Source: https://openjurist.org/19/f3d/350
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 18:56:46+00:00

Document:
John M. HAMILTON, a/k/a John Nordquist, and Robert J.
Miller, a/k/a Robert J. Alexander, Defendants-Appellants.
Timothy O'Shea, Office of U.S. Atty., Madison, WI, (argued), for U.S.
Andrew A. Sultze, Feingold, Bates & Sultze, Janesville, WI (argued), for Robert Miller.
Thomas J. Coaty, Madison, WI (argued), for John M. Hamilton.
Before BAUER, FRIEDMAN* and RIPPLE, Circuit Judges.
The defendants, John Hamilton and Robert Miller, were convicted of aggravated bank robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2113(a) & (d). The district court sentenced them to 190-month and 158-month prison terms, respectively, and ordered them to pay $25,035 in restitution. The defendants now appeal. For the reasons that follow, we affirm.
On the morning of March 12, 1992, the defendants broke into the back door of a bank in rural Burnett County, Wisconsin. They ordered, at gunpoint, the two tellers to open the vault and to lie down on the floor. The robbers then proceeded to make off with over $22,000. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Hamilton and his wife, Monica Hamilton, and Mr. Miller and Jennifer Miller1 fled by automobile to Arizona. They engaged in a spending spree along the way. The defendants were eventually arrested in Arizona on May 6, 1992.
At the time of this arrest, Messrs. Hamilton and Miller were not taken into federal custody. They were arrested on outstanding warrants for violating their probation in Minnesota and Nevada, respectively. While Mr. Hamilton was an inmate in a Minnesota state prison, he confided to fellow inmate William Albee that he had been involved in the Burnett County bank robbery. Albee then informed the FBI. As a result, Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Miller were indicted on September 10, 1992 for bank robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2113(a), and for carrying a firearm during a violent crime in violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 924(e). A superseding indictment was returned on December 2, 1992 charging the defendants with one count of aggravated bank robbery under 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2113(a) & (d).
While awaiting trial on the federal charge, Mr. Hamilton once again befriended a fellow inmate. Failing to learn from his first mistake, Mr. Hamilton told the inmate, Alan Wildman, all the details of how he and Mr. Miller had robbed the Burnett County bank. He also disclosed his intention to murder an FBI agent and his family when he was released from prison. This time, however, Mr. Hamilton had more than just his story to tell; he had discovery materials in his prison cell that his attorney had left with him to peruse. Mr. Hamilton showed Wildman the discovery materials, and the two men began to formulate and discuss trial strategies, including plans to fabricate perjured testimony and evidence. However, Wildman decided to offer the government his testimony concerning the activities of Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Miller because he feared that Mr. Hamilton was actually going to carry out his planned murder of the FBI agent.
On February 12, 1993, the district court held a pretrial evidentiary hearing on the admissibility of the testimony of Albee and Wildman concerning Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements, and on Mr. Miller's motion for severance of the defendants' trials. The district court held that Wildman was not acting as a government agent when Mr. Hamilton disclosed the information about which Wildman was to testify, and that, because Mr. Hamilton voluntarily disclosed the information, he had waived any attorney-client privilege he had concerning the information. The government was therefore not prohibited from using the information either before or at trial. The district court also held that using Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements against Mr. Miller presented no Confrontation Clause problem because those statements were admissible against Mr. Miller under Federal Rule of Evidence 804(b)(3).
On March 3, 1993, after a six-day trial in which neither defendant took the stand, a jury found both defendants guilty. On May 4, 1993, Mr. Hamilton was sentenced to a 190-month prison term; Mr. Miller was sentenced to a 158-month term. The district court ordered the defendants to pay the bank $25,035 in restitution.
