Opinion ID: 2837800
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Admissibility of Rebuttal Evidence

Text: Monell next claims that the district court erred in ruling that the government could introduce recorded prison conversations as rebuttal evidence if Monell called Tommy Nguyen as a defense witness. Shortly before trial, Monell filed a proposed witness list containing three witnesses, including his girlfriend, Nicole Connally. Three days later and one week before trial, Monell added Nguyen as a fourth proposed witness. At the government's request, the district court agreed to appoint counsel for Connally and Nguyen because of the possibility that those two witnesses might incriminate themselves by placing themselves in the apartment. Before the end of the government's case-in-chief, the district court conducted a voir dire of both Connally and Nguyen to determine the scope of their testimony and whether they would assert their Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. Connally validly asserted her Fifth Amendment privilege, and the district court excused her. Nguyen, on the other hand, agreed to waive in part his Fifth Amendment privilege, and refused to answer questions only about whether he owned or directly possessed the guns, ammunition, or drugs found in the apartment. During voir dire, Nguyen testified that he had lived in the apartment at 696 North Main Street for about two months before the police conducted the search; - 25 - that he allowed Monell to stay in the apartment five or six times; and that Nguyen had seen the handgun, shotgun, and ammunition in the apartment before Monell stayed there for the first time. He also denied seeing Monell possess drugs in the apartment. Nguyen stated that he and Monell were members of the Bloods street gang, but denied knowing about Monell's role in the gang. The district court deferred ruling on the admissibility of Nguyen's testimony and any rebuttal evidence until later that day. In the meantime, the government made it clear that, if Nguyen testified, it would seek to introduce as rebuttal evidence an audio recording of a June 15, 2013, prison conversation, recorded while Monell was in pretrial detention, during which Monell seemingly attempted to convince Connally, with whom he shared a child, to take responsibility for the crime.13 The government argued that 13 The following excerpts from the transcript of the prison conversation provide a flavor of the exchange between Monell and Connally: Monell: End of the day, you got to think about it. Think. I will never know. I will never opportunity [sic] for shit. I will be 55, and I come home with 5 years parole. So, they gonna be on my ass for 25. So, think. Don't think now. Think about everything later on. Get it? . . . . Connally: . . . . Throw my name out there. See what happens. If you haven't already. . . . . Connally: I said what you feel deep down inside when it comes to me about the - 26 - the recording supported an inference that Monell also pressured Nguyen to testify falsely as a backup plan when Connally refused.14 Monell objected, arguing that the prison conversation between Monell and Connally was not relevant to Nguyen's decision to testify. Defense counsel also asked the district court to rule on the admissibility of the rebuttal evidence before defense counsel made a decision on whether to call Nguyen. After the government finished its case-in-chief, the district court ruled that it would admit Nguyen's testimony notwithstanding his partial exercise of his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, if this testimony plays out as I expect it and as conducted in the voir dire. The district situation. Monell: That's not true. . . . It's that I figured I would go to--I would do what I would do for you if there's the mathematics. This is about mathematics. Like, last time I was out there, [Marvin] said, Listen, if we get pulled over, I'm taking this for you. That's what my people do for me. . . . . Monell: Like I said, end of the day, you gotta do you now because if you don't do it, I'm done. . . . 20 years? Do you know what that is? You think one year was a lot? You gotta do you now. 14In a transcript of a different prison conversation produced by the government at sentencing, but not during the trial, Monell told Connally, I'm a let you go with all of that and I'm a move on, I go to my plan B now that's all I can do. See infra section II.E. - 27 - court also stated that if Nguyen testified, evidence that Nguyen and Monell were members of the Bloods street gang could come in, and may open the door toward other gang-related evidence, including photographs and gang-colored clothing found in the apartment. The district court explained that it would delay a final ruling on the admissibility of the prison recording until after Monell put on his other evidence, but the court indicated that if Nguyen does testify, the recording would be admissible. The district court confirmed this inclination after Monell presented his other evidence, predicting that my ruling will be that if [Nguyen] testifies, I will permit the government to introduce the transcript or the tapes rather from June 15th, 2013. The district court then made conditional rulings about redacting statements in the recording about Monell's pretrial detention and predicted prison sentence. After defense counsel conversed with Monell, the defense rested without calling Nguyen as a witness. On appeal, Monell argues that the recorded prison conversation was inadmissible as irrelevant and unfairly prejudicial, see Fed. R. Evid. 402, 403, and that the district court's ruling to the contrary violated his Sixth Amendment right to call witnesses in his defense. We do not reach the merits of Monell's argument, however, because Monell waived his challenge by not calling Nguyen as a witness. - 28 - Our conclusion that Monell waived his challenge flows from the reasoning in Luce v. United States, 469 U.S. 38 (1984). In Luce, the defendant sought to challenge the district court's denial of his motion in limine15 to prevent the government from impeaching him, if he testified, with a prior conviction under Federal Rule of Evidence 609(a). 