Opinion ID: 1540179
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Trial Judge Properly Admitted Evidence of a Future Drug Deal.

Text: Campbell argues that the trial judge improperly admitted later bad acts evidence. Campbell claims that a major focus of the trial was evidence of a drug transaction that was planned to occur over the November 3, 2006 weekend. Campbell contends that the trial judge committed legal error in his application of the Getz analysis and D.R.E. 404(b). The trial judge admitted evidence of this uncharged, planned transaction because it was evidence of a plan or scheme, under D.R.E. 404(b). We review for abuse of discretion a trial judge's admission of evidence that is relevant for some purpose other than to prove the defendant's propensity to commit crimes pursuant to D.R.E. 404(b). [6] D.R.E. 404(b) forbids the State from introducing character evidence solely to prove that a defendant acted in conformance with his propensity to commit bad acts. [7] In Getz, we established the following guidelines for the admissibility of evidence subject to D.R.E. 404(b): (1) The evidence of other crimes must be material to an issue or ultimate fact in dispute in this case. If the State elects to present such evidence in its case-in-chief it must demonstrate the existence, or reasonable anticipation, of such a material issue. (2) The evidence of other crimes must be introduced for a purpose sanctioned by Rule 404(b) or any other purpose not inconsistent with the basic prohibition against evidence of bad character or criminal disposition. (3) The other crimes must be proved by evidence which is plain, clear and conclusive. (4) The other crimes must not be too remote in time from the charged offense. (5) The court must balance the probative values of such evidence against its unfairly prejudicial effect, as required by D.R.E. 403. (6) Because such evidence is admitted for a limited purpose, the jury should be instructed concerning the purpose for its admission as required by D.R.E 105. [8] Campbell asserts that the trial judge: (1) failed to completely address the materiality prong; (2) did not address the `plain, clear and conclusive' prong; and (3) improperly instructed the jury to consider evidence of intent instead of evidence of a plan or scheme. The State suggests that the evidence of the planned November 3rd transaction could be admitted after a simple relevancy analysis because the transaction did not in fact occur and thus no bad act occurred. This suggestion over simplifies the evidence. Though the planned transaction did not occur, it was proffered to show that Campbell and Morales engaged in an ongoing drug enterprise. The State introduced the evidence as one part of several ongoing bad acts under the rubric of D.R.E. 404(b)'s plan or scheme exception. The fact that the planned transaction did not occur is relevant to whether the State offered plain, clear and conclusive evidence, but not on the issue whether the State offered it as an intention to commit a bad act in the future. Therefore, we will subject this evidence to a Getz analysis.
To support his criticism of the trial judge's analysis of the materiality prong, Campbell relies on our holding in Deshields v. State. [9] In Deshields, we quoted Getz's holding that no evidential purpose is served by proof that the defendant committed other intentional acts of the same type. [10] The State replies that it is clear that this evidence was material to an ultimate issue in dispute in this case: whether Campbell was trafficking and delivering methamphetamine to Morales. The State claims that the evidence is vital to explain Campbell's trafficking plan and operation because the State could not recover physical evidence and only recorded one wiretapped conversation about delivery (October 26), which did not refer to Campbell. Getz and D.R.E. 404(b) permit later bad acts evidence under certain conditions. [11] Where the evidence of a later bad act is offered for a proper purpose, like plan or scheme, the trial judge should engage in the Getz analysis. [12] Evidence of other bad acts is admissible when those acts have independent logical relevance and when their probative value is not substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice. [13] The evidence of the prior bad act must be logically related to the material facts of the case. [14] In Getz, we held that evidence of other crimes must be material to an issue or ultimate fact in dispute in the case. [15] The planned November 3rd transaction has independent logical relevance because it is material to identifying Campbell as part of a trafficking scheme. The probative value of identifying Campbell as the supplier outweighs the prejudice of notifying the jury about the later bad act. In this case, the State did not prefer evidence of the future deal for the purpose of showing Campbell's bad character but instead to show that Campbell was engaged in ongoing drug deals. [16] This evidence allowed the jury to evaluate the evidence in this case to determine whether Campbell engaged in trafficking as well as delivery of methamphetamine. The evidence of a future drug deal is sufficiently material to satisfy Getz.
