Opinion ID: 203026
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: sufficiency of the evidence

Text: Once the jury returned its verdict, the appellant renewed his motion for judgment of acquittal. See Fed.R.Crim.P. 29(c)(1). The district court denied the motion. The appellant demurs, arguing that the evidence did not support his convictions on two of the three enticement counts, namely, count 2 (the Ashley interactions) and count 3 (the Maria interactions). Presumably because of the explicit planning of a trip by Paige to Boston for meritricious purposes, the appellant does not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence on count 1. The familiar standard that applies to sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenges requires that a court determine whether, after assaying all the evidence in the light most amiable to the government, and taking all reasonable inferences in its favor, a rational factfinder could find, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the prosecution successfully proved the essential elements of the crime. United States v. O'Brien, 14 F.3d 703, 706 (1st Cir.1994). We review a trial court's Rule 29 determination de novo, applying this standard. See United States v. Moran, 312 F.3d 480, 487 (1st Cir.2002). The appellant's challenge has its roots in the peculiarities of the statute of conviction. Section 2422(b) criminalizes the enticement of minors into criminal offense[s] of a sexual nature, but the statute is silent as to which sovereign's law defines those offenses. The decided cases fill this gap; they indicate that such offenses may be defined by the laws of any of the several states. [6] See, e.g., Goetzke, 494 F.3d at 1235 & n. 2; Patten, 397 F.3d at 1103-04; United States v. Panfil, 338 F.3d 1299, 1300 n. 2 (11th Cir.2003); see also United States v. Dhingra, 371 F.3d 557, 565 (9th Cir.2004). In this instance, the indictment accused the appellant of having sought to entice his targets to commit sexual acts rendered illegal by Massachusetts law. It specifically mentioned Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 265, § 23 (criminalizing engagement in sexual intercourse with a child under the age of 16), and Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 272, § 35A (criminalizing commission of an unnatural and lascivious act with a child under that age). Consequently, the district court instructed the jury that it could not find the appellant guilty on a particular count unless it found beyond a reasonable doubt that he attempted to entice the minor in question to perform unlawful sexual acts within Massachusetts. Given this instructionwhich has become the law of the case, see United States v. Gomes, 969 F.2d 1290, 1294 (1st Cir.1992)the government concedes that, in order to sustain a conviction, the record must contain sufficient evidence of this Massachusetts nexus. As to the challenged counts, the evidence supporting that nexus is not overwhelming. We briefly rehearse what the jury supportably could have found in that regard. As to count 3, there was evidence that, on July 1, 2002, the appellant asked Maria to send him some of her lingerie. He stated that he would start a clothes drawer in his house for the underwear that Maria sent him, responded favorably to Maria's proposal that she move in with him (inferribly in Massachusetts), and declaimed that he want[ed] [Maria] to have our baby. The conversations then became salacious and sexually explicit. For example, the appellant told Maria that he was horny, that his penis [was] hard, and that he would engage in oral sex with her if they were together. On July 3, 2002, the appellant (who was in Massachusetts) stated that he wanted Maria in his bed now, mentioned that he had a teddy bear and satin sheets for his bed, and described how he would perform oral sex upon her. Then, on November 7, 2002, as Maria repeatedly gave her eager assent, the appellant successively typed I want you in my arms, in my bed is that ok?, making love all night?, and do you want to make a video tape of us making love? As to count 2, the appellant's communications were less effusive but in much the same tenor. For instance, on October 10, 2002, Ashley mentioned her fear of the D.C. sniper and the appellant bade her to come herethat is, to come to Massachusettsand promised to send some travel money. [7] The appellant then typed that if I sleep with you its rape and noted his disinclination to go to jail. This outburst of anxiety was calmed by Ashley's assurance that she would consent to sex. The appellant then got down to basics: he queried her as to whether she wanted sex, wanted a baby girl, and could handle [his] sex drive. Ashley responded affirmatively each time. When the appellant pleaded for Ashley to stop teas[ing] him, she protested that she was not playing games and that she didn't play with peoples heads. Apparently reassured, the appellant boasted that he had a $250,000 life insurance policy and told Ashley that if you get pregnant you will get it. In light of this and other evidence, we believe that reasonable jurors could conclude, as these jurors did, that the appellant sought to entice both Maria and Ashley into undertaking proscribed sexual acts within Massachusetts. In conversing with Maria, he referred to the prospect of sexual activity taking place in his own bed (and, thus, in Massachusetts) and followed up on a suggestion that Maria might move in with him by making explicit sexual overtures. Moreover, the appellant's descriptions of satin sheets and a dedicated clothes drawer arguably served as lures to entice his correspondent to come to Massachusetts. See, e.g., Goetzke, 494 F.3d at 1235; United States v. Munro, 394 F.3d 865, 869-70 (10th Cir.2005). Given Maria's supposed age, it would not be a stretch for the jurors to find both that Massachusetts was the intended locus of the contemplated conduct and that the conduct would have violated one or both of the aforementioned Massachusetts statutes. By the same token, rational jurors easily could have found that the appellant's invitation to Ashley to come to Boston was meant literally and that this invitation, coupled as it was with comments of an overtly sexual nature, entailed conduct that was to occur in Massachusetts. Given Ashley's supposed age, the jurors could have found both that Massachusetts was the intended locus of the contemplated conduct and that the conduct offended one or both of those statutes. That permissible inference is bolstered by the appellant's promise of a quarter-million-dollar life insurance policy should he impregnate heran inducement that would serve as a very powerful enticement to a thirteen-year-old girl who lacked enough money even to travel to Boston. This is not to say that such a verdict was compelled on either count. The appellant's chief defensethat he was merely role-playing and thought that the communications were mutually entertained fantasies, comfortably remote from any prospect of consummationis plausible. Moreover, that defense was buttressed by the appellant's persistent dodging of suggestions that he and his correspondents meet. But the government's theory of the casethat the appellant was engaged in earnest predation with persons he thought to be minorsalso was plausible. That theory was reinforced by the appellant's own actions: his lewd comments, his participation in discussions about potential meetings, and his recurrent references to his home (which often were followed immediately by entreaties for sexual intercourse or other sexual favors). In the end, everything depended upon which set of inferences the jury chose to draw. When the record is fairly susceptible of two competing scenarios, the choice between those scenarios ordinarily is for the jury. See United States v. Cruz-Arroyo, 461 F.3d 69, 74 (1st Cir.2006); United States v. Fenton, 367 F.3d 14, 18 (1st Cir.2004); see also United States v. Guerrero-Guerrero, 776 F.2d 1071, 1075 (1st Cir.1985) (Breyer, J.) (explaining that jurors are free to choose among varying interpretations of the evidence, as long as the interpretation they choose is reasonable). In the last analysis, the test is whether the evidence, taken in its entirety, supports the judgment of conviction; if it does, [the government] need not rule out other hypotheses more congenial to a finding of innocence. United States v. Gifford, 17 F.3d 462, 467 (1st Cir.1994). This is such a case: taking all the evidence, direct and circumstantial, in the light most hospitable to the verdict and resolving all evidentiary conflicts in favor of the verdict, Carroll, 105 F.3d at 742, a reasonable jury could have found the evidence adequate to ground convictions on counts 2 and 3.