had been recently out of - II . The cou rt 

1This testimony came in without objection or interrupti on . I t was 

not until some time a fte r completion of cross-examina tion that 

defense counsel sough t a mistrial o n the basis of this statement. 

The pros ecutor responded that the remark was a " su rprise and 

shock " to him and that he was merely a ttempti ng to establish "her 

famil i arity wi th the defendant." Ta ken in context, the question 

which prompt e d the response bears o ut that representa tion. The 

prosecu tor asked Ms. Sands how l ong she had known t he def endant 

and then asked whe r e he had lived during that time . After the 

responding remark , the prosecutor asked whether the defendant had 

lived in the vicinity of Ms . Sands ' house . (R. Vol. III, at 31 0). 

The context shows the purpose of the questi o ns was to fix the 

nature and duration of Ms. Sands' familiari ty wi th the def endant. 

Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 11 
describes this statement as an attempt by Mr. Smith to discuss the 

defendant's criminal record, but the remark is incomplete and 

therefore ambiguous. Taken i n or out of context, the statement in 

no way refers to a prior conviction. We have no way of knowing 

what Mr. Smith meant, and, perforce, neither did the jury. To 

say, then, that t his remark c o ul d have i nfluenced the jury i s 

conjecture. 

As a consequence, we are left with only Ms. Sands' testimony 

that her cousin had been "to prison . " We must weigh this 

statement against the evidence of guilt proffer ed by the 

prosecution to determine whether the volunteered remark could have 

influenced the outcome of this case. When the record is viewed in 

this light, I can fi nd no reason to believe Ms. Sands' revelation 

of the defendant's prior incarceration had any effect on the jury. 

There is an a bundance of testimony that supports the verdict . 

First, evidence shows that the defendant, without provocation, 

pointed his gun at his victim' s head and "cl icked " the t r igger 

while threatening to kill the victim and the others in the car. 

(R. Vol. II, at 95). Second, the initial shooting of the vic tim , 

once i n his side and once i n his back, was without warning or 

provocation. Third, Sands got out of the car and pointed his 

pistol at Barbara Sands, his cousin, and asked if she was "going 

to tell." (R. Vol. II, a t 38). Defendant then turned to his 

victim, k icked h im in the face, and fired three more shots point 

blank into his head and body. Id. at 39-40. In light of this 

evidence, I cannot believe the jury was influenced by Ms. Sands ' 

rema rk the defendant had "been to prison." 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 12 
Further, I can see no logic in drawing inferences from the 

inab ility of the first jury to reach a verdict . It seems patent 

t o me that what may have influenced or failed to have influenced 

that jury is irrelevant. Even if the evidence pres en ted to both 

juries was identical -- which we do not know -- the collective 

reaction of that body of people canno t be utilized to surmis e the 

collective reaction of a completely different group of souls. We 

must judge the effect of the volu ntee red t estimony only upon the 

jury which rendered the verdict. To do otherwise is neither just 

nor logical. I would affi rm . 

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Appellate Case: 88-2514 Document: 01019733720 Date Filed: 03/26/1990 Page: 13