Opinion ID: 797855
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Bernstein Testimony

Text: 70 At trial, Commerce Commissioner Bernstein was asked whether he would have approved NSP's CIP budget had he known of Jennings's financial interest in the proposal. Over an objection by Jennings, who claimed that the question was hypothetical, Bernstein was allowed to answer the question. Bernstein testified that he never would have approved the NSP grant to Northern Pole had he known that Jennings had financial interest in the proposal. 12 71 The district court had previously ruled that the government could not ask witnesses whether their conduct would have been different had they known that a legislator had loaned money to a company that would be an affected party. The court stipulated, however, that the government could ask questions that did not specifically ask about Jennings's particular financial interest, but instead inquired in broad terms about how a financial interest would affect a decision maker's conduct. 72 Jennings now argues that the court allowed Bernstein to answer a guilt-assuming hypothetical question. Such questions, Jennings contends, are grossly prejudicial and strike at the very heart of the presumption of innocence. United States v. Polsinelli, 649 F.2d 793, 796 (10th Cir. 1981). Polsinelli and the other cases Jennings cites in his brief can be distinguished from this case, however. In those cases, witnesses were asked hypothetical questions in the context of character testimony. In each case, character witnesses for the defense testified as to the general reputation or opinion of the defendant in the community. Then, during cross-examination, the government asked the witnesses whether their opinion of the defendant would change if they had known the defendant had committed the crime for which he was being tried. See United States v. Pirani, 406 F.3d 543, 554 (8th Cir.2005) (holding that it was improper for the prosecutor to ask . . . guilt-assuming questions of the defendant's character witness, particularly one which assumed [the defendant] was guilty of the charged offenses, but that this did not constitute plain error); United States v. Barta, 888 F.2d 1220, 1224-25 (8th Cir.1989) (finding harmless error where the prosecutor asked the defendant's character witnesses whether their opinion of [the defendant's] reputation would change if .. . the facts showed that he had, in fact, committed the offense for which he was being tried); Polsinelli, 649 F.2d at 795 (finding reversible error where the prosecutor was permitted to ask the defendant's character witnesses questions that were so framed as to assume that [the defendant] was, in fact, guilty of the offense for which he was then on trial); United States v. Candelaria-Gonzalez, 547 F.2d 291, 293-94 (5th Cir.1977) (holding that the witness's answers to the prosecutor's questions about the defendant's character on cross-examination sought speculative responses resting upon an assumption of guilt, and that such error under the circumstances required reversal). 73 In contrast, Bernstein was not called by the defendant as a character witness. Bernstein was called by the government, and his testimony was offered to prove the issue of the materiality of Jennings's undisclosed interest—an issue the government was required to prove under the mail fraud statute. See 18 U.S.C. §§ 1341 and 1346. Further, while the question posed to Bernstein was a hypothetical, the phrasing of the government's question does not assume that Jennings is guilty of the crime for which he was being tried. Pursuant to the district court's previous ruling, the government asked Bernstein a hypothetical question regarding how a legislator's financial interest would affect Bernstein's decision making. The government's question did not allude to the specific interest or assume wrongdoing on Jennings's part; Jennings acknowledges that he did not disclose his financial interest. The government asked the question to establish the materiality of the information. 74 The government was required to prove whether Jennings's financial interest in Northern Pole was material by showing that it would have had a natural tendency to influence, or [was] capable of influencing the government agency or official. United States v. Mitchell, 388 F.3d 1139, 1143 (8th Cir.2004). The government would be hard pressed to prove this element without asking whether the undisclosed information would have affected the decision maker's analysis. See United States v. Bistrup, 449 F.3d 873, 881 (8th Cir.2006) (considering the testimony of bank representatives that the disclosure of withheld information would have affected lending decisions in finding sufficient evidence of material misrepresentation). The district court did not err in allowing Bernstein's testimony.