In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

Cross-Appellee,

v.

WILLIAM WHITE,

Defendant-Appellee,

Cross-Appellant.

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 1:08-cr-00851-1—Lynn Adelman, Judge.

ARGUED JUNE 8, 2012—DECIDED OCTOBER 26, 2012

Before POSNER, FLAUM, and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges. 

PER CURIAM. William White was charged with

soliciting the commission of a violent federal crime

against a juror in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 373. The alleged

solicitations at issue were messages that White posted to

a website that he created to advance white supremacy,

which included White’s 2005 statement that “[e]veryone

associated with the Matt Hale trial has deserved assas-
2 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

sination for a long time,” and his 2008 publication of

information related to the foreperson, “Juror A,” of the

jury that convicted Hale. The 2008 post disclosed Juror A’s

home address and mobile, home, and work phone numbers, though it did not contain an explicit request for

Juror A to be harmed.

White was tried and convicted by a jury. White then

filed a Rule 29 motion for entry of a judgment of acquittal,

arguing that the evidence was insufficient to convict him

of solicitation. The district court granted the motion,

finding that the government failed to present sufficient

evidence for a reasonable juror to conclude that White

was guilty of criminal solicitation, and that White’s

speech was protected by the First Amendment. The

government appeals that ruling, and White has filed a

cross-appeal urging a new trial if we reverse the judgment of acquittal. After reviewing the trial record, we

conclude that a rational jury could have found beyond

a reasonable doubt that, based on the contents of the

website, its readership, and other contextual factors,

White intentionally solicited a violent crime against

Juror A by posting Juror A’s personal information on

his website. Criminal solicitation is not protected by the

First Amendment, and so we reverse White’s acquittal

and reinstate his conviction. Also, because White is not

entitled to a new trial, we remand for sentencing.

I. BACKGROUND

To best understand the facts of this case it is helpful

to have some basic familiarity with another case

involving Matthew Hale, a white supremacist convicted
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 3

of solicitation under 18 U.S.C. § 373. See United States v.

Hale, 448 F.3d 971 (7th Cir. 2006) (per curiam).

The defendant in that case led a white supremacist

organization known as the World Church of the Creator

(“World Church”). A religious organization operating

under the name “Church of the Creator” sued World

Church for trademark infringement in federal court.

Both parties moved for summary judgment and Judge

Joan Lefkow granted the motion of Hale’s organization,

World Church. But we reversed and remanded for judgment to be entered in favor of Church of the Creator.

After Judge Lefkow abided by our instructions, Hale

informed his followers that they were “in a state of war

with this federal judge.” Id. at 978. He then sent an

email to Tony Evola, a cooperating witness who had

infiltrated World Church, requesting the home address

of Judge Lefkow. One day later, Evola and Hale met.

Evola asked Hale if they were “gonna exterminate the

rat.” Hale answered, “I’m gonna fight within the law” but

“that information’s been . . . provided” so “[i]f you wish”

to “do anything yourself, you can, you know?” Evola

responded, “Consider it done,” to which Hale replied,

“Good.” Id. at 979. A jury convicted Hale for, among

other things, criminally soliciting harm to Judge Lefkow,

and he received a sentence of 40 years in prison. Id. at 982.

The foreperson of that jury was “Juror A,” the target of

the alleged solicitation in this case.

William White is an avid supporter of Matthew Hale.

An active white supremacist, White created and served

as editor of a website, Overthrow.com, which sought to

advance that cause. On February 28, 2005, only hours
4 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

Neither Hale nor White (nor anyone connected to either 1

of them) was responsible for the murders.

after Judge Lefkow’s husband and mother were tragically

murdered, White applauded the crimes on his website. 1

He wrote, “Everyone associated with the Matt Hale trial

has deserved assassination for a long time . . . . In my

view, it was clearly just, and I look forward to seeing

who else this new white nationalist group of assassins

kills next.” Not long afterward, in March 2005, White

described an email, circulating on the internet, that contained the personal identification information of the

FBI agents and prosecutors (“scumbags”) who investigated and prosecuted Hale. White noted that they

might be the “next targets of the unknown nationalist

assassin who killed the family of Chicago Judge Joan

Lefkow.” He explained on his website that he would not

disclose the agents’ and prosecutors’ personal information, however, because there was “so great a potential

for action linked to such posting.”

