Opinion ID: 3064941
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Ethnic Generalizations

Text: All four defendants claim that the prosecution violated their constitutional rights to due process, equal protection, an impartial jury, and a fair trial by eliciting testimony about the roles that “Middle Easterners” and “Mexicans” typically play in the pseudoephedrine pill trade and by subsequently linking these “ethnic generalizations” to the defendants. Nobari, George, and Shino, who are of Middle Eastern descent, and Zazueta, who is of Mexican descent, assert that the government improperly “argued ethnicity as evidence of guilt.”
The prosecution broached the subject of which ethnic groups ordinarily occupy certain positions in the pseudoephedrine trade in its cross-examination of the Informant, who was called as a defense witness by George’s attorney to support George’s claim of entrapment. On cross-examination, the government sought to neutralize efforts by the defense to 9658 UNITED STATES v. NOBARI impeach the Informant. At one point during his testimony on cross-examination, the Informant referred to his codefendants from a previous case as “Middle Easterns.” The prosecution used this reference to launch the following set of questions: Q. And speaking of Middle Easterns, based on your experience in the pill business, what — are there Middle — I mean, do you — did you con- duct business with Middle Easterns? A. Mexicans. Q. In what capacity did you know Mexicans? A. Cooks. Q. Have you ever known, in the — your pill traf- ficking, Middle Easterners to actually cook? A. There isn’t a Middle Eastern that cooks, no. Q. What primarily do the Middle Easterns — A. We bring it from Canada to Chicago to Califor- nia. Q. Do the Middle Easterners serve primarily as pill brokers? A. Brokers, yes. Q. And in your experience, the Mexicans, as they were referred to even in these conversations with Eddy George, based on your experience, they would be the people involved in actually extracting the ephedrine from the pills to make the methamphetamine? UNITED STATES v. NOBARI 9659 A. They’re the cookers, that’s their secret. You know, they never let us know their secret of cooking. That’s who cooks the pseudo and did all the pseudo. They called it cooking. The defense did not object at the time to this line of questioning. The prosecution then asked similar questions on direct examination of a DEA agent (“DEA Witness” or “Witness”) who had taken part in an earlier phase of the investigation. The following exchange came during a series of questions that the prosecutor asked the Witness to answer on the basis of his “training and experience” as a DEA agent: Q. Do certain ethnic groups, Mexicans, perform certain roles within the methamphetamine, methamphetamine organization? A. Based on — based on my experience with the wiretaps and other investigations, the individuals handling the pseudoephedrine are of Middle Eastern descent and they talk about trying to get the pseudoephedrine to California — ... Q. And what, based on your training and experi- ence in the investigation of methamphetamine labs, is there — what was the role of the Mexi- cans? A. The pseudoephedrine would be given to a Mex- ican cook and it would be converted with other chemicals into methamphetamine. Q. Based on your training and experience in inves- tigating pseudoephedrine pill cases, [have you] 9660 UNITED STATES v. NOBARI seen Middle Easterners participate in pseu- doephedrine pill trafficking? A. Yes. Q. A large number? A. Yes. Q. And based on your training and experience, what is the role that Middle Easterners play? A. The cases that I have been involved in, the Mid- dle Easterns were secreting the pseudoephe- drine from Canada into the United States with the final destination being California. Q. And typically, what is the role that they — are they involved directly in the manufacturing pro- cess, the Middle Easterners? A. Based on my experience, the Middle Easterners are simply controlling the pseudoephedrine trade and, as a middle man, and getting the pills to a cook. Q. Who you have [sic] seen based on your training and experience to be what ethnic background? A. For which? Q. The cooks. A. Of Mexican descent. The defense did not object to the substance of the DEA Witness’s testimony while he was on the stand. UNITED STATES v. NOBARI 9661 The next morning, before the jury was called, defense counsel moved to strike the testimony of the Witness and the Informant concerning ethnic groups. Rather than strike the testimony, the court gave the following limiting instruction to the jury: Now, I want you to understand that [the DEA Wit- ness’s] testimony is to be considered by you only in the context of this case and the evidence that is in this case and his particular perspective in the Chicago area. You are not to consider that to suggest that any particular ethnic group or persons of a particular racial origin have these characteristics or tendencies or that where a person is born or what a person’s ethnicity is has anything to do with whether he or she is likely or not likely to engage in criminal activity. The prosecution returned to the ethnic generalizations in its closing argument, ostensibly to refute the defense’s claims that the prosecution was engaging in “racial and ethnic profiling”: [W]ithin the context of methamphetamine manufacturing, the fact that George, Shino and Nobari happened to be Assyrian, happened to be Middle Eastern is significant because, as you heard, Middle Easterners typically occupy the role of pill broker and are not involved in the actual manufacture of methamphetamine. Within the context of methamphetamine manufac- turing, the role of obtaining pills for the manufacture of methamphetamine is typically assumed by Mexi- cans. In fact, as you heard in many of the recordings, George himself talks about unloading the pills to the 9662 UNITED STATES v. NOBARI Mexicans, who in his experience would take 50 cases at a time. The district court overruled a subsequent defense objection “to the prosecutor’s reference to heritage,” but reminded the jury that “heritage is not in evidence and therefore you should not treat that as having been proved.”
