Opinion ID: 555453
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: use of a summary witness

Text: 18 Ashford's next ground on appeal concerns the government's presentation of testimony concerning the contents of Secret Service files. At trial the government called as a witness Secret Service Agent Patricia Walker, who testified as to her review of confidential files involving informants. The government put Agent Walker on the stand to counter testimony elicited during earlier defense cross-examination of Agent Procter and a postal inspector involved in the Secret Service investigation. Both men testified that they could not be sure that Willie Russell was not serving as a government informant on the date Ashford was arrested, though neither recalled that Russell ever acted in that capacity. Agent Walker blunted the doubt created by this testimony as to Russell's ties to the government by testifying that her review of relevant files maintained in the Secret Service's Chicago office disclosed that no one by the name of Willie Russell was used as an informant by the Secret Service in 1984. 19 Defense counsel objected to this line of questioning on the ground that Agent Walker's testimony concerning the files she had reviewed would be hearsay. The district court overruled this objection, deciding that the files came within an exception to the hearsay rules, but raising, sua sponte, the issue of whether Agent Walker's testimony would be a summary of voluminous records under Federal Rule of Evidence 1006. That rule removes the Best Evidence Doctrine as an impediment to proving the content of voluminous written, recorded, or photographic material by means of a 'chart, summary, or calculation' when the underlying material 'cannot conveniently be examined in court.'  5 D. Louisell & C. Mueller, Federal Evidence Sec. 598 at 536 (1981) (quoting Fed.R.Evid. 1006). However, the rule requires the party seeking to summarize the contents of voluminous records to make those records available for examination by other parties. Concluding that Agent Walker would be testifying as a summary witness, the district court ordered the government to make the records that she reviewed available to the defense. Sensing the government's reluctance to make the records available, the district court warned the prosecutor that if it gets to the point where we are at the cross-examination stage, and the documents have not been [made] available, I'm going to grant a recess. Transcript at 366. When defense counsel renewed his objection during the course of the government's examination, the district court reassured him that the records, if they have not yet been made available, will be made available to you. Transcript at 368-69. 20 Agent Walker testified late on a Friday afternoon. She was the penultimate witness in the government's case, which because Ashford chose not to present a defense, was the only testimony the jurors heard. On Monday morning, the government announced that it had changed its mind and did not intend to make available the confidential informant files. Transcript at 392. Counsel and the district court discussed the question of whether Rule 1006 applied to the files. The upshot of this discussion was the district court's decision to order the jury to disregard Agent Walker's testimony. 2 Defense counsel, asserting that this curative instruction would be insufficient to undo the prejudice to Ashford caused by Walker's testimony, moved for a mistrial, which the district court denied. 21 Ashford appeals the denial of his motion for a mistrial. He argues that the district court's instruction was ineffective to repair the damage Agent Walker's testimony had caused him, particularly since the jury had all weekend to reflect on what Walker had said. The government responds that Ashford never established what benefit evidence that Willie Russell was an informant would have for his defense, making it unlikely that Agent Walker's testimony meaningfully influenced the jury's decision to convict. 22 Our review of a district court's exercise of its broad discretion with regard to declaring mistrials ... is limited to whether the denial of a motion for mistrial constituted an abuse of [its] discretion. United States v. Beverly, 913 F.2d 337, 351 (7th Cir.1990), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 766, 112 L.Ed.2d 786 (1991); see United States v. Perez, 870 F.2d 1222, 1227 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 136, 107 L.Ed.2d 95 (1989). In this case, rather than granting a mistrial, the district court chose to honor the almost invariable assumption of the law that jurors follow their instructions. Richardson v. Marsh, 481 U.S. 200, 206, 107 S.Ct. 1702, 95 L.Ed.2d 176 (1987); see United States v. Sophie, 900 F.2d 1064, 1077 (7th Cir.1990). We cannot say that this was an abuse of discretion. 23 The effect of Agent Walker's testimony was to exclude the possibility that Willie Russell was a government informant. As we observed in relation to our discussion of Ashford's speedy trial claim, whether or not Russell had ties to the government matters little to any entrapment defense Ashford might have asserted. In his closing argument, however, Ashford's counsel attempted to cast Russell not as the informant that entrapped Ashford but as the real source of the treasury checks that Austin sold to Agent Procter. This theory founders on several grounds independent of whether Russell was or was not an informant: the first is the piece of paper found in Austin's possession, which appears to reflect an agreement between Austin, Russell, and Ashford, giving each man one-third of the proceeds from the sale of the checks. A reasonable jury could well have concluded that Ashford would not have received so generous a share if he was just along for the ride. The second is the presence of Ashford's palm print on one of the treasury checks, which supports the government's assertion that Ashford was the source. Third is the fact that, whether or not Russell was an informant, he was not a postal worker; Ashford was, and the evidence established that he had regular access to treasury checks. Finally, one person whose testimony might have shed light on the question of who supplied the checks was Austin, who sold them to Agent Procter. Ashford, however, never sought to call Austin to bolster his case that Russell rather than Ashford had stolen the checks. 24 We recognize that Russell's role in the sale of the checks remains largely unexplained. The government elected not to file charges against Russell in 1984 because of the insufficiency of the evidence against him and Russell had disappeared by the time the 1988 indictment was filed. This set of facts encouraged the defense to seek to create reasonable doubt as to Ashford's culpability by hinting at Russell's. Because the success or failure of these efforts did not hinge on whether Russell worked for the government, the ultimate point of Agent Walker's testimony, the district court was within its discretion in seeking to undo whatever damage that testimony caused defendant through a curative instruction rather than by granting a mistrial. 25