Opinion ID: 798947
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 12

Heading: Prejudice Resulting from Misjoinder

Text: Erroneous joinder `requires reversal only if the misjoinder result[ed] in actual prejudice because it had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury's verdict.' Shellef, 507 F.3d at 100 (quoting United States v. Lane, 474 U.S. 438, 449, 106 S.Ct. 725, 88 L.Ed.2d 814 (1986)). To determine whether there was actual prejudice, we inquire whether `evidence tending to prove the charge that should have been severed would nevertheless have been admissible. . ., and was admitted subject to appropriate limiting instructions.' Id. at 101. Because prejudice in this context is a two-way street, we also consider whether joining the mail fraud count prejudiced the jury deliberations on the tax evasion count, and vice versa. Id. at 102. The Government argues that the evidence of Litwok's failure to file tax returns for her investment companies and her improper personal use of business funds had virtually no impact on the jury's consideration of the mail fraud count. We disagree. The evidence of the 1995 tax evasion charged in Count Two included testimony about Litwok defrauding her investors of millions of dollars for personal compensation. At trial and in its closing argument, the Government was able to point to that and other evidence to describe Litwok as a cheat, a liar, and a thief and to otherwise contend that Litwok had a propensity to engage in fraudulent activity. Because none of the evidence of the 1995 tax evasion was related to the 1997 mail fraud offense, it would not have been admitted in a trial involving only that offense; yet it inevitably colored the jury's view of Litwok's role in the mail fraud scheme. The prejudice, in our view, went both ways: although the evidence of Litwok's involvement in the fraud related to the Aborigine Way claim would have been inadmissible in a trial involving only the 1995 tax evasion count since it did not support that charge in any way, it surely affected the jury's consideration of that count. Had the evidence against Litwok been overwhelming on both counts, or had the District Court admitted the tax evasion evidence and the mail fraud evidence with appropriate limiting instructions to the jury, we may well have reached a different conclusion and deemed the error harmless. See id. at 100-01 (citing Lane, 474 U.S. at 450, 106 S.Ct. 725). But the evidence was certainly not overwhelming, and the District Court gave no such limiting instructions. In summary, the misjoinder of Counts One and Two prejudicially affected the jury's deliberations on each of these counts. We therefore vacate the judgment of conviction as to these counts and remand to the District Court for further proceedings. Having found the evidence insufficient to sustain Litwok's convictions of tax evasion for 1996 and 1997, we need not address her arguments that these offenses were also misjoined with Count One.