On appeal, Mr. Hamilton makes only one argument: that the government's use of his trial strategy, as discovered through Mr. Hamilton's cellmate, Alan Wildman, denied Mr. Hamilton his Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel. Mr. Miller raises four additional arguments.2 First, he submits that the privilege covering marital communications was violated by admitting portions of Jennifer Miller's testimony. Second, Mr. Miller contends that his Sixth Amendment right of confrontation was violated when the extrajudicial statements of his codefendant, Mr. Hamilton, were admitted against him at trial. Third, and relatedly, Mr. Miller argues that the district court abused its discretion in not severing his trial. Finally, Mr. Miller asserts that the district court's finding that Mr. Miller could have reasonably foreseen that Mr. Hamilton had a firearm during the bank robbery is clearly erroneous. We now examine each defendant's contentions.
Mr. Hamilton contends that Alan Wildman's disclosure of and testimony about the trial tactics he discussed with Wildman in their prison cell, which included information relating to discovery material, violated his Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel. He argues that, to guarantee that right and to maintain the adversarial character of the criminal justice system, we must ban all forms of prosecutorial access to defense strategy and tactics. Mr. Hamilton does not contend on appeal that Alan Wildman was in any way a government agent. Rather, he urges us to adopt a prophylactic rule that would prohibit the government from using or introducing at trial any sensitive defensive plans it learned about in any way.
Mr. Hamilton attempts to ground his proposed rule in Weatherford v. Bursey, 429 U.S. 545, 97 S.Ct. 837, 51 L.Ed.2d 30 (1977). In that case, the plaintiff brought a Sec. 1983 action because a government undercover agent had attended several meetings between Bursey, when he was a criminal defendant, and Bursey's attorney. The Supreme Court found no unlawful interference with attorney-client relations in violation of the Sixth Amendment because, among other reasons, the government agent involved had not disclosed to other government officials "trial plans, strategy, or anything having to do with the criminal action pending against plaintiff." Id. at 548, 97 S.Ct. 837. Mr. Hamilton concedes that no government agent was involved in his case. Nevertheless, he submits that the prejudice in his case resulting from the actual disclosure of his trial secrets to the government more than compensates for the lack of a government actor. In Mr. Hamilton's view, the main point of Weatherford and cases following it is that the Sixth Amendment is violated when prejudice results from the government's use of privileged information. See, e.g., United States v. Dien, 609 F.2d 1038, 1043 (2d Cir.1979) (stating that to establish a Sixth Amendment violation after Weatherford a defendant must establish "that privileged information had been passed to the government or that the government had intentionally invaded the attorney client relationship, and resulting prejudice").
Mr. Miller's arguments are misplaced. The party asserting an evidentiary privilege, such as the marital communications privilege, bears the burden of establishing all the essential elements involved. White, 950 F.2d at 430. When a question arose at the pretrial evidentiary hearing concerning the validity of Mr. Miller's marriage to Jennifer Miller, the district court properly instructed Mr. Miller in a subsequent pretrial order to be prepared to prove the validity of the marriage at trial if he planned on asserting the marital communications privilege. See United States v. Byrd, 750 F.2d 585, 593 (7th Cir.1984) (stating that "only communications that take place during a valid marriage ... are protected by the privilege"). However, when Jennifer Miller testified at trial and Mr. Miller objected based on the privilege, he failed to make the required proffer for which the court had given him notice. Thus, Jennifer Miller's subsequent voir dire testimony stating that she had never been divorced from her previous husband justified the district court's decision to rule that her testimony was not protected by the marital communications privilege.
Mr. Miller argues in the alternative that, even if Mr. Miller and Jennifer Miller were not validly married, the district court should have excluded the confidential communications because Mr. Miller made them to Jennifer Miller in reliance on his belief that they were validly married. We need not address this argument at length. Our cases make clear that we "interpret[ ] strictly the 'valid marriage' requirement in the testimonial privilege context." Id. (citing United States v. Clark, 712 F.2d 299, 302 (7th Cir.1983); United States v. Van Drunen, 501 F.2d 1393, 1397 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 419 U.S. 1091, 95 S.Ct. 684, 42 L.Ed.2d 684 (1974)). Like other evidentiary privileges, the marital communications privilege is "in derogation of the truth." White, 970 F.2d at 334. For these reasons, we are not inclined to extend the privilege to cases in which a valid marriage does not exist. We therefore hold that the district court correctly held the marital communications privilege not to apply to any of Jennifer Miller's testimony.
