Opinion ID: 543684
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Hill's Pending Theft Charge

Text: 19 Finally, the defendants challenge the district court's exclusion of evidence of a prior unrelated theft committed by Hill, on which charges were pending at the time of the interrogation. 8 While the defendants argue the admissibility of this evidence as prior conduct bearing on truthfulness under Fed.R.Evid. 608(b), theft, as discussed in Part II(A)(1)(iii) above, has no such bearing. The defendants' alternative theory is that this pending charge gave Hill a motive to fabricate his account of the interrogation. As with the proffered evidence discussed in Part II(A)(1)(ii) above, this theory seems hopelessly speculative and vastly outweighed by the potential for unfair prejudice. The principal cases cited by the defendants are inapposite in that they involved promises of leniency or immunity as to pending charges against a witness in return for testimony. See, e.g., Jenkins v. Wainwright, 763 F.2d 1390, 1392 (11th Cir.1985), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1164, 106 S.Ct. 2290, 90 L.Ed.2d 730 (1986); United States v. Garrett, 727 F.2d 1003, 1011 (11th Cir.1984), aff'd, 471 U.S. 773, 105 S.Ct. 2407, 85 L.Ed.2d 764 (1985). 9 20 As to all the foregoing impeachment issues, the defense appears to have followed a strategy of putting Hill on trial in place of Roach and Sellers. For the reasons discussed above, the district court properly kept this trial focused on the relevant issues.