Opinion ID: 397401
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Shoe-Mike Evidence

Text: 67 In June 1977 Underhill visited Thevis in prison in Springfield, Missouri, ostensibly to discuss settlement of Underhill's pending civil RICO suit against Thevis. Unknown to Thevis, Underhill carried a small transmitter in the heel of his shoe, permitting FBI agents to monitor and tape the conversation. At one point Underhill told Thevis that he had taken a polygraph test to corroborate his story concerning the Mayes and Hanna murders, had implicated Thevis in the murders, and had passed with flying colors. Thevis responded, No wonder you passed. 19 68 Over strong objections by defense counsel, the trial court admitted this conversation only as evidence showing Thevis knew Underhill was cooperating with the government, and sternly instructed the jury on the legal position of polygraph evidence. 20 The court repeated the limiting instruction in its final charge to the jury. Despite these limiting instructions, appellants contend that the probative value of the evidence was far outweighed by the unfair prejudice to Thevis evoked by Underhill's references to the polygraph test, especially in light of the prior admission of exhibit 47 as motive evidence. Therefore, appellants claim the trial court committed reversible error by not excluding the evidence under Rule 403. 69 We reject appellants' argument. While they are correct in conceding that exhibit 47 provided the jury with strong motive evidence, that exhibit required the jury to infer Thevis' knowledge from the fingerprints on the exhibit. In contrast, the shoe-mike conversation was direct evidence that Thevis knew Underhill was cooperating with the government fully and voluntarily, and thus the conversation was highly probative in its own right. As to the danger of unfair prejudice, we are especially sensitive to the possibility of prejudice arising from courtroom references to polygraph tests. As a result, this circuit has ruled that polygraph results are inadmissible as substantive evidence. E. g., United States v. Masri, 547 F.2d 932, 936 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 431 U.S. 932, 97 S.Ct. 2640, 53 L.Ed.2d 249 (1977); United States v. Cochran, 499 F.2d 380, 393 (5th Cir. 1974), cert. denied, 419 U.S. 1124, 95 S.Ct. 810, 42 L.Ed.2d 825 (1975). Nevertheless, we note that here the reference to Underhill's polygraph was not admitted for its truth, but as evidence that Thevis knew Underhill was cooperating with the government. Given the very high probative value of this evidence and the strong limiting instructions, we are unable to say that the danger of unfair prejudice substantially outweighed the conversation's probative value. We therefore find no abuse of discretion in admitting the evidence. 21 70