Opinion ID: 620563
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Prior Act: Uncharged Handgun Theft

Text: Clay argues that the district court erred in admitting evidence of the theft of the handgun from Moser's car. The court admitted the evidence under the res gestae exception and under Rule 404(b) to show preparation and identity.
We have recognized the admissibility of res gestae, or background evidence, in limited circumstances when the evidence includes conduct that is inextricably intertwined with the charged offense. United States v. Hardy, 228 F.3d 745, 748 (6th Cir.2000). While this rule is an exception to Rule 404(b), see id. at 748, it does not allow a party to evade 404(b) by introducing any and all other act evidence, see United States v. Buentello, 423 Fed.Appx. 528, 533 (6th Cir.2011) (noting that the concerns that prompted Rule 404(b) are very real, and a party may not rely on [the res gestae ] exception as a backdoor to circumvent its goals). The principle contains severe limitations as to temporal proximity, causal relationship, or spatial connections among the other acts and the charged offense. Hardy, 228 F.3d at 749. Examples of general categories that may satisfy these requirements include evidence that is a prelude to the charged offense, is directly probative of the charged offense, arises from the same events as the charged offense, forms an integral part of a witness's testimony, or completes the story of the charged offense. Id. at 748. Here, Clay was charged with carjacking and brandishing a firearm during and in relation to the carjacking. In order to convict on both counts, the government had to establish that Clay did in fact brandish a firearm. Eyewitness testimony established that the carjacker used a silver semi-automatic handgun during the incident. Another witness, Abernathy, testified that she saw Clay with a semi-automatic handgun either the day of or the day before the carjacking. The government argues that the evidence of the uncharged theft was necessary to complete the story of the offense and explain how Clay obtained the handgun. This argument is logically flawed. There is no evidence that firmly establishes a relationship between the carjacking and the theft. The gun stolen from Moser's car was never recovered, and nothing confirms that stolen weapon was the gun Abernathy saw with Clay, or the gun used during the carjacking. Without confirmation that the gun is the same, the car theft is neither a prelude to the charged offense, nor probative of it. It does not arise from the same events as the carjacking; in fact, it is a completely separate and distinct offense that is not essential for providing a coherent and intelligible description of the charged offense. McCormick on Evidence § 190 (6th ed.2006). The government relies on two cases in which evidence of prior acts involving a gun were admitted pursuant to the res gestae exception to show that the defendant had access to a gun in the charged offense. In both of these cases, there was no dispute that the defendant or the weapon were the same. See United States v. Brown, 22 Fed.Appx. 102, 103 (4th Cir. 2001) (per curiam) (holding that, in a prosecution for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, defendant's assault with the firearm the evening before the charged offense was necessary to complete the story and prove that Brown possessed the gun); United States v. Mitchell, 613 F.2d 779, 782 (10th Cir.1980) (holding that, in a prosecution for possession of an unregistered firearm, evidence of an armed robbery committed with the firearm was admissible). In other words, there was a confirmed link between the prior act and the charged offense. Here, the gun has never been found and no such link exists. Thus, the trial court abused its discretion in admitting the evidence of the theft under the res gestae exception.
Having determined that the video could not have been admitted under the res gestae exception, we now examine whether it was properly admitted under Rule 404(b) for the purposes of showing preparation and identity. As explained supra, this analysis requires a three-part test.
First, we must determine whether there is sufficient evidence to support a finding by the jury that the defendant committed the other act. Huddleston v. United States, 485 U.S. 681, 685, 108 S.Ct. 1496, 99 L.Ed.2d 771 (1988). The government argues that this factor does not merit any discussion because there is no dispute that the handgun was stolen from Moser's truck three days before the carjacking. This is not the issue before us; the issue is not whether the theft occurred but whether there is sufficient evidence that Clay committed the act. Clay was never charged with this offense. There are two pieces of evidence that link him to the crime. One, the surveillance video shows that a man in a red and white patterned shirt robbed the cars, and police recovered photos of Clay wearing a similar red and white patterned shirt. Two, items stolen from Archey's car were found in the apartment Clay was located in. These links are tenuous at best, and even more tenuous because the parties dispute whether the evidence from Archey's car is admissible. For the purposes of step one, however, the district court did not clearly err in finding that a jury could reasonably conclude that Clay stole the handgun from the car.
