Opinion ID: 149873
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Regular Practice

Text: Kaiser argues that Redgate's note-taking on telephone conversations was not a regular practice, and that he recorded the conversations to give himself cover in the event the fraud was exposed. United States v. Freidin, 849 F.2d 716, 723 (2d Cir. 1988) (holding that the regular practice requirement must be met to admit a business record, even if the court determines for other reasons that the document is sufficiently trustworthy). Kaiser argues that Redgate's note-taking was too sporadic and selective to meet this standard, citing testimony from Redgate on cross-examination that he only wrote down highlights and matters he perceived to be important. The selectivity that Kaiser points out, however, is the nature of all note-taking. A business record need not be mechanically generated to be part of a regular practice. Redgate's contact log is different in kind from the types of miscellaneous jottings that courts have found inadmissible under this exception, because it was maintained in a consistent way and was focused on a certain range of issues that were relevant to his business. Cf. United States v. Ramsey, 785 F.2d 184, 192 (7th Cir.1986) (Occasional desk calendars, in which entries may or may not appear at the whim of the writer, do not have the sort of regularity that supports a reliable inference.). This Court has allowed the admission of calendars as business records where the witnesses testified that his regular business practice was to keep a calendar in which he documented events of which he had personal knowledge at or near the time they occurred. United States v. Ford, 435 F.3d 204, 214-15 (2d Cir.2006). Redgate's business planners are similar enough to these calendars, in our view, to fall within the scope of the business records exception. [6]