On February 13, 2007, White published on his website

the address of Elie Wiesel, an internationally known

Holocaust survivor, “In Case Anyone Was Looking For

Him.” White praised Eric Hunt, “a fan of [the] website,” as

a “loyal soldier” for attacking Wiesel a few days earlier, on

February 1. White presented similar information about

six black teenagers in Jena, Louisiana in September 2007,

suggesting that they be “lynch[ed]” for their involvement in a schoolyard fight that garnered national attention due to its racial overtones. He continued this trend

in 2008 by posting the personal information of individ-
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 5

White moved in limine to prevent these posts from reaching 2

the jury, but the district court denied his request because

the posts evidenced White’s intent, or were direct evidence

of the “strongly corroborative circumstances” required under

§ 373, or both.

uals whom he labeled “anti-racist” or “enemies” of

white supremacy. One such post, “Kill Richard

Warman,” advocated the murder of a noted Canadian

civil rights lawyer. That particular message could be

accessed from any page on the website because it could

be retrieved using a hyperlink located in a static column

of the site, called “Top Articles.” Another post—“Kill

This Nigger?”—contained images of and articles about

then-presidential candidate Barack Obama. One article

displayed a photograph of the presidential candidate

with swastika-shaped crosshairs superimposed over

his face, and stated that “White people must deny

2

[Barack Obama] the presidency . . . by any means necessary.”

Those postings, however, were mere prelude to the

conduct that got White indicted for criminal solicitation.

On September 11, 2008, White authored a post titled,

“The Juror Who Convicted Matt Hale.” In it, he disclosed

personal, identifying information about Juror A. The

post read:

Gay anti-racist [Juror A] was a juror who played

a key role in convicting Matt Hale. Born [date],

[he/she] lives at [address] with [his/her] gay

black lover and [his/her] cat [name]. [His/Her]
6 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

phone number is [phone number], cell phone

[phone number], and [his/her] office is [phone

number]. 

The post further stated that the “gay Jewish [Juror A],

who has a gay black lover and ties to professional antiracist groups, and who also personally knew [an individual] killed by Ben Smith, a follower of Hale, was allowed

to sit on his jury without challenge and played a leading

role in inciting both the conviction and harsh sentence

that followed.” The entry featured a color photograph

of Juror A.

One day later, White uploaded an identical message to

a different portion of the website. The post carried the

title: “[Juror A] Updated-Since They Blocked the first

photo.” Apparently, Juror A’s employer had blocked

public access to the page on its website that contained

information about Juror A and the color photograph of

the juror that appeared in White’s first post. White’s

second post stated, “Note that [Employer] blocked much

of [Juror A’s] information after we linked to [his/her]

photograph.” The photograph of Juror A that appeared

was embedded in the Overthrow server so that only

White could remove it.

On October 22, 2008, a grand jury indicted White for

soliciting the commission of a violent federal offense

against Juror A in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 373. The indictment charged that White had “solicited and otherwise endeavored to persuade another person to injure

Juror A on account of a verdict assented to by Juror A,

in violation of Title 18, United States Code 1503.” See also
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 7

18 U.S.C. § 1503 (outlawing injuring or threatening to

injure a federal juror). A grand jury returned a superseding indictment against White on February 10, 2009.

White moved to dismiss the indictment, and the district

court granted his motion after finding that White’s

internet postings were protected speech and that the

indictment failed to sufficiently allege “corroborating

circumstances” of White’s criminal intent.

The government appealed. We reversed because the

indictment was facially valid and White’s First Amendment rights were protected by the government’s burden

to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that White had the

requisite intent for criminal solicitation. United States

v. White, 610 F.3d 956, 961 (7th Cir. 2010) (per curiam).

As we explained:

The government informed us at oral argument

that it has further evidence of the website’s readership, audience, and the relationship between

White and his followers which will show the

posting was a specific request to White’s followers, who understood that request and were

capable and willing to act on it. This evidence

is not laid out in the indictment and does not

need to be. The existence of strongly corroborating

circumstances evincing White’s intent is a jury

question. . . . The government has the burden to

prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that White

intended, through his posting of Juror A’s personal information, to request someone else to

harm Juror A. After the prosecution presents its
8 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

case, the court may decide that a reasonable

juror could not conclude that White’s intent was

for harm to befall Juror A, and not merely electronic or verbal harassment.

Id. at 962 (internal citations omitted). 

On remand, White was tried before an anonymous

jury. The government offered as evidence the postings

made by White that we described above. The government

also called several witnesses. FBI Special Agent Paul

Messing testified that he installed highly sophisticated

computer software on the computer and server that

agents seized from White. The software allowed the

FBI to search for specific articles and words that

White personally posted on the Overthrow website.

Officer John Dziedzic explained that an internet user

who visited the Overthrow website before the site had

been disabled could have seen all of White’s postings.

The government also presented the testimony of

Juror A. That testimony established that at approximately

9:30 a.m. on September 11, 2008, Juror A received a

phone call from a telephone registered to White’s wife.

The male caller asked Juror A to confirm Juror A’s name,

date of birth, address, and service on the jury that convicted Hale. The caller did not, however, threaten Juror A.

