Opinion ID: 6931638
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: midtrial publichy

Text: Garcia and Garza contend that they are entitled to reversal of their convictions because they were unfairly prejudiced by extensive publicity that occurred during the trial.
Most of the publicity complained of by Garcia and Garza consisted of articles published in a local newspaper, the McAllen Monitor. The trial lasted from January 15-29, 1992. On Saturday, January 18, the Monitor ran a story entitled “Official’s drug trial underway,” detailing Gonzalez’s testimony and describing the ease as one “involving former Starr County Constable Honorio Garza and 11 other defendants.” The next article cited by Garza and Garcia was entitled “Witness details drug ring operation” and summarized Gomez’s testimony. The next article was entitled “Testimony implicates constable,” and it detailed the testimony of Solis, including his belief that Perez contacted Garza by telephone during marijuana shipments. On January 23, the Monitor ran an article entitled ‘Witness says he was offered bribe not to testify.” The article briefly described testimony by Solis under cross-examination by Garza’s attorney that Solis’s brother had come to visit Solis in Starr County jail in September of 1991 and told Solis that he was sent by Garza to offer him money not to testify. The next article was entitled “Jurors allowed to see evidence over objections.” The article stated that income tax records, weapons, cash, and jewelry had been seized in raids on the homes of some of the defendants and that the trial judge had admitted some of the articles into evidence. Relying in part on a statement by the lead prosecutor, the article further stated that one of the defendants, Eleazar Bermea, had pleaded guilty to misprision of a felony and stated in the plea agreement that “he knew there was a marijuana-trafficking conspiracy, that he allowed his home to be used for telephone conversations between conspirators, and that he did not alert authorities about criminal acts.” Two other articles complained of describe the final day of testimony in the case and mention in passing that jury deliberations had begun. The other source of the publicity complained of by Garcia and Garza was an episode of the nationally televised news program Street Stones that aired the evening of January 23, 1992, in the midst of the trial. Garza has provided a transcript of that episode to this court in his record excerpts. A segment of that episode focused on the marijuana smuggling trade in the Rio Grande Valley, referring specifically to Starr County as a “smuggler’s paradise” and including footage of an unidentified informant who asserted that forty percent of Starr County’s law enforcement personnel were involved in the drug trade. Apparently photographs of Garza were included in the segment, and the program reported that Garza had been indicted and that his trial was pending. The appellants also claim that Garza was shown on the program in handcuffs, although this cannot be verified from the transcript. The district judge made some efforts to discourage the jurors from viewing any media accounts bearing on the case. In the preliminary instructions to the jury before trial, the judge gave the following admonition to the jury: “Don’t read or listen to anything about this case.” Before adjourning for lunch on January 23, the judge asked the jury as a whole if any jurors had “read or seen or listened to anything about th[e] case,” and no juror responded. At the end of the day on January 23, the judge reminded the jurors, “Don’t forget my instructions about newspapers, TV, radio or discussing the case with anybody.” The judge did not, however, accede to the request for individual voir dire made by Garza’s defense counsel. The Street Stories episode was brought to the judge’s attention the next morning before trial resumed, and at the end of the day the judge gave the following admonition: I’ve also given you some instructions about not to read anything about the case, not to hear anything about the case, not to watch anything about the ease, not to do any investigation on your own about a case — about the case and not to discuss it with anybody. If through some inadvertence you have seen something about the ease or you have read something about it but you — you’re clearly not to do that in any way. You cannot consider anything that is not evidence, that has not been presented here in the Courtroom, ladies and gentlemen. And you’re under oath to follow the instructions I give you with regard to that. After some additional prompting by Garza’s defense counsel, the judge asked, “None of you have seen or heard anything about this particular case or any defendant in this case recently, have you?” The record reflects that there was no audible response to the judge’s question, and he dismissed the jury for the day. Before the jury was brought into the courtroom on January 27, Garcia’s attorney raised the Monitor article regarding the property seized during the government raids and the statement given by Eleazar Bermea in conjunction with his guilty plea, and Garza’s attorney moved for a mistrial, which the court denied. When the jury was brought in that morning, the judge asked, “Ladies and gentlemen, is there anybody who has seen, read or heard anything about this case since you all were here on Friday?” After getting no audible response, the judge reminded the jury not to forget the instructions he had given, and the trial proceeded. It appears that the judge did not give any final instructions related to the publicity except for general instructions that the jury should restrict its deliberations to the evidence admitted in the case. Garza argues that the district court should have granted a mistrial because of prejudice stemming from the midtrial publicity, that the district court committed reversible error in failing to conduct midtrial voir dire regarding the publicity, and that the district court committed reversible error for failing to sequester the jury sua sponte. Garcia generally presses the same points.
