Opinion ID: 802339
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: jurisdiction

Text: The District Court had jurisdiction over this case under 18 U.S.C. § 3231. We, in turn, have appellate jurisdiction to consider challenges to “decision[s] or order[s] of a district court suppressing or excluding evidence …, not made after the defendant has been put in jeopardy,” so long as the “United States attorney certifies to the district court that the appeal is not taken for purpose of delay and that the evidence is a substantial proof of a fact material in the proceeding.” 18 U.S.C. § 3731. The government’s appeal from the District Court’s ruling excluding evidence of the Pozo Plot and the Esteves Plot invokes that jurisdiction on the ground that the District Court’s verbal statement that it would “[a]bsolutely” adhere to its prior rulings on retrial (Joint App. at 49) was an appealable “decision or order” excluding evidence. Given § 3731’s express mandate that its provisions “shall be liberally construed to effectuate its purposes,” 18 U.S.C. § 3731, there is wide agreement that oral decisions dealing with subjects within the statute’s scope are appealable. See United States v. Farnsworth, 456 F.3d 394, 398-99 (3d Cir. 2006) (presuming an “oral ruling” is 30 appealable under § 3731, but holding the ruling at issue was not appealable because it was not, as the government contended, a dismissal); United States v. Janati, 374 F.3d 263, 269 (4th Cir. 2004) (exercising appellate jurisdiction over an “oral ruling”); United States v. Presser, 844 F.2d 1275, 1280 (6th Cir. 1988) (“[W]e view the district court’s oral statement as evidencing an intent to exclude government evidence … and consequently, its statement qualifies as an appealable order … .”); United States v. Flores, 538 F.2d 939, 942-43 (2d Cir. 1976) (oral ruling “exclud[ing] evidence of prior acts and statements” was appealable under § 3731). Bergrin argues, however, that the District Court’s statement was not sufficiently definite to constitute an appealable decision or order, because the District Court was not unequivocal in saying it would exclude evidence of the Pozo Plot and the Esteves Plot at Bergrin’s retrial. Cf. United States v. Brooks, 145 F.3d 446, 453-54 (1st Cir. 1998) (stating that orders lacking a requisite “degree of finality … may not qualify as … order[s] excluding evidence under section 3731”). The record belies that claim. Although the Court’s colloquy did include some qualifying language, the first thing it said was that it would “[a]bsolutely” exclude that evidence from Bergrin’s retrial. (Joint App. at 49.) And it further stated that it “fe[lt] strongly that [its] rulings were appropriate.” (Id.) The Court’s rulings over the course of Bergrin’s trial on the Kemo Murder Counts reflect similarly strong convictions, even amidst repeated requests by the government to introduce the Pozo Plot and the Esteves Plot evidence after Bergrin denied any intent to harm Kemo. Moreover, the Court confirmed its resolve to keep out the questioned evidence when, at a hearing after the government’s first appeal was filed, it reiterated that 31 excluding the evidence was “the right decision” (id. at 4446), and subsequently ordered a second severance based on its belief “that trying Bergrin for his alleged involvement in the [Kemo] murder conspiracy with extensive evidence from the [Esteves Plot] … would be fundamentally unfair and improper” (id. at 67). The District Court did, to be sure, leave open the possibility that it would reconsider its evidentiary determinations, and it is possible, as Bergrin points out, that circumstances may change in the future. But the chance of change is inherent in virtually every pretrial evidentiary ruling and treating such rulings as unreviewable “would insulate [them] from appellate review, thus frustrating … the purposes of § 3731.” United States v. Siegel, 536 F.3d 306, 315 (4th Cir. 2008). Indeed, even a district court’s explicit suggestion that a ruling is “preliminary and could change” does not make it an unappealable one under § 3731. Id. at 314; cf. United States v. Horwitz, 622 F.2d 1101, 1104 (2d Cir. 1980) (stating that even “conditional … ruling[s], which raise[] the remote prospect that suppression will not be ordered, [do not] necessarily deprive[] [an appellate] court of jurisdiction under section 3731”). Thus, while there was perhaps some “ambiguity about the district court’s future actions,” its statement clearly “evidenc[ed] an intent to exclude government evidence” at Bergrin’s retrial, Presser, 844 F.2d at 1280, and thereby laid the foundation for our jurisdiction under § 3731. 32 We turn, then, to consider the government’s challenge to the merits of those evidentiary rulings. 20 20 Although we can undoubtedly review the District Court’s second severance to determine whether it warrants mandamus relief, since the government has alternatively petitioned for that writ, see United States v. Santtini, 963 F.2d 585, 590 (3d Cir. 1992) (“[P]arties are free to proceed alternatively on application for a writ or by appeal, with the court determining which, if any, procedure is more appropriate.”), the jurisdictional question presented by the appeal of the Second Severance Order is more difficult. The government argues that we have pendent appellate jurisdiction to consider that appeal based on our § 3731 jurisdiction to consider the District Court’s evidentiary rulings. We have “recognized ‘a discretionary, though ‘narrow,’ doctrine of pendent appellate jurisdiction,’” E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co. v. Rhone Poulenc Fiber & Resin Intermediates, S.A.S., 269 F.3d 187, 204 (3d Cir. 2001) (citation omitted), but there is a split in authority as to whether that doctrine applies in criminal cases and we have not expressly employed it in that context, compare, e.g., United States v. Ferguson, 246 F.3d 129, 138 (2d Cir. 2001) (“[T]here is no pendent appellate jurisdiction in criminal cases.” (citing Abney v. United States, 431 U.S. 651, 662-63 (1977))), with United States v. Lopez-Lukis, 102 F.3d 1164, 1167 & n.10 (11th Cir. 1997) (exercising pendent appellate jurisdiction over an order striking a count from an indictment where the government appealed an order suppressing evidence under § 3731), and United States v. Maker, 751 F.2d 614, 626 (3d Cir. 1984) (reviewing a severance order for an abuse of discretion without explicitly relying on, or referring to, pendent appellate jurisdiction). Because we will require 33