Less than thirty minutes after the call was disconnected,

White posted Juror A’s personal information on Overthrow. Juror A almost immediately began receiving

harassing text messages. The messages conveyed things

like “sodomize Obama,” “Bomb China,” “kill McCain,”

and “cremate[] Jews.” Juror A testified that these mes-
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 9

sages were “all . . . really upsetting.” Juror A reported

receiving text messages of the same nature for the next

few days. Juror A was not personally threatened, stalked,

or physically harmed after White’s initial post.

FBI Special Agent Maureen Mazzola also testified at

trial. She described what an internet user who viewed

the Overthrow website on September 11, 2008 would

have seen. According to her, on that day the site’s

visitors would have immediately been directed to the

post about Juror A. They would not have been able to

see White’s other posts unless they accessed them

via hyperlink or viewed other portions of the website.

According to Agent Mazzola, a user would have “to be

either looking for it or reading every single article on

the website” to access White’s other posts.

The last two witnesses the government called to

testify were Phil Anderson and Michael Burks. Both

were former members of the American National

Socialist Workers Party (“ANSWP”), a white supremacist

organization that White organized and directed. After

his home was searched and his computer seized,

White asked Anderson to reach out to other white supremacists to find out if they were aware of any plans

to harm Juror A. White expressed concern that “someone

may be trying to do something” to Juror A. Anderson

reported back that his associates had not seen the Juror A

post and were not aware of any plans to harm Juror A.

On October 29, 2008, White was arrested. After his

arrest, he sent letters to both Anderson and Burks. White

requested that Anderson testify regarding “the fact that
10 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

you have never done anything criminal, and do not

interpret articles on Overthrow.com as criminal instructions.” And White asked Burks to testify about ANSWP’s

“rejection of criminal activity and violent crime,” and

thanked him for his support. At trial, both Anderson

and Burks maintained that White never instructed

them to commit criminal acts and they never interpreted anything he posted on Overthrow as instructions

to harm Juror A in particular.

Burks, however, acknowledged that some violent

white supremacists—of whom White had knowledge

and approved—might have looked to Overthrow for

criminal instructions. He cited the Richard Warman post

as an example. According to Burks, in addition to

authoring that post, White disclosed Warman’s information during a radio show and stated at that time

that “this bastard has lived way too long. If somebody

wants to kill him, here’s his address.” Burks testified

that White repeated this sentiment “two or three times,”

and White “really didn’t care if something did happen.”

Burks interpreted the Warman, Wiesel, and Jena Six

posts as requests that people go out and do violent

things. But he expressly denied ever seeing anything

on Overthrow or hearing anything from White that he

understood as a call to harm Juror A.

At the close of the evidence, the district court instructed

the jury that the government must prove the following

elements beyond a reasonable doubt:

First, that the defendant solicited, commanded,

induced, or otherwise endeavored to persuade

another person to carry out a violent federal crime.
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 11

Second, with strongly corroborative circumstances, that the defendant intended for another

person to commit a violent federal crime.

The court also crafted a First Amendment instruction,

which combined two of White’s six proposed First Amendment instructions. The court explained:

The First Amendment protects vehement,

scathing, and offensive criticism of others; however, a solicitation, command, inducement, or

endeavor to persuade another to engage in conduct constituting a violent felony as defined in

these instructions is not protected by the First

Amendment.

If the purpose of the speaker or the tendency of his

words are directed to ideas or consequences remote from the commission of the criminal act,

then the speech is protected by the First Amendment.

Speech is protected unless both the intent of the

speaker . . . and the tendency of his words was

to produce or incite an imminent lawless act.

An imminent lawless act is one that is likely to

occur.

A statement which is mere political hyperbole

or an expression of opinion does not constitute

a solicitation.

If you find that the defendant’s statements were

no more than an indignant or extreme method of
12 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

stating political opposition to the juror in

the Matthew Hale case, then you are justified in

finding that no solicitation was, in fact, made

and you may find the defendant not guilty.

The jury convicted White of soliciting a violent federal

crime against Juror A. White filed a post-trial motion

for judgment of acquittal, requesting in the alternative

a new trial. The district court ruled that the government

failed to present sufficient evidence to sustain White’s

conviction. The court found that White’s posts were

not objective solicitations and nothing on the website

“transformed” them into solicitous instructions. Additionally, the court found that the government failed to

present adequate evidence of section 373’s “strongly

corroborative” circumstances, which is necessary under

the statute to prove intent. Finally, the court held that

because the government did not prove White’s criminal

intent beyond a reasonable doubt, White’s posts were

protected speech under the First Amendment. The

district court granted White’s Rule 29 motion and conditionally denied his request for a new trial. Both the government and White appeal.

