Opinion ID: 6500514
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Purported Coercion of the Substituted

Text: Juror by Other Jurors75 The Defendants also complain about a different type of juror coercion: pressure from other jurors on the alternate who replaced Juror #12. They claim that the alternate confronted “outward hostility from the deliberating jurors” just prior to being empaneled and that the initial jury had already reached unanimity on certain issues before he joined. (NS Opening Br. at 133-34.) Together, those supposed facts leave the Defendants with “little doubt that the Alternate felt pressure to comply with previously made decisions and acquiesce to the majority’s previous determinations as to guilt and innocence.” (NS Opening Br. at 138.) And that pressure was allegedly reflected in the timing of the verdict, returned three days after the alternate was empaneled, when contrasted against the seven days that the original jury deliberated. The District Court’s decision to empanel the alternate under such coercive conditions was an abuse of discretion, claim the Defendants, and so requires reversal. Juror coercion can indeed arise not only from trial court instructions but also from other jurors who are forced to start deliberations anew with an alternate. See Claudio v. Snyder, Jackson, 443 F.3d 293, 297 (3d Cir. 2006) (“[The defendant] must show that the Court’s action was ‘arbitrary, fanciful or clearly unreasonable.’” (citation omitted)). 75 “We review for abuse of discretion a district court’s decision to dismiss a juror and to impanel an alternate juror.” United States v. Glover, 681 F.3d 411, 422 (D.C. Cir. 2012). 117 68 F.3d 1573, 1575-77 (3d Cir. 1995); e.g., United States v. Lamb, 529 F.2d 1153, 1156 (9th Cir. 1975) (en banc). When an alternate is empaneled after jury deliberations have commenced, it is not unnatural to worry “that the 11 original regular jurors may have already made up their minds to convict and, together, may coerce the alternate juror into joining in their position.” United States v. Kopituk, 690 F.2d 1289, 1310 (11th Cir. 1982). But precautions are available to limit that potentially coercive dynamic. In Claudio v. Snyder, we affirmed the denial of habeas relief when, in the petitioner’s state-court trial, an alternate replaced a juror after deliberations had commenced. 68 F.3d at 1574, 1577. Although the manner of replacement violated a state procedural rule prohibiting substitutions after the start of deliberations, we followed our sister circuits in holding that, as a federal constitutional matter, such a substitution “does not violate the Constitution, so long as the judge instructs the reconstituted jury to begin its deliberations anew and the defendant is not prejudiced by the substitution.” Id. at 1575, 1577. We concluded in that case that both requirements were met, noting that the petitioner had not been prejudiced because alternates were chosen in the same manner as regular jurors, the alternates and jurors heard the same evidence and legal instructions, the replacement juror affirmed that she had not been influenced by outside discussions or media reports, and the reconstituted jury deliberated longer than the original jury did. Id. As in Claudio, the record reflects no problematic coercion here. Upon empaneling Juror #12’s replacement, the Court instructed the new jury to start its deliberations anew, as prescribed by Rule 24(c)(3). And, as in Claudio, the alternate 118 juror was selected in the same manner as the regular jurors, heard the same evidence and instructions,76 and affirmed that 76 Although the Court instructed the newly constituted jury that all previous instructions (which the alternate heard) remained in effect, the Defendants nonetheless complain that the alternate “was not part of the process in formulating [previous] question[s]” from the jury about answering interrogatories for the RICO predicate acts, and he therefore did not understand the Court’s responsive instruction to the same degree as the other eleven. (NS Opening Br. at 135-36.) We disagree. The jury’s questions were straightforward: (1) whether they had to answer each interrogatory or could stop after finding two were committed, and (2) whether they should leave an interrogatory blank if they were not unanimous as to that interrogatory. The Court’s answer was also clear: Of course you must consider all the interrogatories and you must attempt to answer all of them unanimously. All 12 of you have to agree on at least two predicate or qualifying acts as to any individual defendant. If you find the Government has proven beyond a reasonable doubt two or more predicate or qualifying acts, then you can find the Government has proven one of the essential elements of Count one which is the RICO conspiracy as to that defendant. Now all 12 of you have to agree on the same predicate or qualifying act or acts. That is, you can’t have six agree on one and six agree on another. All 12 have to agree on each predicate 119 he had not been influenced by external sources. Although the reconstituted jury here did not deliberate for as long as the original jury, it still deliberated for three days before returning a verdict. That amount of time does not persuade us that the original jurors coerced the alternate into agreeing with the counts on which they were apparently unanimous before Juror #12 was excused. See United States v. Oscar, 877 F.3d 1270, 1289 (11th Cir. 2017) (noting that nine-hour deliberations after empaneling alternates “indicat[ed] that the jury did in fact renew its deliberations[,]” even though original jury deliberated “for several days”); cf. Lamb, 529 F.2d at 1156 (finding coercion of substitute juror when deliberations of reconstituted jury lasted 29 minutes).77 And although it may act you found to have been proven. (JAC at 13989.) We don’t see what special background experience was necessary for the alternate to understand what was asked or what was instructed. 77 The Defendants rely heavily on United States v. Lamb, 529 F.2d 1153 (9th Cir. 1975), which is distinguishable not only factually, as noted above, but also legally. The Ninth Circuit was in that case interpreting an old, since-amended version of Rule 24(c) that required the court to discharge all alternate jurors when the jury retired to deliberate. Id. at 1155; Fed. R. Crim. P. 24(c) advisory committee’s note to 1999 amendment. Further, the Ninth Circuit made explicit that it relied exclusively on that old version of Rule 24(c) in reversing the conviction. See Lamb, 529 F.2d at 1156 n.7 (“While we have noted the obvious coercive effect suggested by the final deliberative period of only twenty-nine minutes, that is not a factor contributing to our conclusion in this case. The 120 be true that one juror told the replacement, “[W]elcome to hell” (NSA at 19), it is not at all plain that the comment was intended or received as “outward hostility[,]” as the Defendants claim. (NS Opening Br. at 133.) Tone, facial expressions, and body language all matter mightily in communication, and we have none of those to aid us in understanding whether the comment had an edge or was just a joke. Plus, the lack of any juror issues over the next three days of deliberations convinces us that the alternate was not singled out or coerced into a certain verdict, notwithstanding Juror #7’s earlier-voiced frustration with the dynamics in the jury room. Our concern here is coercion specifically aimed at the alternate juror, not general tension in the jury room, and we find no evidence in the record of such coercion. Oscar, 877 F.3d at 1289.78 mandatory provision of Rule 24 having been violated, the period of time during which the substitute juror participated in the deliberations is essentially irrelevant.”). 78 The Defendants also make much of the fact that the original jurors could keep their notes from the first deliberations and did not return their original verdict sheets until the end of their first full day of deliberations with the replacement juror. Although it perhaps would have been “good practice” to confiscate the old notes and verdict sheets before the newly constituted jury commenced deliberations, “we cannot say that it is required[,]” United States v. Oscar, 877 F.3d 1270, 1289 n.18 (11th Cir. 2017), or that, as the Defendants claim, “the substituted alternate would have naturally felt pressure to play catch up and concede certain previously made decisions.” (NS Opening Br. at 136.) 121