Campbell contends that the trial court also committed legal error by not conducting any analysis under the `plain, clear and conclusive prong' of the Getz test before admitting evidence of Morales' November 3rd phone call to Campbell. Campbell asserts that the November 3rd telephone call that the State characterizes as an attempt to arrange a drug buy does not present clear and conclusive evidence that Campbell possessed methamphetamine. Campbell maintains that the telephone call transcript indicates that Campbell gave no assent to any drug transaction. There was no mention of drugs in the transcript. To bolster their argument for admitting Morales's November 3rd call to Campbell, the State offered Morales' testimony about calling his cocaine supplier Angel Torres on November 3rd. Morales testified that he called Torres the same evening he called Campbell to tell Torres that it was too late in the evening for Morales to travel to Philadelphia to purchase Torres' cocaine. Campbell denies that Morales' testimony about his conversation with Angel Torres provided plain, clear and conclusive evidence that he possessed methamphetamine on November 3rd. The State also offered GPS tracking evidence to show that Morales was in the vicinity of Campbell's house on the same date that Morales testified he went to pick up drugs from Campbell. The State insists that the GPS tracking evidence and the wiretap corroborated Morales' testimony. Campbell emphasizes that DSP did not recover any drugs or drug paraphernalia from his house that weekend while Campbell was out of town and unaware of the search warrant. Campbell complains that Morales' wiretapped phone call to him is not plain, clear and conclusive evidence of a drug trafficking scheme. The State suggests that [t]estimony alone is sufficiently plain, clear and conclusive. The State relies on Lloyd v. State [17] for the proposition that testimony standing alone is enough to support an element of a crime. In Lloyd, we held that testimony sufficient to support an element of a crime must also be sufficient to show reliability under the plain, clear and conclusive standard articulated in Getz. [18] Our standard of review is abuse of discretion and we will not disturb the trial judge's ruling if it is based on conscience and reason, as opposed to being arbitrary and capricious. [19] Testimony implicating a person's plan to meet to sell drugs could support a criminal conviction for trafficking. The November 3rd phone call transcript is consistent with the GPS tracking evidence and Morales' testimony. Therefore, the evidence of a future drug deal is sufficiently plain, clear, and conclusive to satisfy Getz.
The third Getz factor Campbell quarrels with is the jury instructions. The trial judge left it up to defense counsel to fashion an instruction. Getz requires a trial judge to instruct the jury about the specific purpose for which they can use the bad acts evidence. [20] The jury instruction, submitted by Campbell, states: You have heard evidence in this trial alleges [sic] that the defendant was involved in acts subsequent to the offense charged. You may not use that evidence as proof that the defendant is a bad person and, therefore, probably committed the offenses charged in the indictment. You may only consider subsequent acts evidence to help you in deciding whether the defendant possessed the requisite intent to commit the acts for which he is now on trial. Again, you are not to consider the alleged subsequent bad acts as proof that the defendant is a person of bad character. Campbell argues that the use of the word intent instead of plan or scheme was reversible error. Neither party nor the trial judge objected to the instruction. Jury instructions are not grounds for reversal if they are reasonably informative and not misleading. [21] Some inaccuracies in jury instructions are permissible. [22] A jury instruction is grounds for reversal only when the deficiency undermined the ability of the jury `to intelligently perform its duty in returning a verdict.' [23] All jury instructions will be reviewed as a whole. [24] Campbell argues that we should find his case analogous to Milligan v. State, [25] in which we found the trial court's cryptic reference to another proper purpose in the jury instructions was, as a matter of law, reversible error. [26] In Milligan, we found the jury instructions were not specific enough to limit the jury's consideration to the proper purpose for which the evidence had been admitted. [27] Campbell argues that the trial judge admitted the bad acts evidence for plan or scheme, and therefore, it was improper to instruct the jury to consider the bad acts for intent. Campbell emphasizes that intent is an element of the charged offenses unlike plan or scheme. Campbell contends that intent focuses prospectively on the acts to show evidence of a defendant's specific intent to do the bad act, which in this case was the future November 3rd weekend deal. Campbell distinguishes plan or scheme by claiming that those terms focus retrospectively to show evidence of a defendant's ongoing plan to do bad acts like the charged offense. His concern is that the jury found him guilty of the one offense that occurred only a few days before the alleged later bad act because the jury was allowed to infer that he had a specific intent to engage in that later bad act. Whereas, if the jury was instructed to determine if he had plan[ned] or scheme to engage in the later bad act, then Campbell might not have been found guilty on the one charge because the jury acquitted him on all the similar charges and having done so could not have believed that he engaged in an ongoing plan or scheme. Campbell's reliance on Milligan is misplaced because his jury instructions stated specifically that the jury should limit their consideration of the alleged bad acts to whether the defendant possessed the requisite intent to commit the acts for which he is now on trial. The evidence of later bad acts was admitted as evidence of a plan or scheme. We fail to comprehend Campbell's distinction between whether he intended to or planned to arrange a future drug deal. The jury instructions were specific enough to limit the jury's consideration of the evidence to the purpose for which it was admitted. In the context of jury instructions as a whole, the trial judge's use of defense counsel's wording did not constitute error.