II. ANALYSIS

Subsection (a) of 18 U.S.C. § 373 states, in relevant part,

that: 

Whoever, with intent that another person engage

in conduct constituting a felony that has as an

element the use, attempted use, or threatened use

of physical force against property or against the
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 13

person of another in violation of the laws of the

United States, and under circumstances strongly

corroborative of that intent, solicits, commands,

induces, or otherwise endeavors to persuade

such other person to engage in such conduct,

shall be imprisoned . . . .

The underlying felony White allegedly solicited was

harm to Juror A, which is prohibited by 18 U.S.C. § 1503

(“Whoever . . . by threats or force . . . endeavors to influence, intimidate, or impede any grand or petit juror . . . or

injures any such grand or petit juror . . . on account of any

verdict or indictment assented to by him, or on account

of his being or having been such juror . . . shall be

punished . . . .”). So to convict White of solicitation, the

government had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt:

(1) with “strongly corroborative” circumstances that

White intended for another person to harm Juror A; and

(2) that White solicited, commanded, induced, or otherwise tried to persuade the other person to carry out that

crime. 18 U.S.C. § 373(a); see also Hale, 448 F.3d at 982

(“[T]he government had to establish (1) with ‘strongly

corroborative circumstances’ that Hale intended for

Tony Evola to arrange the murder of Judge Lefkow; and

(2) that Hale solicited, commanded, induced, or otherwise

tried to persuade Evola to carry out the crime.”).

A. The District Court’s Judgment of Acquittal Must Be

Reversed Because a Reasonable Jury Could Have

Convicted White of Criminal Solicitation

A judgment of acquittal must be granted when “the

evidence is insufficient to sustain a conviction.” Fed. R.
14 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

Crim. P. 29(a). Our review is de novo. United States v.

Presbitero, 569 F.3d 691, 704 (7th Cir. 2009). Our job, however, is not to “reweigh the evidence nor second-guess

the jury’s credibility determinations.” United States v.

Tavarez, 626 F.3d 902, 906 (7th Cir. 2010). Rather, we

view the evidence in the light most favorable to the government and ask whether any rational jury could have

found the essential elements of the charged crime

beyond a reasonable doubt. Presbitero, 569 F.3d at 704. “We

will set aside a jury’s guilty verdict only if ‘the record

contains no evidence, regardless of how it is weighed,’

from which a jury could have returned a conviction.” Id.

(quoting United States v. Moses, 513 F.3d 727, 733 (7th

Cir. 2008)). But the defendant “bears a heavy burden

on appeal, as he must demonstrate that no rational trier

of fact could decide beyond a reasonable doubt” that

he committed the offense charged. See United States v.

Cervante, 958 F.2d 175, 178 (7th Cir. 1992).

We begin our analysis with our instructions to the

district court on remand: “After the prosecution presents its case, the court may decide that a reasonable

juror could not conclude that White’s intent was for

harm to befall Juror A, and not merely electronic or

verbal harassment.” White, 610 F.3d at 962. The government bore not only the burden of proving White’s intentional solicitation, but it also had to prove beyond a

reasonable doubt the objective of that solicitation: harm

or the threat of harm to Juror A, not mere electronic or

verbal harassment. Id.; cf. United States v. Rahman, 34 F.3d

1331, 1337 (7th Cir. 1994) (requiring the government

to show with “strongly corroborative” circumstances

that the defendant “intended for [the solicitee] to extort
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 15

and rob [the victim] of $60,000,” and that the defendant

“solicited, commanded, induced, or otherwise tried to

persuade [the solicitee] to carry out the extortion and

robbery.” (emphasis added)).

A reasonable jury could have found that the government met this burden. Whether White’s post was a criminal solicitation depended on context, and the government provided ample evidence of such context from

which a rational jury could have concluded that the post

was an invitation for others to harm Juror A, though

fortunately no one accepted the invitation. The post

attributed to Juror A characteristics intended to make

the target loathed by readers of White’s neo-Nazi

website: a Jew, a homosexual with a black lover, and

above all the foreman of the jury that had convicted

Overthrow.com’s hero, Matthew Hale—an anti-Semitic

white supremacist—of soliciting the murder of a federal

judge. And whereas White previously refrained from

“republish[ing] the personal information” of others

involved in the Hale trial because, as White acknowledged, “there [was] so great a potential for action linked

to such posting,” White expressly published Juror A’s

personal information, including Juror A’s photograph,

home address, and telephone numbers.

The post has a context created by previous posts on the

website that had solicited the murder of Barack Obama,

Richard Warman (a Canadian civil rights lawyer

and the bane of hate groups), Elie Wiesel, and six black

teenagers known as the “Jena 6.” Other posts had congratulated murderers or urged the murder of enemies
16 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

defined in terms that would embrace Juror A. All

that was missing was an explicit solicitation to murder

Juror A. But the description summarized above

would have made Juror A seem to loyal readers of

Overthrow.com as being at least as worthy of assassination as Richard Warman, who had been described in a

post, published only a few months before the Juror A

post, as “Richard, the sometimes Jewish, sometimes not,

attorney behind the abuses of Canada’s Human Rights

Tribunal,” who “should be drug out into the street

and shot, after appropriate trial by a revolutionary

tribunal of Canada’s white activists. It won’t be hard to

do, he can be found, easily, at his home, at [address].”

