Opinion ID: 146214
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Surveillance and drug transaction testimony

Text: Adams also argues that the district court should have limited Officer Fox's testimony to the execution of the search warrant. According to Adams, the testimony concerning the surveillance was irrelevant and unfairly prejudicial, and the testimony of hand-to-hand transactions amounted to propensity evidence in violation of Rule 404(b). The district court had excluded baggies and a digital scale found in the same room as the firearm out of a concern that the trial would become a narcotics case. Adams reasons the same should have applied to other evidence of drug dealing as well. Assuming, without deciding, that the district court abused its discretion in admitting this evidence, any error was harmless. United States v. LaDue, 561 F.3d 855, 859 (8th Cir.2009) (improper evidentiary rulings are subject to harmless error analysis and will be disregarded if there is no substantial influence on the verdict). The properly admitted evidence established both Adams's dominion and control over the location where the firearm was found out in the open as well as his dominion and control over the weapon itself. We therefore reject Adams's arguments based on the admission of this evidence.