Opinion ID: 8414571
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Government’s Good Faith

Text: The court also gave the following non-pattern instruction proposed by the government: The law does not require the government to have a pre-existing good faith basis for suspecting criminal activity before a government officer may initiate an undercover investigation. Hilliard’s defense counsel objected at the instructions conference that this instruction was unnecessary to the defense of entrapment, as “whether or not [the government] had a preexisting good-faith basis for suspecting criminal history has nothing to do with [Hilliard’s] predisposition,” or “inducement.” Counsel contended that including this irrelevant instruction could confuse the jury. On appeal, Hilliard again argues that this non-pattern instruction was irrelevant and “served only to provide a gratuitous imprimatur to the government’s conduct on a matter not in issue.” The government responds that a key defense argument was that Hilliard had not been engaged in dealing drugs prior to being approached by Romano. Thus, the government argues, the instruction was helpful in case the jury was confused about whether predisposition required an inquiry into what the “agents did know and didn’t know” about Hilliard’s pre-sting activities at the time the operation had begun. Without this instruction, which accurately states the law, see, e.g., United States v. Miller, 891 F.2d 1265, 1269 (7th Cir. 1989), the jury could have mistakenly perceived the government’s initiation of the operation, without knowledge of prior or ongoing drug dealing by Hilliard, as evidence of alleged inducement or entrapment. As such, the district court acted within its discretion in including this instruction; and given the numerous other instructions provided regarding the two elements, there was little possibility of prejudice to Hilli-ard stemming from this particular instruction’s inclusion.