And Juror A could be found at home just as easily

because White posted Juror A’s personal contact information along with the denunciation.

The “abuses” of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal

had been left unspecified in the denunciation of Warman,

whereas Juror A was identified as instrumental in the

conviction of the hero Hale: If “all [Juror A] was . . . was

another anonymous voice in a dirty Jewish mob,

screaming for blood and for the further impoverishment of the white worker . . . [he/she] would hardly be

of note. But [Juror A] is something more. [He/She] was

not only a juror at the nationally publicized trial of

Matt Hale, but the jury foreman, and the architect of both

Hale’s conviction and his extreme and lengthy 40-year

sentence.” If Warman should be killed, then a fortiori

Juror A should be killed, or at least injured. White

didn’t have to say harm Juror A. All he had to do and

did do to invite violence was to sketch the characteristics
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 17

that made Juror A a mortal enemy of White’s neo-Nazi

movement and to publish Juror A’s personal contact

information.

The fact that White made an effort to discourage assassination attempts against Juror A when law enforcement moved against his website shows at a minimum

that he knew he was playing with fire. But a reasonable

jury could have also interpreted such evidence as intent

to solicit violence against Juror A followed by a change

of mind when he realized that if someone harmed Juror A

he could get in trouble. There was enough evidence

of White’s intent to solicit the murder of, or other

physical violence against, Juror A, to justify a reasonable jury in convicting him.

It’s true that the posts that establish the context that

makes the solicitation to violence unmistakable were

not links to the posts on Overthrow.com about Juror A.

That is, they were not words or phrases in blue in the

posts that if clicked on by the reader would appear

on the reader’s computer screen. Some of the

explicit solicitations to murder had been published on

Overthrow.com months, even years, earlier, though

others were recent. The Juror A posts had appeared

between September 11 and October 3, 2008, the postings

regarding Wiesel and the Jena 6 between February 3 and

September 20, 2007. But the Warman and Obama

death threats were recent—March 26, 2008 and September 9, 2008 respectively—the latter threat having been

posted two days before the first threat against Juror A.

Regardless of when these other still-accessible posts

were technically created, a reasonable jury cannot be
18 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

expected to ignore the audience, who may not have

been as concerned about such chronological specifics.

Readers of Overthrow.com were not casual Web

browsers, but extremists molded into a community by

the internet—loyal and avid readers who, whether or

not they remember every specific solicitation to assassination, knew that Overthrow.com identified hateful

enemies who should be assassinated. A reasonable jury

could infer that members of the Party were regular

readers of the Overthrow website, which prominently

displayed links to the Party’s own website, to its

streaming radio, and to its hotline. One witness testified

that he learned of the Party through Overthrow.com. White

identified one reader in a post on the website as a “loyal

soldier” and “fan of this website,” and there is similar

language in other posts. Two members of the party

who testified made clear their familiarity with the

contents of the website over a period of years. Though

these members specifically denied interpreting White’s

post as an invitation to harm Juror A, a reasonable jury

could have thought, based on White’s reaching out to

them for support following the search of White’s home,

that they were biased in White’s favor and therefore

skewed their testimony in order to protect a fellow supremacist.

The government also established “strongly corroborative circumstances” of White’s intent to urge the killing

of, or harm to, Juror A. Typically, the government will

satisfy its burden of strongly corroborating the defendant’s intent by introducing evidence showing that

the defendant: (1) offered or promised payment or some

other benefit to the person solicited; (2) threatened to
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 19

punish or harm the solicitee for failing to commit the

offense; (3) repeatedly solicited the commission of the

offense or expressly stated his seriousness; (4) knew or

believed that the person solicited had previously committed a similar offense; or (5) acquired weapons, tools or

information, or made other preparations, suited for use

by the solicitee. United States v. Gabriel, 810 F.2d 627,

635 (7th Cir. 1987) (citing S. Rep. No. 307, 97th Cong., 1st

Sess. 183 (1982)). These factors are not exclusive or conclusive indicators of intent, id., but they are representative examples of the types of circumstantial evidence

that a rational jury could rely on to corroborate the defendant’s intent. See Hale, 448 F.3d at 983 (“The existence

of strongly corroborating circumstances is a question of

fact for the jury.” (citation omitted)).