The management of midtrial publicity is entrusted to the broad discretion of the district court; we will reverse only if we find an abuse of discretion. United States v. Aragon, 962 F.2d 439, 443 (5th Cir.1992); United States v. Harrelson, 754 F.2d 1153, 1163 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 908, 106 S.Ct. 277, 88 L.Ed.2d 241, and cert. denied, 474 U.S. 1034, 106 S.Ct. 599, 88 L.Ed.2d 578 (1985).
We consider first the argument that the district judge committed reversible error by failing to voir dire the jurors individually after the instances of midtrial publicity were brought to the court’s attention. There is a paucity of Supreme Court authority on the subject of midtrial publicity. The more celebrated cases dealing with the adverse effects of publicity, e.g., Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U.S. 333, 86 S.Ct. 1507, 16 L.Ed.2d 600 (1966), have involved convictions obtained after massive pretrial publicity and frequently a pervasive media presence during the trial as well. The instant case is not one like Sheppard and its kind, as it does not involve a “conviction obtained in a trial atmosphere that had been utterly corrupted by press coverage.” Murphy v. Florida, 421 U.S. 794, 798, 95 S.Ct. 2031, 7035, 44 L.Ed.2d 589 (1975). In Marshall v. United States, 360 U.S. 310, 79 S.Ct. 1171, 3 L.Ed.2d 1250 (1959) (per curiam), the Court exercised its supervisory power over the enforcement of the criminal law in the federal courts and reversed a conviction because the jurors had been exposed to two newspaper accounts of the defendant’s criminal record. The district judge in Marshall conducted individual voir dire of the jurors in his chambers and concluded that the defendant would not be prejudiced by the publicity because even the jurors who had read one or both of the prejudicial articles said that they could be impartial in deciding the case. Id. at 312, 79 S.Ct. at 1172-73. The Court, although recognizing the district judge’s broad discretion in ruling on the possibility of prejudice from the publicity, reversed the conviction and granted a new trial. Id. at 312-13, 79 S.Ct. at 1172-73. Although the Supreme Court has not set down many guidelines for resolving the problem of midtrial publicity, we have considered the issue several times in recent years. Our touchstone is United States v. Aragon, 962 F.2d at 443-47, in which we undertook a thorough review of our cases regarding midtrial publicity. The test, reduced to its most basic elements, is twofold: voir dire is required if there are serious questions of possible prejudice, considering (1) whether the publicity is innately prejudicial, and if so (2) the probability that the publicity in fact reached the jury. Id. at 443-44. In determining whether publicized material is innately prejudicial, we consider factors such as the content of the material, the timing of the publicity in relation to critical stages of the trial, and the possible effects of the material on legal defenses. Id. at 444. The second prong is governed by commonsense considerations such as the prominence of the media coverage and the nature, number, and regularity of the district court’s warnings against viewing the coverage. Id. The test is necessarily highly fact-specific. Id. (citing Marshall, 360 U.S. at 312, 79 S.Ct. at 1172-73). We have held district courts to a stricter standard in mid-trial publicity cases as compared to pretrial publicity eases because information reported during the trial is more likely to remain in the mind of a juror exposed to it. Id. at 441 n. 3 (citing United States v. Williams, 568 F.2d 464, 468 (5th Cir.1978)).
