Opinion ID: 203028
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Voluntariness of Morelis's Statement

Text: Before Agent Santiago testified about Morelis's statement admitting that Tejeiro told him that the Sea Atlantic would carry contraband, the court observed that no voluntariness issue had been raised with respect to the statement. Morelis's counsel responded that he had not yet done so, but had filed a continuance motion because he had not had time to explore the whole contents of all the documents. De La Rosa points to this exchange in arguing that the court's denial of a continuance was an abuse of discretion. Neither De La Rosa nor Morelis develops this point, however, by showing that Morelis's counsel could have raised a viable voluntariness challenge to the statement if he had had more time to scrutinize the documents and interview his client. Given counsel's opportunity to examine the relevant documents since the time of trial, we can only conclude that the documents, in fact, do not support a voluntariness challenge and that the district court's continuance ruling is not vulnerable on that basis.