“When the defendant objects to alleged prosecutorial misconduct, the standard of review is abuse of discretion.” United States v. Steele, 298 F.3d 906, 910 (9th Cir. 2002). We conclude that the defendants’ objections here qualify as timely under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 51(b), so we will consider whether the district court abused its discretion in allowing the contested testimony and argument. Nevertheless, “establishing that there has been prosecutorial misconduct is not in and of itself sufficient to merit reversal” of the defendants’ convictions. United States v. Blueford, 312 F.3d 962, 973 (9th Cir. 2002). Rather, we must consider whether any such misconduct was harmless. Id. We therefore apply harmless error analysis to the misconduct claim we address in this section, as well as to those claims we consider in subsequent sections, so long as the defendants entered a timely objection at trial.
[1] We have held that “[a]ppeals to racial, ethnic, or religious prejudice during the course of a trial violate a defendant’s Fifth Amendment right to a fair trial.” United States v. Cabrera, 222 F.3d 590, 594 (9th Cir. 2000). Specifically, clearly established federal law provides that such prosecutorial conduct “violates a criminal defendant’s due process and equal protection rights.” Bains v. Cambra, 204 F.3d 964, 974 (9th Cir. 2000); see also United States v. Doe, 903 F.2d 16, 25 (D.C. Cir. 1990) (“Racial fairness of the trial is an UNITED STATES v. NOBARI 9663 indispensable ingredient of due process and racial equality a hallmark of justice.” (citations omitted)). These conclusions follow from the premise that “[p]eople cannot be tried on the basis of their ethnic backgrounds or national origin.” Cabrera, 222 F.3d at 597. In Cabrera, we reversed two defendants’ convictions for crack cocaine offenses, having found that “at their joint trial the lead detective injected extraneous, prejudicial material, including impermissible references to Cabrera and Mulgado’s national origin” of Cuba. Id. at 591. At trial, the detective repeatedly referred to drug activity among “Cubans” in Cabrera’s neighborhood. Id. at 591-92. The detective “also testified that the round, flat wafers of cocaine that he purchased from Cabrera were typical of members of the Cuban community” and that he had only seen such a form of cocaine “in Cuban cases.” Id. at 592-93. Finally, the detective suggested that Cubans tended to be flight risks. Id. at 593. We analyzed these statements under the Federal Rules of Evidence and found that “[m]ost of [the detective’s] references to Cubans were not relevant under Rules 401 and 402.” Id. at 596. Although the testimony about drug packaging may have been relevant, it also was prejudicial and should have been excluded under Rule 403 balancing. Id. We then reversed the defendants’ convictions under plain error review despite finding that “the improper testimony came in through [the detective], not through the prosecutor during closing argument,” id. at 595, and that the defense “insisted that [the detective] explain his references to Cubans on cross-examination,” id. at 597, potentially exacerbating the harm caused by the direct examination. We explained why we were reversing the convictions, notwithstanding these (potentially) mitigating factors: “The fairness and integrity of criminal trials are at stake if we allow police officers to make generalizations about racial and ethnic groups in order to obtain convictions.” Id. Similarly, in Bains, we found the use of ethnic generalizations impermissible where the prosecutor employed trial testi9664 UNITED STATES v. NOBARI mony about the Sikh religion to suggest that “all Sikh persons (and thus [the defendant] by extension) are irresistibly predisposed to violence when a family member has been dishonored . . . and also are completely unable to assimilate to and to abide by the laws of the United States . . . .” 204 F.3d at 975. Although the evidence of Sikh beliefs had been properly admitted for other purposes, “the introduction of clearly inflammatory prosecutorial arguments very well might have had the effect of motivating the jury to draw and to focus upon the impermissible inferences” from the testimony. Id. The Bains Court nevertheless affirmed the defendant’s conviction under the less stringent standard for habeas review of state court decisions established by Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 636-38 (1993). Bains, 204 F.3d at 977-78. In both Cabrera and Bains, we reviewed numerous authorities recognizing that references to racial or ethnic groups are improper. See Cabrera, 222 F.3d at 594-95; Bains, 204 F.3d at 974-75. In one noteworthy case, United States v. Vue, 13 F.3d 1206 (8th Cir. 1994), the Eighth Circuit reversed the convictions of brothers who were of Hmong ethnic descent. At trial, a government customs supervisor testified that “primarily the opium smuggling cases we have identified or we’ve investigated relate to Hmong individuals” and estimated that 95 percent of such cases in the area were attributable to persons of Hmong descent. Id. at 1212. The Eighth Circuit found error “of constitutional dimension, because the injection of ethnicity into the trial clearly invited the jury to put the Vues’ racial and cultural background into the balance in determining their guilt.” Id. at 1213. The testimony and argument in the case before us is similar to what was