Opinion ID: 2271619
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Obstruction

Text: Castillo was convicted of obstruction of justice [15] on the basis of statements he made regarding expected testimony by government witness Mauro Delcid. Anaya testified that, while in a courthouse holding cell on one of appellants' scheduled court dates, he was present during a discussion of snitching. Juan Morales told the group of VL members that Delcid was cooperating with the government and Castillo responded that he was not going to let Delcid do that. Castillo argues that the testimony about this statement was insufficient to sustain his obstruction conviction. We disagree. Courts have recognized that, for purposes of obstruction of justice, the objective standard for evaluating whether a statement constitutes a threat . . . is whether the statement has a reasonable tendency to intimidate, . . . that is, whether the defendant's statement is actually an expression of intention to inflict evil, injury, or damage on another. United States v. England, 507 F.3d 581, 589 (7th Cir. 2007) (citation and quotation marks omitted). Whether that test is met depends upon the statement and the context in which it was made. See United States v. Young, No. 08-5021, 2009 WL 2196852, at , 2009 U.S.App. LEXIS 16379, at  (4th Cir. July 24, 2009) (per curiam) (where defendant yelled at a cooperating witness in the courthouse lock-up in the presence of other prisoners and called the cooperating witness a `snitch' and a `rat,' his statements and the context in which they were made establish[ed] his intent to, directly or indirectly, intimidate or unlawfully influence the cooperating witness and enabled the court properly to conclude that he intended to obstruct justice). Here, the evidence was that Castillo made his statement during a discussion (of Delcid's activities) in which appellant Chávez responded that he would put a bullet in Delcid's head or in the head of anyone who snitched. Given the context of Castillo's statement about not letting Delcid cooperate with the government, we agree with the government that there was sufficient evidence from which the jury could infer that Castillo endeavored to obstruct justice by intimidating anyone who heard his statement (or who heard of his statement) from testifying for the government. It was not necessary for the government to prove that Castillo actually succeeded in preventing any witness from testifying. See McBride v. United States, 393 A.2d 123, 131 (D.C.1978) (explaining that the obstruction statute does not require that obstructing statements or threats of harm be directly addressed to the allegedly intimidated witnesses, and statements that could have a tendency to influence or intimidate those who heard the statements. . . can constitute obstruction).