Opinion ID: 3180852
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Second Alleged Error: Napue Claim

Text: The Supreme Court in Napue v. Illinois articulated that the defendant’s rights to due process under the Fourteenth Amendment are violated when he is convicted “through use of false evidence, known to be such by representatives of the State” or “when the State, although not soliciting false evidence, allows it to go uncorrected when it appears.” Napue, 360 U.S. 264, 269 (1959); see Caballero, 277 F.3d at 1243. To establish this Napue violation, the defendant must show that the testimony was false, the prosecution knew the testimony was false, and the testimony was material. Caballero, 277 F.3d at 1243. Ordinarily, under Napue, “[t]he false testimony is material ‘unless failure to disclose [the perjury] would be harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.’” United States v. Garcia, 793 F.3d 1194, 1207 (10th Cir. 2015) (second alteration in original) (quoting United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667, 680 (1985)), cert. denied, 577 U.S. ----, No. 157141, 2016 WL 100762 (Jan. 11, 2016). Because plain error review applies in this case, the burden is on Mickling under the third prong to show that the alleged violation likely affected the outcome of the trial. Mickling argues that Cheney committed perjury when she testified that she first met him in 2010. He argues that this testimony was false because he was incarcerated for the entirety of 2010. He also alleges that the government was aware that Mickling pled guilty to various felonies in late 2009 and was incarcerated for all of 2010. And he argues this was material because the government characterized Ms. Cheney’s testimony as “‘very important’ to the central issue in the case—whether Mickling possessed the 8 cocaine base in order to use it or distribute it to others.” Aplt. Br. at 20 (quoting App. III at 370 (government’s rebuttal closing argument)). Even if we assume the elements of a Napue violation were satisfied here, Mickling has not met his burden under the third prong of plain error review. He has not shown that the outcome of the trial would likely have been different had Cheney testified to first meeting Mickling in a different year. Mickling primarily argues that Cheney’s testimony was very important to the government’s case, by its own admission. However, we are not convinced that the specific fact that Cheney met Mickling in 2010 was integral to the government’s case. Cheney testified that she met Mickling in 2010 and that she did not see him use crack cocaine at that time. However, the main focus of the government’s questioning was on the subsequent time she spent with Mickling in 2013—during which she also testified she had not seen him use crack cocaine. She said she had seen him seven or eight times in 2013, but was “not exactly sure” how many times she saw him in 2010. And where Mickling argues that the government, in its rebuttal closing argument, told the jury that Cheney’s testimony was important, the government in fact referred only to the “seven or eight times” Cheney was with Mickling—that is, in 2013—not the initial time they met. Consider what would have happened if the government had disclosed the perjury. If Cheney was mistaken about the year, and in fact met Mickling in 2009 (for example), then it is extremely unlikely that there would be any change in the jury’s verdict if the government disclosed Cheney’s error. The same is true if Cheney did not actually meet 9 Mickling until 2013. The jury would still have Cheney’s testimony that she was with Mickling seven or eight times in 2013 and that she had not seen him use crack cocaine during any of those occasions. Both sides focused their examination on the time period in 2013, because the events leading to Mickling’s arrest had occurred in 2013—any drug activity or lack thereof that occurred in 2010 would be almost entirely irrelevant to whether Mickling was a drug user or distributor in late 2013. Further, because Cheney did not even remember what time of year in 2010 she met Mickling, the jury very likely did not focus on this part of her testimony. Even if Mickling established a Napue violation, he has not satisfied the more stringent plain error standard that requires a strong showing of prejudice.