Opinion ID: 6330595
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Smoloff’s Identification of Gershman

Text: Gershman first challenges the District Court permitting Gershman’s former neighbor, Todd Smoloff, to identify Gershman at trial as the person who likely possessed a firearm outside Smoloff’s apartment building in September 2012. Smoloff testified that, after hearing a noise outside one day, he looked out his window to observe Gershman on a walkway pointing a black gun in the air. 3 Smoloff further explained to the jury that there appeared to be a dispute occurring at the time. The District Court admitted this testimony under Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) as evidence of Gershman’s access to guns during the relevant time period. 3 To avoid undue prejudice, the District Court precluded the Government from eliciting testimony that Smoloff saw Gershman discharge the firearm. 12 Before identifying Gershman at trial, Smoloff had already met with the police concerning the September 2012 incident. First, in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Smoloff told law enforcement that someone he recognized who lived on the sixth or seventh floor of his building, and who had a Russian accent, unique tattoos, and black-rimmed glasses, discharged a firearm outside the building during an incident with other people. Detectives then showed Smoloff approximately 600 photographs of individuals, none being Gershman, and Smoloff said that the perpetrator was not depicted in any of the photographs. Five years later, detectives showed Smoloff a six-photograph array, which included Gershman. Smoloff identified Gershman from the array and said that he was “virtually certain” that Gershman was the shooter. Gershman argues that before allowing Smoloff’s identification testimony, the District Court should have conducted an evidentiary hearing, known as a Wade hearing, to determine whether Smoloff’s anticipated in-court identification of Gershman had been improperly tainted by these previous identification events. And by failing to conduct a Wade hearing, Gershman argues, the District Court improperly admitted Smoloff’s in-court identification. Gershman contends that because this evidence was “critical” to the Government’s proof as to his 13 commission of the gun trafficking offenses (i.e., Counts 22 and 23), those two convictions must be vacated.
The Supreme Court has recognized that due process can sometimes prevent a witness who identified a defendant before trial from identifying the defendant at trial. See, e.g., Simmons v. United States, 390 U.S. 377, 384-85 (1968); Perry v. New Hampshire, 565 U.S. 228, 238-39 (2012). But those circumstances are scarce—“we will exclude a pre-trial identification only if it was both produced through an unnecessarily suggestive procedure and unreliable.” United States v. Bautista, 23 F.3d 726, 729 (2d Cir. 1994). So to exclude an in-trial identification based on a pretrial identification, a defendant must follow those two steps based on the “facts of [his] case and the totality of the surrounding circumstances.” United States v. Maldonado-Rivera, 922 F.2d 934, 973 (2d Cir. 1990). At step one, the Court must determine whether “the pretrial identification procedures were unduly suggestive of the suspect’s guilt.” Id. If the procedures were not unduly suggestive, then “the trial identification testimony is generally admissible without further inquiry into the reliability of the pretrial identification.” Id. That is because when “there is no possible taint of 14 suggestiveness in the identification procedures, any question as to the reliability of the witness’s identifications goes to the weight of the evidence, not its admissibility.” United States v. Al-Farekh, 956 F.3d 99, 110 (2d Cir. 2020) (quotations omitted). But if the procedures were unduly suggestive, the analysis moves to the second step. There, “we must consider whether the in-court identification is independently reliable rather than the product of the earlier suggestive procedures.” Id. (quotations omitted). To determine whether a witness should be permitted to identify a defendant at trial, a defendant may request a pretrial evidentiary hearing under United States v. Wade, 388 U.S. 218, 239-243 (1967). 4 “The purpose of a Wade hearing is to 4 At issue in Wade was the in-court identification of the defendant by two witnesses, following their viewing of a post-indictment lineup at which the defendant was not represented by counsel. The Supreme Court held that the post-indictment lineup was a critical stage of the prosecution, and therefore the Sixth Amendment provided the defendant the right to counsel at that lineup. See 388 U.S. at 237-38. In reaching this holding, the Court discussed the “innumerable dangers and variable factors which might seriously, even crucially, derogate from a fair trial” that are attendant to witness identification of a defendant. Id. at 228. The Court also explained that “[i]nsofar as the accused’s conviction may rest on a courtroom identification in fact the fruit of a suspect pretrial identification which the accused is helpless to subject to effective scrutiny at trial, the accused is deprived of that right of cross-examination which is an essential safeguard to his right to confront the witnesses against him.” Id. at 235 (citing Pointer v. Texas, 380 U.S. 400 (1965)). As to the remedy, the Court remanded for the district court to consider “whether the in-court identifications had an independent source, or whether, in any event, the introduction of the evidence was harmless error.” Id. at 242. 