Mr. Miller next asserts a Sixth Amendment Confrontation Clause violation. He claims that the district court erred by admitting the extrajudicial statements of his codefendant, Mr. Hamilton, against him at trial. He asserts as an absolute proposition that "where two defendants are tried jointly, the pre-trial confession of one cannot be admitted against the other unless the confessing defendant takes the stand." Appellant Miller's Br. at 6. He submits that the district court erred in concluding that incriminating statements made by Mr. Hamilton were admissible against him under Federal Rule of Evidence 804(b)(3), which excepts statements made against the declarant's interest from the general prohibition against hearsay.4 As a result, Mr. Miller asserts, the admission of Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements in his trial violated his right of cross-examination under the Confrontation Clause as set forth in Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123, 88 S.Ct. 1620, 20 L.Ed.2d 476 (1968). In response, the government argues that Mr. Miller's Bruton contention is misplaced. In its view, the district court was correct in deeming Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements to be admissible against Mr. Miller under Rule 804(b)(3). Bruton, the government states, dealt only with a confession used at a joint trial against the declarant-codefendant that was not admissible against the nondeclarant-codefendant under any hearsay exception.
We emphasize that the hearsay statement inculpating petitioner was clearly inadmissible against him under traditional rules of evidence.... There is not before us, therefore, any recognized exception to the hearsay rule insofar as petitioner is concerned and we intimate no view whatever that such exceptions necessarily raise questions under the Confrontation Clause.
Id. at 128 n. 3, 88 S.Ct. at 1623-24 n. 3. In short, Bruton does not address the issue before us in this case. Previous cases in this circuit, however, have, and those cases present the rule of decision that must govern the case before us today.
So long as the incriminating and inculpatory portions of a statement are closely related, if the circumstances surrounding the portion of a declarant's statement inculpating another are such that the court determines that the inculpatory portion of the statement is just as trustworthy as the portion of the statement directly incriminating the declarant, there is no need to excise or sever the inculpatory portion of the statement. Mahar's inculpatory statements were admissible under Rule 804(b)(3) and therefore there was no confrontation clause violation.
We note that it is possible that no Bruton problem truly exists in this case. In [York] and [Curry], we held that admitting statements which were admissible as statements against penal interest under Fed.R.Evid. 804(b)(3) did not violate the defendants' Confrontation Clause rights. It appears that Mr. Clark's statements to his sister would meet the requirement of Rule 804(b)(3), thus eliminating any Bruton concerns; however, the government did not raise this issue.
We therefore examine whether the statements of Mr. Hamilton were admissible under Rule 804(b)(3). In order to determine the admissibility of hearsay under this Rule, we apply a three-part test: A " 'court must find that, (1) the declarant's statement was against the penal interest of the declarant, (2) corroborating circumstances exist indicating the trustworthiness of the statement, and (3) the declarant was unavailable.' " United States v. Gio, 7 F.3d 1279, 1288 (7th Cir.1993) (quoting United States v. Garcia, 897 F.2d 1413, 1420 (7th Cir.1990)).
Whether a statement is in fact against interest must be determined from the circumstances of each case. Thus a statement admitting guilt and implicating another person, made while in custody, may well be motivated by a desire to curry favor with the authorities and hence fail to qualify as against interest.... On the other hand, the same words spoken under different circumstances, e.g., to an acquaintance, would have no difficulty in qualifying.
With respect to the last part of the Rule 804(b)(3) test, Mr. Hamilton was unavailable because he asserted his Fifth Amendment right not to testify at trial.
The second part of our Rule 804(b)(3) test requires somewhat closer scrutiny. Mr. Miller argues that Mr. Hamilton's statements are untrustworthy and unreliable because they amount to nothing more than "jailhouse boasting." Although we are aware that inculpatory and incriminating statements can sometimes be nothing more than bravado, we do not think the district court abused its discretion in finding Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements trustworthy. A review of the record reveals that the extrajudicial statements Mr. Hamilton made to Alan Wildman, including those portions inculpating Mr. Miller, were corroborated by other government witnesses, including Jennifer Miller, whom Wildman has never met. Finally, the incriminating portions of Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements were closely related to the inculpatory portions. See York, 933 F.2d at 1364. Mr. Hamilton's incriminating statements against his interest were replete with tightly woven references to Mr. Miller's inculpating role in their joint activities. We therefore hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in admitting Mr. Hamilton's extrajudicial statements against Mr. Miller.
