Opinion ID: 572166
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Alleged Vouching by Government Agent

Text: 39 Pujana-Mena also claims that the district court erred in permitting DEA agent James Kerrigan to vouch for the credibility of Aponte, the government's key informant. 40 On cross-examination of Agent Kerrigan, defense counsel questioned him extensively as to his efforts to corroborate information supplied to the DEA by Aponte. For example, defense counsel asked Agent Kerrigan whether he tried to obtain phone records to verify that Aponte actually called Pujana-Mena on certain dates. Defense counsel also asked Kerrigan whether he tried to corroborate the fact that Aponte called Bogota on the days on which computer messages were received, purportedly from Pujana-Mena. After receiving negative responses to these questions, defense counsel emphasized a perceived absence of sufficient corroboration with statements such as [You j]ust accepted Aponte's word for everything he told you that Mr. Pujana told him, is that right? and So we have to accept his word that he had that conversation with Mr. Pujana, isn't that right? Several times, Kerrigan responded to these statements by explaining why he did not do more to corroborate the informant: No, I wasn't corroborating the informant. The informant is a reliable informant.... If I thought that Hernando wasn't telling the truth, I wouldn't use him. Neither would any other agents. Defense counsel did not object to any of these responses elicited from Kerrigan on cross-examination. 41 On redirect, the prosecutor conducted the following examination of Agent Kerrigan: 42 Q: There was a great deal of discussion on cross-examination about corroborating informants. Do you ever check up on an informant? 43 A: Yes, I do. 44 Q: Who determines how much you need to do to check up on an informant in the course of a case? 45 A: The case agent. 46 Q: On what basis do you personally make that determination? 47 A: If I feel that the informant is lying to me or not giving me all the information. 48 Q: And in this particular case what determination did you make concerning whether you should check up on Mr. Aponte? 49 A: I determined it wasn't necessary. 50 Q: Why? 51 A: Because I felt that--I was getting the information and also that he wasn't lying to me. 52 Q: In your practice as a DEA agent, if you determine that an informant is lying to you what do you do? 53 [DEFENSE COUNSEL]: Objection. 54 THE COURT: I'll allow it, go ahead. 55 A: I haven't had one lie to me yet that I've found out but if they lied to me and I found out-- 56 [DEFENSE COUNSEL]: I object to any further answer. 57 THE COURT: Is there some sort of DEA policy on this or is this left to the individual judgment of each agent? 58 THE WITNESS: It's basically left to the judgment of each agent but there is a policy if you want to follow the ultimate policy of DEA as to terminate the agreement between the informant and DEA. 59 THE COURT: Is that the DEA policy? 60 THE WITNESS: If that's what the agent feels and you put it--if you put in the report that you want that to happen, that will be the policy. It's called blackball. 61 As a preliminary argument, the government contends that Pujana-Mena's vouching claim has been waived because defense counsel did not object to any of the testimony elicited by the prosecutor on redirect and arguably only registered an objection to testimony elicited by the court. Since Pujana-Mena did not move to strike or seek a limiting instruction, the government claims that any objection to the testimony elicited by the court was also waived. To be timely, an objection must be  'made as soon as the ground of it is known, or reasonably should have been known to the objector.'  United States v. Check, 582 F.2d 668, 676 (2d Cir.1978) (quoting 21 C. Wright & K. Graham, Federal Practice and Procedure § 5037, at 188 (1977)); see also Fed.R.Evid. 103(a)(1). We do not construe the timely-objection rule so inflexibly as to require that the objection always be made immediately after the question has been asked but before an answer has been given. See Hutchinson v. Groskin, 927 F.2d 722, 725 (2d Cir.1991). Nor do we necessarily find on objection affirmatively waived because it might have been interposed a few questions earlier in the midst of a hotly-contested trial, particularly where the grounds for the objection are not immediately apparent. See Check, 582 F.2d at 676. Under the circumstances of this case, we conclude that defense counsel's first objection was sufficient to preserve the issue for appellate review. 62 Turning to the merits, we reject Pujana-Mena's claim of vouching. While it is true that [t]he credibility of witnesses is exclusively for the determination by the jury, and witnesses may not opine as to the credibility of other witnesses at the trial, United States v. Scop, 846 F.2d 135, 142 (2d Cir.1988) (citation omitted), we do not believe such vouching occurred in this case. In Scop we found vouching where an expert witness gave testimony that was based on the witness's positive assessment of the credibility of the trial testimony of another witness. Thus, Scop prohibits witnesses from assess[ing] the trustworthiness or accuracy of testimony given in the same case or [from] offer[ing] opinions based on such an assessment. Scop, 846 F.2d at 143 (emphasis in original); see also United States v. Scop, 856 F.2d 5, 6 (2d Cir.1988) (on petition for rehearing) (stating previous decision reversed convictions because the government's expert witness was wrongly allowed to give opinions that embodied legal conclusions and were based on that witness's assessment of the credibility of the testimony of other witnesses). 63 In this case, Agent Kerrigan did not testify as to the credibility of Aponte's in-court testimony, but basically testified as to a general DEA policy regarding an informant's veracity. This testimony was not elicited on direct examination, but on redirect, after defense counsel had repeatedly suggested that Agent Kerrigan had not done enough to corroborate Aponte's information. In light of defense counsel's cross-examination, it was entirely appropriate on redirect examination for the prosecution to elicit testimony from the witness for the limited purpose of showing why Agent Kerrigan did not undertake more steps to verify Aponte's story. See, e.g., United States v. Sanchez, 790 F.2d 1561, 1564 (11th Cir.1986) (per curiam).