Such circumstantial evidence, much of which is

already recounted above, exists here. In posts on his

website directed at his neo-Nazi readers, White wrote

that “everyone associated with the Matt Hale trial has

deserved assassination for a long time;” he expressly

solicited violence against Obama, Warman, Wiesel, and

the Jena 6; he praised Wiesel’s assailant and appreciated

that White’s expressed views “may have played a role

in motivating” the assailant; he went to the trouble of

obtaining and publishing Juror A’s contact information

after expressly recognizing the “great [] potential for

action” linked to the posting of personal contact information of other “scumbags” involved in the Hale trial;

and after learning of the FBI’s investigation he demonstrated awareness that his posts might induce readers

to commit a violent act against Juror A.
20 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

Though the government did not present a specific

“solicitee,” it was unnecessary to do so given the very

nature of the solicitation—an electronic broadcast

which, a reasonable jury could conclude, was specifically

designed to reach as many white supremacist readers

as possible so that someone could kill or harm Juror A.

18 U.S.C. § 373 requires proof of intent “that another

person” commit the felony, and White’s desire for any

reader to respond to his call satisfies this requirement.

See White, 610 F.3d at 960 (“a specific person-to-person

request is not required” (citing United States v. Rahman,

189 F.3d 88, 117-18 (2d Cir. 1999)).

White rightfully emphasizes that the First Amendment protects even speech that is loathsome. But

criminal solicitations are simply not protected by the

First Amendment. See id.; Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire,

315 U.S. 568, 572 (1942) (“[T]hose [words] which by

their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an

immediate breach of the peace” are not protected by

the First Amendment); see also United States v. Williams,

553 U.S. 285, 297 (2008) (“Offers to engage in illegal

transactions are categorically excluded from First Amendment protection.” (citations omitted)). A reasonable jury

could have found that White’s posts constituted “a proposal to engage in illegal activity” and not merely

“the abstract advocacy of illegality.” See id. at 298-99.

Accordingly, the First Amendment provides no shelter

for White’s criminal behavior.

For the above reasons, White’s acquittal must be reversed.
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 21

B. White Is Not Entitled to a New Trial

“If the court enters a judgment of acquittal after a

guilty verdict, the court must also conditionally

determine whether any motion for a new trial should be

granted if the judgment of acquittal is later vacated or

reversed.” Fed. R. Crim. P. 29(d)(1). Upon acquitting

White, the district court, pursuant to this rule, conditionally denied White’s motion for a new trial, which

White now challenges as an abuse of discretion. See

United States v. Wilson, 237 F.3d 827, 831-32 (7th Cir.

2001). None of White’s arguments have merit.

1. Anonymous Jury

White first argues that the district court erred in

empanelling an anonymous jury. “A court weighing the

need for an anonymous jury must . . . balance the defendant’s interest in preserving the presumption of innocence and in conducting a useful voir dire against the

jurors’ interest in their own security and the public’s

interest in having a jury assess the defendant’s guilt or

innocence impartially.” United States v. Mansoori, 304

F.3d 635, 650 (7th Cir. 2002) (citations omitted). 

Factors bearing on the propriety of an anonymous jury include the defendant’s involvement

in organized crime; his participation in a group

with the capacity to harm jurors; whether he

previously has attempted to interfere with the

judicial process; the severity of the punishment

that the defendant would face if convicted; and
22 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

whether publicity regarding the case presents

the prospect that the jurors’ names could become public and expose them to intimidation

or harassment.

Id. at 650-51. “We review the decision to use an anonymous jury only for an abuse of discretion, remaining

particularly deferential to the district court’s substantial

discretion in this area.” United States v. Morales, 655 F.3d

608, 621 (7th Cir. 2011) (citations omitted). Even if the

district court errs in empanelling an anonymous jury,

a new trial is unwarranted where such error was

harmless, such as when voir dire is “extremely thorough,”

Mansoori, 304 F.3d at 652, or when the jurors are told

that their names are withheld “to prevent out-ofcourt contact, not out of concern for juror safety,”

Morales, 655 F.3d at 623, in combination with other

factors mitigating prejudice.

White almost exclusively emphasizes the alleged

lack of “some evidence indicating that intimidation is

likely.” Mansoori, 304 F.3d at 651. But such evidence

could not be clearer here. It was certainly clear by the

time the district court granted the government’s motion

to empanel an anonymous jury that White had posted

the personal contact information—of a juror—also in a

case involving a white supremacist, which resulted

in harassment and intimidation. White also does not

challenge the district court’s finding that his target audience had previously committed acts of violence against

their perceived enemies, particularly those involved in

the justice system, or the fact that there had been some
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 23

publicity of the case, exacerbating the risk that the jurors’

identities would become public. The district court’s

consideration of these factors in deciding to empanel an

anonymous jury was therefore not an abuse of discretion.

