Opinion ID: 477760
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Application of the Kennedy Test.

Text: 36 A careful review of the record in this case reveals no conduct by either Judge Walker or the AUSA intended to provoke the defendant into moving for a mistrial. Kennedy, 456 U.S. at 679, 102 S.Ct. at 2091. Indeed, the judge's and the prosecutor's actions--although in hindsight perhaps not the best possible choices--were scrupulously designed to avoid any prejudicial impact on the trial. 37 Judge Walker found that the facts and circumstances allowed no inference that the prosecutor in this case intended 'to subvert the protection afforded by the Double Jeopardy Clause' , United States v. Rivera, 634 F.Supp. 204, 212 (S.D.N.Y. 1986) (quoting Kennedy, 456 U.S. at 676, 102 S.Ct. at 2089), that finding is fully supported by the record. Upon discovering Bonilla's allegation that Salaway had suborned perjury in an unrelated state action, the AUSA promptly advised the judge of the potential conflict and sought a hearing to advise Peter of his rights. Far from acting to provoke a future mistrial motion by appellants, the AUSA cooperated fully with the court in seeking to avoid that result. 38 Similarly, there are no objective facts and circumstances from which to infer an intent by the district judge to provoke appellants' mistrial motions. See Kennedy, 456 U.S. at 679-80, 102 S.Ct. at 2091 (Powell, J., concurring) (emphasizing that the objective facts and circumstances govern the analysis of intent to provoke a mistrial). To begin with, appellants' claim is inherently implausible; it borders on the ludicrous to suggest that two weeks prior to trial the judge acted with an intent to provoke the later mistrial motions. Judge Walker did candidly acknowledge that, in retrospect, it might have been better to include all parties in the pretrial discussions of Salaway's possible conflict of interest. However, the omission of appellants from those discussions does not indicate any intent to provoke a mistrial. One can fairly infer two things from the pretrial events: (1) a scrupulous effort by Judge Walker to protect one defendant from a serious possibility that his attorney might have a conflict that could deny him a fair trial, and (2) a commendable desire to protect, if possible, the professional reputation of two members of the bar from possibly unfounded accusations of criminal misconduct. 39 The district judge's desire to avoid a mistrial is further borne out by his rulings on the various mistrial motions made by appellants. After learning of Salaway's potential conflict from material produced by the government pursuant to 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3500, Pedro, Sonia, and Laguer moved for a mistrial on the ground that there would be spillover prejudice from the allegations of misconduct by co-defense counsel Salaway. This motion was denied as premature. When Peter Rivera reconsidered his position and moved for a mistrial to obtain new counsel, the other appellants renewed their mistrial motions contingent upon the resolution of Peter's motion and whether Salaway remained in the case. Even when the court subsequently granted Peter a severance and mistrial, the court continued the trial as to the other appellants. It was not until Laguer's counsel brought out Salaway's name in cross-examining Bonilla that Judge Walker finally granted appellants' third set of mistrial motions. Had he conducted the earlier in camera proceedings with an intent ultimately to provoke appellants' mistrial motions, surely he would have granted, rather than denied, the earlier motions. We conclude that the objective facts and circumstances allow no inference that the judge intended to provoke a mistrial, see Kennedy, 456 U.S. at 675, 102 S.Ct. at 2089, his own conclusion in that regard, therefore, is fully supported by the record. 40 From the detached, unhurried perspective of our appellate review we note that this whole problem might have been circumvented by expressly limiting the scope of Bonilla's examination. A direction to all counsel to avoid identifying Salaway as the attorney who had allegedly suborned perjury would have preserved to defendants the opportunity to challenge the credibility of the government's informant witness, and at the same time excluded from the trial the collateral, irrelevant fact that one of defendants' counsel had participated in the witness's prior perjury. We also note that if counsel for Laguer had focused on the true issues of this case, rather than forcing a cumulative credibility issue, or possibly seeking the potential strategic advantage of a mistrial, he would have realized that all reference to Salaway was surplusage at best. The trial could then have proceeded without Salaway's name ever being mentioned, and the jury would have been unaware of the potentially prejudicial information. 41