Opinion ID: 201687
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Refusal to Admit Evidence of Bisanti's Incarceration and Acquittal

Text: 21 We review the claim that the district court erroneously excluded evidence for abuse of discretion. United States v. Otero-Mendez, 273 F.3d 46, 53 (1st Cir.2001). The district court was plainly correct. 22 The government introduced the testimony of Detective Jay Huff of the Miami-Dade Police Department, that during a post-arrest interview he had with Bisanti during the earlier federal money laundering investigation in Florida, Bisanti stated that he owed a million dollars to the IRS. There is no appeal from the denial of the motion in limine to preclude the government from introducing any statements Bisanti made during that investigation. 23 Bisanti argues that as a result of the district court's decision to admit this evidence, he should have been permitted to introduce testimony that he could not pay the government the taxes he owed because he was incarcerated during that earlier money laundering prosecution, of which charges he was eventually acquitted. Bisanti did put into evidence that a major asset of his — a Ferrari automobile worth an estimated $700,000 — had been confiscated by the government and was unavailable to him to pay his taxes. He was able to make his main point: that he had no intent to evade payment of taxes — he simply lacked the ability to pay what was owed. 24 Bisanti is being disingenuous when he argues on appeal that he was precluded from putting on evidence that he was incarcerated. He was given the opportunity to do so when he took the stand and declined, and there are obvious reasons that it was not in his interest to testify that he had been incarcerated on earlier federal criminal charges. 25 Before trial, the district court granted the government's motion in limine to preclude Bisanti from introducing evidence of his acquittal, but did not address any other aspects of the earlier investigation. The district court later specifically stated that its preclusive order was limited to Bisanti offering evidence of his acquittal. When Bisanti took the stand, the district court asked Bisanti's counsel how he intended to get into the money laundering prosecution, the arrest, and the incarceration. Bisanti's counsel said that he would refer to the entire event as the Florida legal proceeding. There was no offer by Bisanti of any evidence that he was incarcerated, so he can hardly complain now. 26 Bisanti's last argument is that, given the admission of his statements made during the money laundering investigation, he was entitled to offer evidence that he was acquitted of the money laundering charge and that the district court abused its discretion in refusing to allow him to do so. To the contrary, the fact of acquittal in a prior court proceeding involving similar subject matter is usually not admitted into evidence. See United States v. Marrero-Ortiz, 160 F.3d 768, 775 (1st Cir.1998); see also United States v. Smith, 145 F.3d 458, 462 (1st Cir.1998). That is because such acquittals are not generally probative of the defendant's innocence in the case at trial and the information has a tendency to confuse the jury rather than assist it. Marrero-Ortiz, 160 F.3d at 775. It is also potentially prejudicial to the government. Here the earlier money laundering charge on which there was an acquittal bears only a tangential relationship to the tax charges; even if the acquittal were probative of Bisanti's intent to evade taxes (and we think it is not), the district court struck the correct balance. 27 In an attempt to minimize the potential prejudice to both sides, the court instructed the jury that the statements made by Bisanti were during a legal proceeding brought by the United States government, that the details of the Florida legal proceeding ... were complex and not directly relevant to the ... case now before you, and that the proceeding did not result in any criminal conviction or finding of civil liability against John Bisanti. There was no abuse of discretion in excluding the evidence and no trial error.