469 U.S. at 39-40. The Supreme Court held that the defendant's challenge was not reviewable because he decided not to testify and the challenged evidence therefore did not come in. Id. at 43. The Court identified several reasons why this must be so: (1) the lack of factual context made it difficult for a reviewing court to balance probative value and unfair prejudice; (2) the district court's in limine ruling was subject to change until the evidence was actually offered; (3) the government ultimately might not use the objectionable impeachment evidence; (4) the defendant might have chosen not to testify even without the adverse ruling; and (5) harmless error analysis would be an empty exercise because the appellate court could not logically term 'harmless' an error that presumptively kept the defendant from testifying. Id. at 41-42. Though Luce involved a challenge to a Rule 609(a) ruling, we have 15 The Court in Luce used the term in limine in a broad sense to refer to any motion, whether made before or during trial, to exclude anticipated prejudicial evidence before the evidence is actually offered. Luce, 469 U.S. at 40 n.2. Monell's objection to the government's anticipated rebuttal evidence fits within this broad definition. - 29 - extended its reasoning to other in limine evidentiary rulings, including those under Rule 403. See United States v. Griffin, 818 F.2d 97, 104 (1st Cir. 1987). The concerns animating Luce counsel against appellate review here. We would need to make too many speculative assumptions to rule on Monell's claim. First, and most significantly, Nguyen's testimony might not have made it into evidence. The district court made the admissibility of Nguyen's testimony contingent on his trial testimony conforming to his voir dire. The district court acknowledged the possibility that Nguyen's actual testimony might differ from his voir dire: I, of course, don't know how precisely this is going to play out. I'm sort of guessing how this is going to play out . . . . Had Nguyen refused to answer all or most of the government's questions on cross-examination, the district court could have stricken Nguyen's testimony. See United States v. Gary, 74 F.3d 304, 310 (1st Cir. 1996) (When cross-examination on material issues raised on direct examination is curtailed because of a witness's valid claim of privilege . . . the trial court, in its discretion, may refuse to permit that witness's testimony.). Second, we would also need to assume that Monell would have called Nguyen if not for the district court's ruling on the recorded prison conversation. There are at least two other reasons Monell might have had for keeping Nguyen off the stand. One would - 30 - be to keep the lid shut on evidence about Monell's shared street gang affiliation with Nguyen. The other was that, after hearing Nguyen's voir dire, Monell might have decided that the jury would not believe Nguyen, regardless of the government's crossexamination or rebuttal evidence.16 Third, the government might have elected not to risk a reversible appellate issue, and ultimately might have decided not to introduce the prison recording. This possibility would have become more likely if Nguyen's testimony suffered from internal inconsistencies, or if the government was able to put in all of the evidence of gang affiliation. Furthermore, had the government introduced the recording, we do not know to what extent the statements in the recording would have been redacted, which makes it difficult to evaluate the degree of unfair prejudice Monell would have suffered. Appellate review of an evidentiary ruling, especially a Rule 403 ruling, cannot bear this level of speculation. Thus, if Monell wished to challenge the admissibility of the rebuttal evidence, he should have called Nguyen, put his testimony before the jury (and cemented it into the record), objected if and when 16 In particular, Nguyen's story during voir dire that he stayed with a friend the night before the search, then, upon returning the next morning, did not enter his own apartment, instead remaining on the stairwell for several hours, could have struck the jury as unbelievable. - 31 - the government sought to introduce the prison recording, and then appealed the ruling if the district court overruled his objection. See, e.g., Aguirre v. Turner Constr. Co., 582 F.3d 808, 814 (7th Cir. 2009) (When a judge makes a conditional ruling on evidence, the party objecting to it must satisfy the condition if he wants to preserve the issue for appellate review.). True, Monell would have run the risk that we would affirm the admission of the rebuttal evidence, but parties must engage in this sort of calculus all of the time. Cf. Ohler v. United States, 529 U.S. 753, 75759 (2000) (discussing the choices defendants with prior convictions face in deciding whether to testify). Our approach to this issue presents no unfairness to Monell or to other defendants in similar positions. Monell points us to no trial management rule that required the prosecution to tell Monell before he called Nguyen what the prosecution would do on rebuttal. Nor did the district court have a duty to preview its likely ruling. If we were now to rule that those discretionary disclosures--all to Monell's benefit--also conveyed the advantage of challenging an evidentiary ruling that was never actually made, the likelihood of such disclosures would drop. We think it fairer to all to presume that providing a defendant with more information does not itself alter the rules on waiver to his advantage. Monell points to cases in which we have suggested in dicta that a defendant could avoid the Luce waiver rule by - 32 - screening the proposed testimony voir dire, thereby providing a verisimilitudinous enactment of an actual context, rather than putting it before the jury. Griffin, 818 F.2d at 105 ([C]ounsel may request . . . in exceptional cases, that the actual testimony be screened voir dire in the jury's absence. (emphasis added)); see also United States v. Nivica, 887 F.2d 1110, 1116 (1st Cir. 1989) (quoting Griffin). We do not rule out the possibility that a sufficiently definite preview of the defendant's and the government's proposed evidence could provide a verisimilitudinous enactment of an actual context, Griffin, 818 F.2d at 105, such that the district court and appellate court can rule without the disadvantages listed in Luce. Here, though, for all the reasons we have already listed, no such enactment occurred (or was likely possible). Finally, our recent decision in United States v. Jimenez-Bencévi, 788 F.3d 7 (1st Cir. 2015), does not dictate a different result. In Jimenez-Bencévi, the district court required the defendant to reveal to his proposed expert the defendant's proffer of an admission of guilt during plea negotiations with the government. Id. at 13-14. That proffer was protected by direct use immunity granted in a written proffer agreement. Id. at 10. The defendant did not call the expert, and on appeal sought to argue that the district court violated his proffer agreement. Id. at 14. We held that the defendant did not waive this challenge, - 33 - even though he did not put the expert on the stand. Id. at 15. There are several reasons why Jimenez-Bencévi does not control here. The ruling at issue in Jimenez-Bencévi unconditionally required the defendant to violate his proffer agreement as a precondition to calling his expert, rather than as a down-the-road ramification of calling the expert. In addition, the district court in Jimenez-Bencévi effectively excluded the defendant's expert, because it concluded that the expert would likely recant upon learning of the proffer; and if he did not, the court would not allow him to testify. Id. Simply put, in Jimenez-Bencévi it was abundantly clear that because of the challenged ruling, the defendant could not call his expert, and certainly could not do so without violating his proffer agreement, whereas we are left to guess how events would have transpired in the district court had Monell called Nguyen.