Opinion ID: 2967728
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Vouching by Haarstick

Text: Hayes next contends that the district court improperly permitted Haarstick to vouch for other Government witnesses. This claim arises from the following colloquy, which occurred at the end of the Government’s direct examination of Haarstick: Q And were any of the taxpayers subjects of the investigation? A No. Q Why is that? A The element was willfulness. And when the interviews were done, to my knowledge — [DEFENSE COUNSEL]: This requires hearsay. Second of all, requires a legal opinion, which I don’t think she is qualified to make. THE COURT: No. It is a policy of the IRS. The objection is overruled. 10 UNITED STATES v. HAYES Proceed. BY [THE PROSECUTOR]: Q If you could just — the question was why weren’t they considered to be — why wouldn’t the IRS have considered them to be subjects of the investigation? A It was determined that they did not willfully know what was on the tax return. They had not reviewed it, didn’t have knowledge that it was false. J.A. 483-84. It is impermissible for a prosecutor to indicate her personal belief in the credibility of Government witnesses or to elicit one witness’ opinion that another witness has told the truth. See United States v. Lewis, 10 F.3d 1086, 1089 (4th Cir. 1993). Such improper vouching is not necessarily reversible error, however. Instead, a reviewing court must assess the prejudicial effect of the improper comments by considering (1) the degree to which the comments could have misled the jury; (2) whether the comments were isolated or extensive; (3) the strength of proof of guilt absent the inappropriate comments; and (4) whether the comments were deliberately made to divert the jury’s attention. United States v. Sanchez, 118 F.3d 192, 198 (4th Cir. 1997). We assume for purposes of decision that Haarstick’s testimony amounted to improper vouching. Nevertheless, applying the factors listed in Sanchez, we hold that any error was harmless.2 With respect to the first factor, we conclude that the comments had no appreciable effect on the jury. We recognize that the comments in question went to the central issue to be decided at trial—that is, 2 The Government asserted at oral argument that this claim is subject to plain error review because Hayes did not object on the basis of improper vouching. We need not consider whether Hayes adequately preserved this claim, because we conclude that the Government prevails even under a harmless error standard. UNITED STATES v. HAYES 11 whether the misstatements in tax returns prepared by Hayes resulted from inaccurate information provided by Hayes’ customers or from Hayes’ own fabrications. But Haarstick’s statement that the Government had resolved that question against Hayes only restated the obvious; if the IRS had believed Hayes rather than his customers, Hayes would not have been indicted. Furthermore, Haarstick expressed the conclusion of the IRS, without indicating either that the IRS had any undisclosed knowledge to support that conclusion or that she personally considered the testimony against Hayes to be credible. For these reasons, we do not believe the testimony in question misled the jury. The remaining three factors also weigh against reversal. The testimony at issue was not extensive, but rather amounted to two or three sentences in the middle of the trial. In addition, the Government’s case, viewed in its entirety, was quite strong, as it demonstrated a pattern of similar misstatements on 24 different tax returns prepared by Hayes; thus, the jury could not have credited Hayes’ defense—that he relied entirely on information provided by his customers—without concluding that Hayes’ diverse customers all made false claims involving the same types of deductions and similar dollar amounts. And finally, there is nothing in the record to indicate that the Government deliberately elicited the statements in question for improper purposes. For these reasons, we affirm Hayes’ 24 convictions for violating § 7206(2).