We first consider whether the publicized material complained of by the appellants was innately prejudicial. In Aragon, we reaffirmed the rule that publicity revealing to jurors a defendant’s prior criminal record is inherently prejudicial. Id. (citing Williams, 568 F.2d at 469). We also concluded that a media account was innately prejudicial in the leading case of United States v. Herring, 568 F.2d 1099 (5th Cir.1978). In that case, Herring was on trial for various drug offenses. Id. at 1100 n. 3. Herring was a road manager for noted rock musician Gregg Allman, and Allman testified at trial against Herring in exchange for a grant of immunity. Id. at 1100. The local daily newspaper carried a front-page story, complete with photograph, entitled “ALL-MAN UNDER HEAVY GUARD” and subtitled “Death Threats Reported.” Id. at 1102. We concluded that this material, released on the very day the defendant took the stand, was innately prejudicial and demanded full voir dire of the jurors. Id. at 1105. Finally, in United States v. Williams, 809 F.2d 1072, 1091-92 (5th Cir.), modified, 828 F.2d 1 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 896, 108 S.Ct. 228, 98 L.Ed.2d 187 and cert. denied, 484 U.S. 913, 108 S.Ct. 259, 98 L.Ed.2d 216, and cert. denied, 484 U.S. 987, 108 S.Ct. 506, 98 L.Ed.2d 504 (1987), we considered midtrial publicity stemming from a government witness’s testimony that certain defendants accused of drug offenses were involved in drug dealing even during the trial. This testimony led the trial judge to revoke bail, leading to numerous media accounts of the event, including front page coverage complete with a color photograph of the defendants being led away from the courthouse in chains. Id. at 1091. We concluded that the nature of the material “definitely [went] beyond the record and raise[d] serious questions of possible prejudice.” Id. at 1092. Most of the publicity that occurred in the instant case was not exceptionally prejudicial; as the district court noted, most of the newspaper accounts were limited to descriptions of the trial proceedings witnessed by the jurors themselves. See United States v. Martinez-Moncivais, 14 F.3d 1030, 1037 (5th Cir.1994) (finding that publicity carried no potential for prejudice because “the news media had merely publicized an issue that the jurors had already been informed of by the judge himself’), petition for cert. filed, 62 U.S.L.W. 3844 (U.S. June 3, 1994) (No. 93-1933). Two specific instances of midtrial publicity, however, do cause us special concern. First, the newspaper account of Eleazar Bermea’s plea agreement, and in particular its detailed recitation of Bermea’s admissions regarding the existence and operations of a marijuana trafficking conspiracy, went well beyond what the district judge told the jurors: “Ladies and gentlemen, the case of Mr. Eleazar Bermea has been disposed of, and it will not be necessary for you to return a verdict of guilty or not guilty with regards to Mr. Bermea.” We have made it abundantly clear that evidence about a coconspir-ator’s conviction is not admissible as substantive proof of the guilt of a defendant. United States v. Leach, 918 F.2d 464, 467 (5th Cir.1990), ce rt. denied, 501 U.S. 1207, 111 S.Ct. 2802, 115 L.Ed.2d 976 (1991); see also United States v. Griffin, 778 F.2d 707, 710 (11th Cir.1985) (“Due to the extreme and unfair prejudice suffered by defendants in similar situations, courts and prosecutors generally are forbidden from mentioning that a code-fendant has either pled guilty or been convicted.”). Indeed, we held in the Leach case that the government’s introduction of evidence during Leach’s trial that Leach’s alleged eoconspirator had pleaded guilty rose to the level of plain error and warranted reversal of one of Leach’s convictions despite his failure to object. Leach, 918 F.2d at 468. Thus, the newspaper coverage of Eleazar Bermea’s guilty plea and the details of his plea agreement was plainly prejudicial to the remaining defendants. The same article also mentioned certain items seized during a search of Garcia’s house, including $110,000 in cash, twenty weapons, and jewelry, that the court had excluded from evidence. Second, the episode of Street Stories chronicled public corruption in Starr County and specifically mentioned Garza in conjunction with other prominent Starr County residents who had pleaded guilty or already gone to prison for drug offenses. Although no explicit connection was made between these drug dealers, who included a justice of the peace and a former county clerk, and Garza, Garza’s name, photograph, and indicted status were included or described in thfe broadcast in close proximity to the persons who had pleaded guilty or already gone to prison. We conclude that these two instances of publicity contained material that was innately prejudicial. See Aragon, 962 F.2d at 445 (suggesting that publicity is innately prejudicial if its substance “may be taken as probative of the appellants’ guilt”).
