Opinion ID: 787946
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Admission of the Hester Letter

Text: 62 Morgan argues on appeal that the district court committed plain error when it refused to give the jury a limiting instruction that Hester's letter to her boyfriend (the Hester letter) not be considered by the jury against Morgan because it was inadmissable hearsay. During the trial, Morgan's counsel asked for the instruction on the grounds that the Hester letter was unduly prejudicial under Rule 403 of the Federal Rules of Evidence. Counsel for Morgan and the government agree that because the ground that Morgan urges here is different from the ground that was argued on her behalf to the district court, we review for plain error the court's refusal to give the limiting charge. To constitute plain error, there must be (1) error, (2) that is plain, and (3) that affects substantial rights. If all three conditions are met, an appellate court may then exercise its discretion to notice a forfeited error, but only if (4) the error seriously affects the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. Johnson v. United States, 520 U.S. 461, 466-67, 117 S.Ct. 1544, 137 L.Ed.2d 718 (1997) (citations, internal quotation marks, and alterations omitted). We conclude that the district court did not commit plain error in declining to give the requested jury instruction. 63 The district court admitted the Hester letter under Federal Rule of Evidence 807, the catch-all hearsay exception. According to Rule 807: 64 A statement not specifically covered by Rule 803 or 804 but having equivalent circumstantial guarantees of trustworthiness, is not excluded by the hearsay rule, if the court determines that (A) the statement is offered as evidence of a material fact; (B) the statement is more probative on the point for which it is offered than any other evidence which the proponent can procure through reasonable efforts; and (C) the general purposes of these rules and the interests of justice will best be served by admission of the statement into evidence. 65 Fed.R.Evid. 807. A statement will be admitted under this rule if (i) it is particularly trustworthy; (ii) it bears on a material fact; (iii) it is the most probative evidence addressing that fact; (iv) its admission is consistent with the rules of evidence and advances the interests of justice; and (v) its proffer follows adequate notice to the adverse party. United States v. Bryce, 208 F.3d 346, 350-51 (2d Cir.1999). Morgan argues only that the letter was neither trustworthy nor probative on the single most important question in this case, Morgan's state of mind. Morgan Br. at 35. We disagree. 66 Before the Supreme Court held in Crawford v. Washington, ___ U.S. ___, 124 S.Ct. 1354, 158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004), that testimonial hearsay is inadmissible under the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment if the declarant is unavailable for cross-examination, we noted that inculpatory hearsay statements made by an accomplice in certain circumstances, such as during formal police interrogation, could not be introduced as evidence of the guilt of an accused because they were untrustworthy. See United States v. Matthews, 20 F.3d 538, 545-46 (2d Cir.1994). We recognized that: On the other hand, if the statement is made to a person whom the declarant believes is an ally rather than a law enforcement official, and if the circumstances surrounding the portion of the statement that inculpates the defendant provide no reason to suspect that that inculpatory portion is any less trustworthy than the part of the statement that directly incriminates the declarant, the trustworthiness of the portion that inculpates the defendant may well be sufficiently established that its admission does not violate the Confrontation Clause. 67 Id. at 546. The statement at issue in Matthews, made by a co-defendant to his girlfriend, was therefore held to be admissible against the defendant at trial. 68 In the instant case, the Hester letter, 8 like the statement at issue in Matthews, was not in response to police questioning. It was not written in a coercive atmosphere. It was not addressed to law enforcement authorities. To the contrary, the letter was written by co-defendant Hester to an intimate acquaintance, a boyfriend (compare the statement by a co-defendant to a girlfriend in Matthews ), in the privacy of her hotel room. She had no reason to expect that it would ever find its way into the hands of the police; she did not write it to curry favor with them or with anyone else. We therefore think that the Hester letter was trustworthy. 69 We also think that the Hester letter was probative with respect to issues in the case against Morgan. Hester and Morgan were virtually joined at the hip during the course of the events that gave rise to their prosecution. Morgan's position at trial was that she was a babe-in-the-woods who, while accepting an offer of payment for her travel to New York and Europe, had no knowledge that something untoward — or at least not this particular something untoward — was happening. Hester testified that the we in the Hester letter — when we get home we'll be able to get a car and a place of our own. I hope so, and, after them just handing over 1000 $ like that [t]hey just might be telling the truth, Hester Letter, Duplicated in Joint Appendix on Appeal, at 10-11 (emphasis added) — referred to Hester and Morgan. The Hester letter thus tends to show that both women were expecting a suspiciously large payment for their willingness to go to Europe as couriers for Scott and that therefore, in the words of the jury instructions, the defendant [Morgan] deliberately closed her eyes to what would otherwise have been obvious to her — that she was taking part in an illicit scheme. 70 We find no error, let alone plain error, in the district court's refusal to instruct the jury to disregard the Hester letter in its consideration of the charges against Morgan. See United States v. Rybicki, 354 F.3d 124, 129 (2d Cir.2003) (in banc) (holding that if there is no error, a fortiori, there is no plain error).