Opinion ID: 3170633
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Post‐Trial Procedure

Text: Four months after Lawson’s trial, Detective Rogers was indicted in state court for sexual misconduct with a person subject to lawful detention, official misconduct, and false in‐ forming. The government then requested Rogers’s personnel file from the Fort Wayne Police Department, in which it found prior instances of misconduct that Rogers had not disclosed. The government disclosed to Lawson Rogers’s four letters of reprimand: (1) in July 2013 (after Lawson’s trial), Rogers was reprimanded for negligently failing to log evidence into the evidence management system; (2) in 2006, Rogers was rep‐ rimanded for a preventable accident involving a police vehi‐ cle; (3) in 2004, Rogers received a sustained reprimand for improper conduct; and (4) in 1998, Rogers received a sus‐ tained reprimand for improper conduct. Lawson filed a motion for a new trial arguing that the failure to disclose Rogers’s personnel file was a violation of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), and Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972). Lawson argued that Rogers’s past misconduct impeached the reliability of the fingerprint evi‐ dence that he had collected. Lawson also argued that be‐ cause of his disciplinary record, Rogers “knew he was on thin ice,” and this knowledge “automatically makes Rogers biased and prejudiced against the defendant.” In addition, the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Rosemond v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 1240, 1249 (2014), in which it held that to sustain a conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c), the jury must find that the accomplice had advance knowledge that a firearm would be used. Lawson moved for 10 No. 14‐3276 a new trial based on Rosemond because the jury had not been properly instructed. On August 26, 2014, the district court denied both of Lawson’s motions. First, the district court concluded that Lawson had not been prejudiced by the government’s failure to disclose Rogers’s personnel file. Second, the district court acknowledged that the instruction given was an error under Rosemond, but it concluded that the erroneous instruction did not affect Lawson’s substantial rights because based on the evidence presented at trial, the jury’s verdict could “only be understood as a determination that the Defendant in‐ tended to assist in an armed robbery.” The district court sentenced Lawson to 84 months on counts one and three to be served concurrently and 60 months on count two to be served consecutively, plus three years of supervised release. Lawson appeals.