Our analysis must next focus on the likelihood that the prejudicial accounts reached the jury. The most important factors, in our view, are the prominence of the media coverage itself and the measures taken by the district court to minimize the probability of jury exposure. Lesser factors that we have recognized as bearing on the inquiry include whether the jury returned mixed verdicts, which can indicate fair-minded consideration of the evidence, the length of the trial, and the amount of detail provided to the district court regarding the extent and content of the publicity. United States v. Faulkner, 17 F.3d 745, 764-65 (5th Cir.1994), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 115 S.Ct. 93, — L.Ed.2d - (1994). First, we consider the nature of the publicity itself. All the articles, including the one containing the account of Eleazar Bermea’s guilty plea, appeared prominently in what is apparently a leading daily newspaper in the city where the trial was held. As we have already noted, however, the great bulk of the publicity was not particularly prejudicial, and the portion of the article describing Eleazar Bermea’s guilty plea consisted of only three short paragraphs in the middle of a longer article. See United States v. Manzella, 782 F.2d 533, 541 (5th Cir.) (rejecting a claim based on midtrial publicity in part because the media discussion of a defendant’s prior conviction “occupied but one short paragraph in a lengthy article”), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1123, 106 S.Ct. 1991, 90 L.Ed.2d 672, and cert. denied, 479 U.S. 961, 107 S.Ct. 457, 93 L.Ed.2d 403 (1986). The television program, of course, aired nationally and could have been seen by any of the jurors. On balance, it appears that the prejudicial television broadcast was widely and freely disseminated in a manner likely to reach some jurors, while the prejudicial newspaper story was probably not as likely to come to their attention. Cf. Aragon, 962 F.2d at 441-42 (reversing a conviction based on a single article printed conspicuously on the front page of the most widely circulated local daily newspaper); Williams, 809 F.2d at 1091-92 (reversing a conviction based on publicity including one front-page newspaper story with photograph and reports on “local television and radio news programs”). The other critical factor in weighing the probability that the jury was exposed to the prejudicial publicity is the procedure adopted by the district judge to shield the jury from the publicity. The cases place great emphasis on the particular instructions given to the jury by the trial judge to minimize or eliminate the danger of jury contamination by prejudicial publicity. For instance, we declined to reverse convictions due to midtrial publicity in Faulkner, 17 F.3d at 764, in part because the judge gave preliminary jury instructions regarding the need to avoid press reports which were “unusually lengthy and emphatic,” rather than “boilerplate or casual recitations of standard jury instructions.” Faulkner involved a television newscast on the first day of trial that erroneously reported that the defendants’ first trial had ended in a mistrial caused by jury tampering. Id. at 763. We noted with favor the judge’s decision to give the jurors an immediate explanation of the real reason for the prior mistrial, which was a hung jury, directly rebutting the allegedly prejudicial statement in the press report. Id. at 764. Another approach we have favored is the giving of a blanket instruction to the jury not to view or listen to any radio or television news broadcasts or to read any newspapers except as provided by the court, and then to provide newspapers with any relevant portions redacted from them. Aragon, 962 F.2d at 445; Harrelson, 754 F.2d at 1163. The procedures followed by the district judge in the instant case, however, do not precisely match those used in any of the precedents cited above. The judge did instruct the jury at the outset and occasionally throughout the trial not to read or listen to any media accounts of the case, an instruction we have favored over the weaker instruction simply to pay no attention to such accounts. Herring, 568 F.2d at 1105. The frequency of the jury admonitions is also factor we have considered in deciding whether an abuse of discretion has occurred. Faulkner, 17 F.3d at 765. In Aragon, we reversed appellants’ convictions due to mid-trial publicity, in part because “a selective prohibition against reading about the case, done rather quickly and casually by the court, did not obviate the court’s need for inquiry.” Aragon, 962 F.2d at 445 (emphasis added). In the instant case, the district judge apparently did not repeat his cautionary instructions each day of the trial, despite the fact that newspaper accounts of the trial appeared several times while the trial was in progress. We observe, however, that the judge did repeat his instructions on a few occasions; significantly, he reminded the jury not to forget his “instructions about newspapers, TV, radio, or discussing the case with anybody” just before dismissing the jury the very day the prejudicial television program aired. We presume that a jury heeds its instructions. United States v. De La Rosa, 911 F.2d 985, 992 (5th Cir.1990), cert. denied, 500 U.S. 959, 111 S.Ct. 2275, 114 L.Ed.2d 726 (1991). Additionally, even though the district judge did not conduct individual voir dire regarding the publicity, he asked the jury as a whole three times if anyone had been exposed to media coverage of the case. Two of those inquiries were made immediately following the two instances of innately prejudicial publicity that we have already identified, so any contamination would have been fresh in the minds of any jurors that had been exposed to those accounts. The fact that none of the jurors responded to the judge’s direct questions strongly suggests that no contamination in fact occurred. The other factors recognized in the cases have little bearing on this case. Two defendants were wholly exonerated, and Perez and Baldemar Bermea were acquitted on one and two counts of marijuana possession, respectively. Although these mixed verdicts arguably weigh against finding an abuse of discretion in the judge’s refusal to conduct individual voir dire, Faulkner, 17 F.3d at 