15 determine before the trial whether pretrial identification procedures have been so improperly suggestive as to taint an in-court identification.” Lynn v. Bliden, 443 F.3d 238, 248 (2d Cir. 2006), as amended (May 19, 2006) (quotations and alteration omitted). “Where there is a contention that the pretrial identification was the result of impermissibly suggestive procedures, a Wade hearing is advisable; but the Supreme Court has made it clear that there is no ‘per se rule compelling such a hearing in every case.’” Dunnigan v. Keane, 137 F.3d 117, 128-29 (2d Cir. 1998) (quoting Watkins v. Sowders, 449 U.S. 341, 349 (1981)) (alterations omitted), abrogated on other grounds by Perry, 565 U.S. 228. That is because “the information needed for assessment of reliability can ordinarily be elicited through the timehonored process of cross-examination.” Id. at 129 (quotations omitted). It is therefore the jury that should determine the reliability of identification evidence in all but the most extraordinary cases. See United States v. Brewer, 36 F.3d 266, 269 (2d Cir. 1994) (“[I]n the absence of a very substantial likelihood of irreparable misidentification, identification evidence is for the jury to weigh.” (quotations and alterations omitted)). 16 In assessing whether Gershman was entitled to a Wade hearing under this framework, we employ a similar analysis as we do when assessing whether a defendant is entitled to an evidentiary hearing on a suppression motion, asking whether the defendant has shown that “the moving papers are sufficiently definite, specific, detailed, and nonconjectural to enable the court to conclude that contested issues of fact . . . are in question.” United States v. Pena, 961 F.2d 333, 339 (2d Cir. 1992) (quotations omitted). Thus, a district court may decide the motion without a Wade hearing unless the defendant shows disputed issues of definite, specific, and nonconjectural material fact. See United States v. Torres, 191 F.3d 799, 811 (7th Cir. 1999) (adopting the same test for out-of-court identifications). 5 Because the trial court has discretion as to whether to hold a Wade hearing, we review “the decision not to hold an evidentiary hearing for abuse of discretion.” United States v. Finley, 245 F.3d 199, 203 (2d Cir. 2001). “We review a district court’s determination of the admissibility of identification evidence for clear error.” Id. 5 District courts in the Second Circuit have also applied the general rule from Pena for deciding whether to conduct a Wade hearing. See, e.g., United States v. Durant, No. 18 Cr. 702 (CM), 2019 WL 2236233, at  (S.D.N.Y. May 15, 2019); United States v. Collymore, No. 16 Cr. 521 (CM), 2017 WL 5197287, at  (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 20, 2017); United States v. Abu Ghayth, 990 F. Supp. 2d 427, 434 (S.D.N.Y. 2014). 17
We find that the District Court did not clearly err in permitting Smoloff to identify Gershman at trial nor abuse its discretion in denying Gershman’s request for an evidentiary hearing. To begin with, Gershman failed to show that Smoloff’s identification of Gershman from the six-photographic array—five years after the incident—arose from unduly suggestive procedures. “In evaluating whether or not a photographic array was unduly suggestive, a court must consider several factors, including the size of the array, the manner of presentation by the officers, and the contents of the array.” United States v. Thai, 29 F.3d 785, 808 (2d Cir. 1994); see also id. (collecting cases in which six-photograph array was found to be sufficiently large). Gershman relies heavily on the fact that he was the only individual in the photograph array wearing a black hoodie. This is significant, he argues, because Smoloff first described the shooter on a 911 call shortly after the shooting as wearing a black hoodie, glasses, and shorts. Other individuals in the array, however, were depicted wearing similar clothing styles, including one person wearing a lighter colored hoodie and another wearing what appears to be a dark, collared jacket. Moreover, Gershman appeared in the photograph with various 18 features that differed markedly from how Smoloff described him shortly after the shooting: in the photograph, Gershman was not wearing glasses, had a different hairstyle, and had facial hair. And while some of the other individuals in the photograph array had similar facial hair as Gershman, at least two had noticeably less facial hair. But even if there were any basis to conclude that the pretrial identification procedure was unduly suggestive, Gershman fails on the second step because of the independent reliability of Smoloff’s in-court identification. Considerable indicia of reliability supported that identification. While the trial took place years after Smoloff witnessed the event, Smoloff had a clear view of Gershman from the safety of his apartment window, from where he surveyed the scene after hearing a gunshot; he saw Gershman’s face, general build, and a tattoo on his arm; and he immediately recognized Gershman as a neighbor with whom he had ridden the elevator and conversed. When Smoloff identified Gershman in court, he did so with “100 percent” certainty. App’x 1307-08.