Opinion ID: 788340
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Use of limiting instructions

Text: 137 We have repeatedly held that a district court's careful and frequent limiting instructions to the jury, explaining how and against whom certain evidence may be considered, can reduce or eliminate any possibility of prejudice arising from a joint trial. See Hanley, 190 F.3d at 1028; United States v. Nelson, 137 F.3d 1094, 1108 (9th Cir.1998); Baker, 10 F.3d at 1388; see also Zafiro v. United States, 506 U.S. 534, 539, 113 S.Ct. 933, 122 L.Ed.2d 317 (1993). Throughout the trial, the district court instructed the jury that it must consider the evidence against each defendant and evaluate each defendant's guilt separately, stating on the first day of trial and repeatedly throughout the proceedings: 138 [A] separate crime is charged against one or more of the defendants in each count. The charges have been joined for trial. You must decide the case of each defendant on each crime charged against the defendant separately. Your verdict on any count as to any defendant ... should not control your verdict on any other count or as to any other defendant. 139 Combined with its detailed instructions on the law governing conspiracies, and on substantive RICO violations, the district court's explanatory and limiting instructions to the jury are more than sufficient to guard against the possibility of prejudice to the defendants. See Hanley, 190 F.3d at 1027-28 (assessing similar instructions as adequate to cure any risk of prejudice); cf. Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. 750, 769, 66 S.Ct. 1239, 90 L.Ed. 1557 (1943) (noting that an appropriate instruction to avert spillover prejudice in cases where related but separate conspiracies are tried together would be that the jury should take care to consider the evidence relating to each conspiracy separately from that relating to each other conspiracy charged). 140