764-65, any force this factor might ordinarily carry is substantially diminished in the instant case by the fact that Garcia and Garza, the only defendants to complain about the midtrial publicity, were not acquitted of any charges. The two-week length of the instant trial does not militate strongly for or against reversal, falling as it does between the extremes of the Aragon case, in which the problematic publicity occurred in the middle of a two-day trial, and the Faulkner case, in which the prejudicial broadcast occurred on the first day of a seven-week trial. This is a close case, and the more prudent course would have been for the district judge to conduct the requested voir dire and perhaps to provide the jurors with newspapers to read each day with all references to the case expurgated from them. Considering all of the circumstances, however, we conclude that the likelihood of actual jury exposure to the innately prejudicial publicity was so low as to require the conclusion that no abuse of discretion occurred. The most significant fact distinguishing this case from Aragon and the other cases finding reversible error is that the district judge did conduct a sort of collective voir dire after both instances of innately prejudicial publicity. The negative response he received on each occasion strongly indicates that jury exposure did not occur in this case and supports his discretionary decision that individual voir dire was unnecessary. We have found nothing in our cases to support a rule that midtrial publicity requires individual voir dire even after the district judge has made a collective inquiry to the jury and received no positive response. Indeed, in United States v. Capo, 595 F.2d 1086, 1092-93 (5th Cir.1979), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 1012, 100 S.Ct. 660, 62 L.Ed.2d 641 (1980), we rejected a midtrial publicity claim, basing our decision in part on a collective voir dire of the jury by the court after the publicity was brought to the court’s attention. As Manzella illustrates, there is no reason to presume, as Garcia and Garza implicitly would have us do, that jurors would conceal their exposure to media coverage from a direct inquiry by the trial judge. Manzella, 782 F.2d at 541-42 (approving the trial judge’s decision to perform collective voir dire first and then to voir dire individually only the three jurors who indicated they had seen the publicity). Because the collective voir dire indicated that no jury contamination occurred, and because independent factors in this ease exist that minimize the likelihood of contamination such as the district judge’s instructions to the jury and the obscurity of the prejudicial newspaper account, the district court acted within its discretion in not performing a more searching examination of the jurors individually. See United States v. Hyde, 448 F.2d 815, 848 n. 38 (5th Cir.1971) (“[Wjhen there has been publicity that would possibly prejudice the defendant’s case if it reached the jurors, the court should first ask the jurors what information they have received. Then it should ask about the prejudicial effect and it should make an independent determination whether the juror’s impartiality was destroyed.”), cert. denied, 404 U.S. 1058, 92 S.Ct. 736, 30 L.Ed.2d 745 (1972); see also United States v. Davis, 583 F.2d 190, 196-98 (5th Cir.1978) (finding an abuse of discretion because the trial judge was aware that all the jurors had been exposed to media coverage and still performed only cursory collective voir dire asking whether any panel member felt that his impartiality had been impaired). The precautions taken by the district court were sufficient to dispel any serious questions about possible prejudice.
Garza also contends that the district court committed reversible error by denying his motion for a mistrial due to the midtrial publicity and by failing to order sequestration of the jury sua sponte. This court will reverse a district court’s refusal to grant a mistrial only if an abuse of discretion has occurred. United States v. Limones, 8 F.3d 1004, 1007 (5th Cir.1993), cert. denied, - U.S. -, 114 S.Ct. 1543, 128 L.Ed.2d 194, and cert. denied, — U.S. -, 114 S.Ct. 1562, 128 L.Ed.2d 209 (1994). We have already determined that the district court’s decision not to conduct individual voir dire in connection with the midtrial publicity was not an abuse of discretion. By the same token, the court’s decision not to declare a mistrial based on the identical publicity was not an abuse of discretion. Garza argues that the district court should have sua sponte ordered sequestration of the jury. His failure to request this measure in the district court requires him to show that the court’s failure constituted plain error. Fed.R.CRIM.P. 52(b) (“Plain errors or defects affecting substantial rights may be noticed although they were not brought to the attention of the court.”). The Supreme Court has stated that the courts of appeals “should correct a plain forfeited error affecting substantial rights if the error ‘seriously affeet[s] the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings.”’ United States v. Olano, — U.S. -, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 1779, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993) (quoting United States v. Atkinson, 297 U.S. 157, 160, 56 S.Ct. 391, 392, 80 L.Ed. 555 (1936)); see Jeffrey L. Lowry, Note, Plain Error Rule — Clarifying Plain Error Analysis Under Rule 52(b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, 84 J.CRIM.L. & CRIMINOLOGY 1065, 1072-75 (1994) (discussing the Court’s opinion in Olano). This a heavy burden, and one that we conclude Garza has not met. It is well-known that sequestration is one of the most burdensome tools of the many available to assure a fair trial. United States v. Greer, 806 F.2d 556, 557 (5th Cir.1986). Even when error has been preserved, the defendant complaining of a refusal to sequester must demonstrate a substantial likelihood of prejudice flowing from the reversal to sequester before we can find an abuse of discretion. Id. at 557-58. Given our conclusion that the district court’s handling of the midtrial publicity was not an abuse of discretion, we cannot conclude that the court’s failure to sequester the jury sua sponte rose to the level of plain error.