Second, we must determine whether the evidence relating to the theft of the handgun was offered for the proper purposes of preparation and identity. Looking to preparation first, we have allowed the admission of other acts evidence to show how the defendant obtained items used in the charged offense. See United States v. Hembree, 312 Fed.Appx. 720, 724 (6th Cir.2008). In Hembree, we approved the admission of evidence under 404(b) that the defendant was driving a stolen car when arrested. Id. In that case, however, it was clear that the stolen car was the car used during the offense. Here, the government asked the jury to infer that Clay stole the handgun from Moser's car, and then infer that Clay used that handgun in the carjacking. Even if the jury reaches the first conclusion, there is no evidence that would enable them to reach the second. The fact that both guns were silver is not enough. Guns do not come in a wide variety of colors. This piling of inference upon inference is calling for exactly the kind of propensity determination that Rule 404(b) was intended to prevent. See Huddleston, 485 U.S. at 689, 108 S.Ct. 1496 (noting that the Government may [not] parade past the jury a litany of potentially prejudicial similar acts that have been established or connected to the defendant only by unsubstantiated innuendo). Thus, the evidence of the theft was not properly admitted as evidence of preparation. Turning next to identity, Rule 404(b) allows the introduction of other acts evidence to show identity, provided they are `of sufficient distinctive similarity' with the charges in the indictment to `create a pattern or modus operandi.' United States v. Allen, 619 F.3d 518, 524 (6th Cir.2010) (quoting United States v. Perry, 438 F.3d 642, 648 (6th Cir.2006)). The government argues that the evidence relating to the theft of the handgun shows that Clay was responsible for the theft, which in turn shows that he committed the carjacking. This argument contains the same flaw as the argument about preparation: there is no evidence that the handgun stolen from Moser's truck was used in the carjacking. Thus, evidence from the theft of the handgun does not help establish the identity of the carjacker. While the government suggests that the red and white patterned shirt connects both offenses and shows that the same man was responsible, without a substantiated evidentiary link or shared methodology, a mass-produced shirt does not establish a unique identity. In sum, the crimes are not so similar that they establish a pattern or distinctive modus operandi. See Perry, 438 F.3d at 648 (affirming admission of other acts evidence that established a distinctive signature); Johnson, 27 F.3d at 1194 (noting that other acts evidence is admissible if the perpetrator employed the same modus operandi or method of operation). Accordingly, the evidence of the theft was not properly admitted for evidence of identity.
The district court erred in admitting evidence of the theft of the handgun for the purposes of establishing preparation and identity. The Court's 404(b) analysis does not have to proceed, but in order to establish firmly that error occurred, we will continue with the final step. For the most part, the analysis here mirrors the preceding analysis of the assault. As with the assault, the evidence of the theft of the handgun was of limited probative value. Additionally, there was other, less prejudicial, evidence admitted in the trial that Clay had possession of a gun. Abernathy testified that she saw Clay with a handgun before the carjacking occurred. If the government's goal was to show that Clay had obtained a handgun before the charged offense, it successfully achieved that goal with Abernathy's testimony. The prejudicial impact of the evidence was high. There was a great risk that the evidence suggested that Clay was a repeatedly violent offender. This risk increased the possibility that the jury used the evidence for precisely the reasons it was counseled not to: that Clay was a bad person and a threat to society. Thus, the prejudicial impact of the evidence substantially outweighed its slim probative value. As the evidence of the theft was not admissible pursuant to the res gestae doctrine or for a permissible purpose under Rule 404(b) and because its prejudicial impact outweighed its probative value, we find that the district court erred in admitting the evidence of the theft of the handgun.