Opinion ID: 2994743
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Hatcher, Gholson and Crenshaw

Text: Defendants Hatcher, Gholson and Crenshaw were convicted of participating in a continuing criminal enterprise (CCE) and sentenced to imprisonment for life. 21 U.S.C. sec. 848. They claim that their convictions on the CCE charges cannot stand in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in Richardson v. United States, 526 U.S. 813 (1999). Richardson held that a CCE conviction can be sustained only if the jury unanimously agreed on each of the specific predicate acts required to show the existence of the CCE. Hatcher, Gholson and Crenshaw correctly note that the jury was not instructed that it needed to unanimously agree on the predicate offenses for the conviction. They urge that such a failure requires reversal of the CCE convictions. Although the government initially confessed error on this point, it has since thought better of the matter (after prompting from the bench at oral argument) and it now argues that the jury did convict on two predicate offenses for each defendant, thus providing a proper basis for the CCE convictions and making the jury instruction error harmless. Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1 (1999). Even if the government had not amended its argument, this court retains an independent responsibility to evaluate confessions of error for legal correctness. United States v. Locklear, 97 F.3d 196, 198 (7th Cir. 1996). Our review of the law and the record convinces us that the Richardson error was harmless. Count Two alleged the following substantive offenses as CCE predicates: (1) possession with intent to distribute and distribution of controlled substances, in violation of 21 U.S.C. sec. 841(a)(1); (2) use of telephones to facilitate the unlawful possession and distribution of controlled substances, in violation of 21 U.S.C. sec. 843(b); (3) use of minors to facilitate the narcotics conspiracy, in violation of 21 U.S.C. sec. 861(a)(1); and, (4) use of minors to assist in avoiding detection and apprehension for engaging in the narcotics conspiracy, in violation of sec. 861(a)(2). All three of the defendants were also substantively charged in Count Three with the use of minors in furtherance of the narcotics conspiracy and in Count Four with the use of minors to avoid detection and apprehension; all three were convicted by the jury on those two counts. The critical issue for our harmless-error analysis is how many predicate offenses are required for a CCE conviction: two or three? This is not a matter on which the circuits are in agreement. Some commonly define continuing series of violations as three or more offenses. United States v. Sinito, 723 F.2d 1250, 1261 (6th Cir. 1983); United States v. Valenzuela, 596 F.2d 1361, 1365 (9th Cir. 1979); United States v. Michel, 588 F.2d 986, 1000 & n.15 (5th Cir. 1979). Nonetheless, this court has held that a CCE charge may be established by two or more predicate offenses, even when the jury instructions require three. See United States v. Baker, 905 F.2d 1100, 1104 (7th Cir. 1990). Because the jury unanimously agreed that each defendant had committed two of the predicate offenses with which he was charged (i.e., use of minor to further conspiracy and use of minor to avoid detection), the omission of the instruction was a harmless error and the CCE convictions stand. See Smith, 223 F.3d at 567-68; Jackson, 207 F.3d at 919; Lanier v. United States, 205 F.3d 958, 964-65 (7th Cir. 2000).