Though unnecessary to address, we also note the

absence of harm. White argues that the jury’s anonymity

predisposed it to believe that White was dangerous

and therefore a criminal, and emphasizes Juror 8’s expression of concern about putting his name on the

juror sign-in sheet. But the district court assured Juror 8

that the sign-in sheet was not public and that it could

be sealed, and it confirmed that Juror 8 did not discuss

his concern with any other juror. Most importantly, the

court asked him whether he could still render a fair

verdict, and he responded “Yes.” We agree with the

district court that “some concerns on the part of jurors

were likely unavoidable” given the context, but the

district court properly ensured that Juror 8’s specific

concerns would not give rise to improper bias against

White by confirming that he could be impartial. The

district court also told the jurors that they were kept

anonymous in order to ensure a fair and impartial trial

and to prevent contact with the parties and lawyers; it

did not mention security as a reason. And White does

not challenge the rigor of the district court’s voir dire,

or any other measure taken by the court to ensure him

a fair trial. Accordingly, even if the district court erred

in empanelling an anonymous jury, such error was harmless.
24 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

2. Admission of Rule 404(b) Evidence

Next, White challenges the district court’s Rule 404(b)

admission of his posts concerning people other than

Juror A. Rule 404(b) prohibits the admission of evidence

of “prior bad acts to show that the defendant’s character

is consistent with a propensity to commit the charged

crime; however, it allows the court to admit evidence of

a defendant’s prior [acts] for other permissible, nonpropensity purposes,” such as intent. United States v.

Perkins, 548 F.3d 510, 513-14 (7th Cir. 2008). In order to

be admissible, such evidence must: 

(1) be directed toward establishing a matter in

issue other than the defendant’s propensity to

commit the crime charged; (2) show that the

other act is similar enough and close enough in

time to be relevant to the matter in issue; (3) be

sufficient to support a jury finding that the defendant committed the similar act; and (4) have

probative value that is not substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice.

Id. This court reviews a district court’s Rule 404(b) admission for abuse of discretion. Id. at 513.

Taking the last prong first, we note that the probative

value of these posts was particularly strong, in that they

helped the government to satisfy its burden of producing

evidence of circumstances “strongly corroborative” of

White’s intent (and for that reason, the first prong is

also satisfied). Though there was an undeniable danger

that the jury would be inflamed against him when

exposed to his “noxious views,” Hale, 448 F.3d at 986,
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 25

the jury had already been exposed to White’s white

supremacist views from other evidence that was unquestionably admissible, and White never sought a specific

limiting instruction. The district court’s conclusion

that such danger did not “substantially outweigh” the

strong probative value of these posts was therefore not

an abuse of discretion. While the admission of prior

posts might be improper in another electronic criminal

solicitation case, we simply cannot say that the district

court, in its consideration of the unique facts and evidentiary context, erred in this one. See id. at 985 (“We give

special deference to the district court’s assessment of

the balance between probative value and prejudice

because that court is in the best position to make

such assessments.”).

As for the remaining factors, though several of these

posts were created a year or more before the Juror A

post, they were nonetheless “close enough in time to be

relevant” in that they were contemporaneously available

at the time of the post about Juror A. And there is no

dispute that these posts were made by White. Accordingly, the district court’s Rule 404(b) admission of

White’s posts concerning people other than Juror A

was not an abuse of discretion.

3. White’s Proposed Jury Instructions Concerning

the First Amendment

White finally argues that a new trial is warranted because the district court failed to include four of his proposed jury instructions concerning the First Amendment.
26 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

Briefly summarized, these include: an instruction that

speech is protected when it incites imminent lawless

action, an instruction that speech may not be banned

simply because it is unpopular, an instruction that

speech scrutinizing people involved in the prosecution

of crimes (e.g., jurors) is protected, and an instruction

that speech approving of past violence by others is protected.

Plain error review applies when counsel fails to

“object, on the record, to the judge’s refusal to tender the

defendant’s instructions [and] clearly state the reasons

for his or her objections.” United States v. Douglas, 818

F.2d 1317, 1320 (7th Cir. 1987); see Fed. R. Crim. P. 30(d).

The government points out that after the court expressly made its instructions ruling and asked White’s

counsel, “Do you have any objections, by the way, . . . or

are you otherwise satisfied with the instructions?”, counsel

responded, “Judge, I’m pretty sure—I haven’t looked

at the other ones, but I’m satisfied with the elements

instruction that I think is the main one.” The government therefore argues that no objection was made. White

counters that his proposed First Amendment instructions were vigorously debated, albeit before the district

court ruled on the instructions.

