Opinion ID: 764213
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Summaries of Prior Testimony

Text: 7 Leon-Reyes argues that the district court erred in admitting the drug trafficking summaries into evidence. We review a district court's decision to admit or exclude evidence for an abuse of discretion. United States v. Hernandez, 109 F.3d 1450, 1452 (9th Cir.1997). 8 Summaries of voluminous writings, recordings or photographs are admissible under Rule 1006 of the Federal Rules of Evidence. However, the use of summaries of testimony given by witnesses in prior trials has not been addressed by this court, and the guidelines for the use of such summaries have not been established. 4 9 In a perjury case, the government must prove that the statement made by the defendant in the prior tribunal and alleged to be false was material. In order to do that, the prosecution must offer evidence from the prior trial to show that the defendant's statements were material; simply offering the allegedly false statement itself is not enough. See United States v. Dipp, 581 F.2d 1323, 1328 (9th Cir.1978); see also United States v. Damato, 554 F.2d 1371, 1373 (5th Cir.1977) (holding that the judge did not have sufficient basis to determine materiality where the entire transcript of the prior proceeding was not received by the court). 5 Previously, we have allowed the prosecution to prove materiality of a statement by introducing the complete transcript of the prior proceeding, see Dipp, 581 F.2d at 1328, by presenting testimony from persons who witnessed the proceedings, see Damato, 554 F.2d at 1373, or by presenting testimony from a member of the grand jury or jury, see United States v. Ostertag, 671 F.2d 262, 265 (8th Cir.1982). We are unaware of any case where the court admitted summaries of the type in this case to prove materiality in a perjury trial. However, we can find no reason to exclude such summaries. Indeed, we believe admission of summaries like the ones from this case offer numerous advantages to district courts. Rather than admitting the potentially voluminous transcript or subpoenaing witnesses from the prior trial to repeat their testimony, the prior testimony can be reduced to short summaries tending to prove materiality. Additionally, the district court is better able to monitor and exclude unduly prejudicial material from short summaries than the entire transcript. The portions of the prior trial relevant to the determination of materiality are easily extracted and placed before the jury in a clear and coherent manner. 10 We do recognize, however, that summaries of oral testimony have inherent risks. Summaries are normally prepared by an interested party and therefore may not be completely accurate or may be tainted with the preparing party's bias. Additionally, juries may be misled by the summaries and conclude that the defendant was involved in the crimes which were the subjects of the prior trial. Summaries, therefore, must be scrutinized by the trial court to ensure that they are accurate, complete, not unduly prejudicial, limited to the relevant issues, and confined by appropriate jury instructions. 11 Applying these guidelines to this case, we hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in admitting the summaries. The district court reviewed the written summaries before trial and removed irrelevant and unduly prejudicial material. Defense counsel was given a copy of the summaries prior to trial and could have objected to the form and content of each summary, but did not. Nor does Leon-Reyes contend that the summaries were inaccurate or incomplete. Moreover, the district court instructed the jury each time a group of summaries were presented that the summaries were to be considered only on the issue of materiality and not on the issue of whether the statements were false. 12 Leon-Reyes argues that the summaries were irrelevant. We disagree. The government was required to prove that Leon-Reyes's statements were material to the Garcia trial. See 18 U.S.C. § 1623; Johnson, 520 U.S. at 465. A statement is material if it has a natural tendency to influence, or was capable of influencing, the decision of the decision-making body to which it was addressed. United States v. Clark, 918 F.2d 843, 846 (9th Cir.1990) (internal quotation omitted), overruled on other grounds by United States v. Keys, 133 F.3d 1282, 1285 (9th Cir.1998). The money laundering summaries and the accounting summaries were clearly relevant, as Leon-Reyes had been called by the defense to rebut government testimony and to explain the large amounts of money the Garcias invested in Radio Pantera. The drug trafficking summaries were also relevant to show the materiality of Leon-Reyes's testimony as a defense to the claim that the funds were from an illegitimate source. In order to prove the Garcias were guilty of money laundering, the government had to prove that the Garcias' funds were from an illegitimate source. The drug summaries show the government's alleged illegitimate source that Leon-Reyes was called to refute. 13 Leon-Reyes also argues that the drug trafficking summaries were unduly prejudicial because they implicated him in the drug trade. We review a district court's decision balancing the probative value of evidence against its prejudicial effect for an abuse of discretion. United States v. Cordoba, 104 F.3d 225, 229 (9th Cir.1997). In this case, the summaries were not unduly prejudicial. The summaries were brief and did not suggest Leon-Reyes played a role in the drug trafficking. Moreover, the district court clearly instructed the jury each time a group of summaries were read that the summaries were only relevant to the issue of materiality. The district court specifically instructed that: 14 You may only consider this evidence as you may find it bears upon the materiality of Defendant Leon-Reyes' testimony at that trial. You may not consider the summary testimony as proof that the defendant's testimony at that trial was false. So you are limited to considering this as you may find that it has materiality to the issues that were presented at trial. 15 In addition to these instructions, the prosecution specifically stated in its opening statement that none of the summary testimony implicated Leon-Reyes in the drug trafficking or money laundering activities, and that there was no proof that Leon-Reyes had participated in any of those activities. In light of the district court's monitoring of the content of the summaries and repeated limiting instructions, we hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in admitting the summaries into evidence.