(1) conflicting and irreconcilable defenses; (2) a massive and complex amount of evidence that makes it almost impossible for the jury to separate evidence as to each defendant; (3) a codefendant's statement that incriminates the defendant; and (4) a gross disparity of evidence between the defendants.
Mr. Miller bases his argument for severance on the third circumstance set out in Clark--i.e., that codefendant Hamilton's extrajudicial statements incriminated him. Mr. Miller thus presents as grounds for severance the same Bruton arguments we have already rejected. We need not revisit this issue. Suffice it to say that, because the statements were properly admitted against Mr. Miller under Rule 804(b)(3), they can hardly constitute grounds for asserting that the district court abused its discretion in denying his severance motion, much less that its decision amounted to actual prejudice.
Finally, Mr. Miller submits that the district court erred in increasing his offense level by five levels under U.S.S.G. Sec. 2B3.1(b)(2)(C) when it found that he could have reasonably foreseen that his codefendant was carrying a firearm during the robbery. He acknowledges that we review findings of fact in the Guidelines application context only for clear error, and that the preponderance of the evidence standard applies to such factual findings, not the beyond a reasonable doubt standard. United States v. Duarte, 1 F.3d 644, 649 (7th Cir.1993), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 724, 126 L.Ed.2d 688 (1994). Nonetheless, he asserts that the district court had no accurate information upon which to have made the determination that Mr. Hamilton even carried a firearm in the course of the robbery, much less that Mr. Miller could have reasonably foreseen that Mr. Hamilton would do so.
We do not agree with Mr. Miller's assessment of the evidence before the district court. First, with respect to whether Mr. Hamilton was bearing a firearm during the robbery, Mr. Hamilton's cellmate, Alan Wildman, testified that Mr. Hamilton had told him that he had taken with him to the bank a .357 magnum, which he had stuck into the waistband of his pants. Tr. at 4-90, 4-96. Further, the bank tellers testified that the robbery involved weapons, although they were unable to specify what type of gun each robber had used. Mindful of the fact that a "sentencing judge's determinations of credibility are entitled to great deference on review," id., 1 F.3d at 650, we conclude that this was enough evidence for the district court to find by a preponderance of the evidence that Mr. Hamilton carried a firearm in committing the robbery.
Second, we cannot say that the district court lacked a basis for finding that Mr. Miller could have reasonably foreseen that Mr. Hamilton would carry a firearm with him in committing the bank robbery. See id. at 651 (stating that, in applying the clearly erroneous standard, "we will not reverse a sentencing judge's factual determination unless it is 'without foundation' ") (quoting United States v. Blas, 947 F.2d 1320, 1328 (7th Cir.1991), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 1234, 117 L.Ed.2d 468 (1992)). Jennifer Miller testified at trial that Mr. Miller had informed her shortly after the robbery that Mr. Hamilton had carried a gun during the robbery. Tr. at 3-A-21. It was not clearly erroneous for the district court to deem her testimony credible and find as a factual matter that Mr. Miller was aware or should have been aware that his compatriot was armed; this is particularly so in light of the fact that Jennifer Miller's testimony was corroborated on this point in large part by Alan Wildman's testimony.
There is a preference in the federal system for joint trials of defendants who are indicated together. Joint trials "play a vital role in the criminal justice system." They promote efficiency and "serve the interests of justice by avoiding the scandal and inequity of inconsistent verdicts."
Zafiro v. United States, --- U.S. ----, ----, 113 S.Ct. 933, 937, 122 L.Ed.2d 317 (1993) (quoting Richardson v. Marsh, 481 U.S. 200, 209-10, 107 S.Ct. 1702, 1708-09, 95 L.Ed.2d 176 (1987)).

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