We have said that, so long as defense counsel “alert[s]

the court and the opposing party to the specific grounds

for the objection in a timely fashion,” then “[t]here is no

utility in requiring defense counsel to object again after

the court has made its final ruling.” United States v. James,

464 F.3d 699, 707 n.1 (7th Cir. 2006). But in the case of
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 27

See Fed. R. Crim. P. 30(b) (“The court must inform the 3

parties before closing arguments how it intends to rule on

the requested instructions.”).

the court’s refusal to give a proposed instruction, some

of our cases have suggested that objections must be

made after a ruling is made, or at least after the district

court indicates how it intends to rule. See United States 3

v. Irorere, 228 F.3d 816, 825 (7th Cir. 2000) (objection

not preserved where defendant “did not object on the

record at the time the district court refused to give the

defendant’s proposed instruction”); United States v.

Green, 779 F.2d 1313, 1320 n.6 (7th Cir. 1985) (objection

not preserved where “the defendant originally argued

on behalf of his proposed instruction, but offered no

further comment, much less an objection” after court

adopted other instructions). And counsel can simply

object by stating that he or she objects and incorporates arguments previously made. See United States v.

Hollinger, 553 F.2d 535, 543 (7th Cir. 1977) (“While the

process of stating for the record that such pre-charge

objections are incorporated by reference is a somewhat

pro forma exercise, we are nevertheless of the opinion

that the better practice would be for counsel to see

that the record affirmatively shows that counsel has

renewed his specific objections by the incorporation

method.”); see also United States v. Requarth, 847 F.2d

1249, 1254 (7th Cir. 1988) (“Specific objections to instructions that are distinctly made at an instructions conference may be incorporated by reference.”). It would

have been wise for White’s counsel to have at least
28 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

objected and incorporated his previous arguments by

reference when the district court gave him an express

opportunity to do so after it had made its ruling on the

instructions. See generally Hollinger, 553 F.2d at 543

(district court has discretion to determine when the

“distinct statement of the matter to which counsel objects

and the grounds of the objections are stated” pursuant

to Rule 30(d)).

In any event, we need not decide whether plain error

review applies, because we find that the district court

did not improperly exclude his proposed instructions

even on de novo review. See James, 464 F.3d at 707 (review

of district court’s refusal to give proposed jury instructions is de novo). “To be entitled to a particular theory

of defense instruction, the defendant must show the

following: (1) the instruction is a correct statement of

the law, (2) the evidence in the case supports the theory

of defense, (3) that theory is not already part of the

charge, and (4) a failure to provide the instruction

would deny a fair trial.” Id.

Excluding White’s proposed jury instructions was not

improper. The district court essentially incorporated

White’s proposed instruction about speech being

protected unless it incites imminent lawless action, and

adopting any additional emphasis on that point as

White proposed could have been misleading because it

would have suggested that the solicitation of a non-immediate crime was protected, when it is not. See White,

610 F.3d at 960 (“solicitations[] remain categorically

outside [the First Amendment’s] protection”). And the
Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209 29

district court essentially incorporated White’s proposed

instruction about unpopular speech when it told the

jury that the “First Amendment protects . . . offensive

criticism of others,” and that speech that is nothing

more than an “indignant or extreme method of stating

political opposition to the juror in the Matthew Hale

case” was not criminal. This latter instruction also

captured White’s proposed instruction about the First

Amendment protecting speech that scrutinizes people

involved in the prosecution of crimes, such as jurors.

And White was not clearly denied a fair trial by the exclusion of his proposed instruction concerning speech

approving of past violence by others. No reasonable

juror would interpret the district court’s instruction

about what solicitation means—“an endeavor to

persuade another to engage in conduct constituting a

violent felony”—to mean that mere approval of past

violence automatically translates into solicitation of

future criminal conduct.

The district court’s jury instructions concisely described

the protections of the First Amendment and correctly

informed the jury that criminal solicitations fall outside

its protection. See Trident Inv. Mgmt., Inc. v. Amoco Oil

Co., 194 F.3d 772, 780 (7th Cir. 1999) (“[w]e will not find

reversible error in jury instructions if, taken as a

whole, they fairly and accurately inform the jury about

the law”). The inclusion of White’s proposed instructions would have been unduly cumulative and potentially confusing, and White points to no indication that

the jury failed to appreciate the protections of the First

Amendment, to the extent they were relevant in this
30 Nos. 11-2150 & 11-2209

criminal solicitation case. See DePaepe v. Gen. Motors

Corp., 33 F.3d 737, 743 (7th Cir. 1994) (“ ‘Inadequate jury

instructions are cause for reversal only if it appears that

the jury’s comprehension of the issues was so misguided

that one of the parties was prejudiced.’ ” (citation omitted)).

Therefore, the district court’s exclusion of White’s

proposed jury instructions was not erroneous. White’s

argument that the cumulative impact of all the above

alleged errors warrants a new trial is also without merit.

III. CONCLUSION

For the reasons stated above, the judgment of acquittal

entered by the district court is REVERSED, the conviction is REINSTATED, and the case is REMANDED for sentencing. White’s cross-appeal is DISMISSED.

10-26-12