introduced in the cases where our circuit and others have identified error. See Cabrera, 222 F.3d at 597; Bains, 204 F.3d at 975; Vue, 13 F.3d at 1213. The prosecution deliberately elicited testimony from the Informant and the DEA Witness that it then used in closing argument to link the ethnicity of the defendants to the roles typically played in the UNITED STATES v. NOBARI 9665 pseudoephedrine pill trade by members of their respective ethnic groups. The prosecution’s syllogism reduced, in essence, to this: (1) Middle Easterners typically are pseudoephedrine pill brokers, and Mexicans typically obtain the pills and cook methamphetamine; (2) Nobari, George, and Shino are Middle Eastern, and Zazueta is Mexican; (3) therefore, Nobari, George, and Shino played the role of pill brokers, and Zazueta was the cook. Cf. Jinro Am. Inc. v. Secure Invs., Inc., 266 F.3d 993, 1007 (9th Cir. 2001) (addressing a similar syllogism in a civil case). “Our caselaw, and that of other circuits, establishes that this is an impermissible syllogism.” Id. Indeed, the deliberateness with which the prosecution elicited the ethnic generalization testimony and later referred to it in closing argument makes this conduct at least as objectionable as the introduction of testimony in Cabrera, where no comparable reference was argued to the jury, 222 F.3d at 591-93, or the closing argument made in Bains, which drew from evidence that was properly admitted for a legitimate purpose, 204 F.3d at 975. In denying the defendants’ motions for new trial, however, the district court analogized this case not to Cabrera or Bains, but instead to United States v. Santiago, 46 F.3d 885 (9th Cir. 1995). In Santiago, we found no constitutional violation in a trial during which the gang names “Mexican Mafia” and “Latin Kings” were used, and in which the prosecution presented testimony that referenced the defendant’s presence at a prison recreation center for Mexican Americans and demonstrated that 25 percent of the Hispanic population would have the same blood type as the defendant. Id. at 890. Holding that “the government did not appeal to emotion in any of the examples cited” but rather simply “elicited relevant testimony that alluded to the ethnic background of certain prisoners,” we denied an equal protection challenge. Id. at 891. The facts of Santiago have little in common with those here. Santiago featured ethnic terms exclusively in the context of explaining relevant facts, while the present case includes repeated discussion of ethnic role stereotypes in the methamphetamine 9666 UNITED STATES v. NOBARI trade, introduced by the prosecution in a manner that may have encouraged the jury to view the defendants as fitting an ethnic-based pattern of criminal activity. On appeal, the government argues that George opened the door to ethnic generalization testimony by introducing recordings of his conversations with the Informant in support of his entrapment defense. As the government accurately notes, “[t]hose recordings contained numerous and sometimes pejorative references to ‘Mexicans,’ ” the people to whom George claimed he would resell the pseudoephedrine, as well as to “people of Middle Eastern descent.” The government contends that it was entitled to question the Informant and the DEA Witness about the meaning of George’s “ethnic-based references” to dispute his entrapment defense and to make the conversation between George and the Informant comprehensible. [2] The government is correct that the ethnic generalization testimony was relevant under Federal Rule of Evidence 401, if only to a small degree, for helping make sense of the conversation between George and the Informant in which they discussed George’s interest in making a pseudoephedrine purchase. See Fed. R. Evid. 401 (“ ‘Relevant evidence’ means evidence having any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence.”). However, the minimal probative value of the evidence was substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice inherent in its admission, as the testimony encouraged the jury to convict the defendants on the basis of their membership in a particular ethnic group, rather than on the strength of the government’s case. See Fed. R. Evid. 403. As such, the evidence should have been excluded under Rule 403. See id.; Cabrera, 222 F.3d at 596.1 1 The limiting instruction given by the district court the morning after the Informant and the DEA Witness testified did not effectively address any prejudice that their testimony may have caused the defendants. Asking the jury to consider the DEA Witness’s testimony “only in the context of this case and the evidence that is in this case” did not help matters. UNITED STATES v. NOBARI 9667 [3] The district court abused its discretion by admitting the testimony and allowing the closing argument concerned with ethnic generalizations, as the introduction of these remarks violated the defendants’ due process and equal protection rights. See Cabrera, 222 F.3d at 594, 597; Bains, 204 F.3d at 974. After considering the defendants’ remaining challenges to their convictions, we will discuss the basis for our conclusion that this error, in combination with any others, was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. See, e.g., United States v. Bushyhead, 270 F.3d 905, 911 (9th Cir. 2001) (“A constitutional error may be disregarded only if it is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.”).