Court Opinion

ID: 9382632
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-03-28 15:00:37.542086+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:17:40.654086
License: Public Domain

Appellate Case: 22-4059     Document: 010110833724      Date Filed: 03/28/2023   Page: 1
                                                                                 FILED
                                                                     United States Court of Appeals
                       UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS                        Tenth Circuit

                              FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT                        March 28, 2023
                          _________________________________
                                                                        Christopher M. Wolpert
                                                                            Clerk of Court
  UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

        Plaintiff - Appellee,

  v.                                                         No. 22-4059
                                                  (D.C. No. 2:21-CR-00227-DAK-1)
  GERARDO DELGADILLO, JR.,                                    (D. Utah)

        Defendant - Appellant.

  –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

  UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

        Plaintiff - Appellee,

  v.                                                         No. 22-4060
                                                  (D.C. No. 2:21-CR-00157-DAK-1)
  GERARDO DELGADILLO, JR.,                                    (D. Utah)

        Defendant - Appellant.
                       _________________________________

                              ORDER AND JUDGMENT*
                          _________________________________

 Before HARTZ, KELLY, and BACHARACH, Circuit Judges.
                   _________________________________

       *
         After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
 unanimously that oral argument would not materially assist in the determination of
 this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore
 ordered submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment is not binding
 precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral
 estoppel. It may be cited, however, for its persuasive value consistent with
 Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th Cir. R. 32.1.
Appellate Case: 22-4059    Document: 010110833724       Date Filed: 03/28/2023      Page: 2

       Gerardo Delgadillo, Jr. appeals the district court’s judgments revoking the

 supervised release imposed in two criminal cases.1 He argues that the district court

 violated his confrontation right under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure

 32.1(b)(2)(C) by allowing the government to rely on hearsay evidence at the

 revocation hearing. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm.

                                  I.     Background

       Jurisdiction over Mr. Delgadillo’s supervised release in two other districts was

 transferred to the District of Utah. While on supervised release, he moved to

 California, where he engaged in conduct that led to his being charged in the District

 of Utah with violating several conditions of his release. He admitted most of the

 violations but denied two concerning conduct that was the subject of criminal charges

 filed against him in California state court: (1) unlawfully taking property from

 another person by use of force or fear, and (2) committing serious bodily injury to

 another individual. The basis for those charges is described in a police report of the

 Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD).

       According to the report the complainant told police a man assaulted him in the

 alley behind a store and took his knife and cell phones. A witness recorded part of

 the incident. The video showed the alleged assailant and another man leaving the

 scene in a white van. Using the license plate number shown on the video, police

 determined that the van was registered to a nearby business. When they arrived at

       1
        Mr. Delgadillo filed two appeals, one for each underlying district-court case.
 We procedurally consolidated the appeals.
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 the business shortly after the incident, they saw Mr. Delgadillo and the other man get

 out of a van with license plates that matched the one on the video. Because of the

 size of the video, the witness was unable to email it to police, but the witness gave

 them screenshot photos of the two men for identification purposes. Neither the

 complainant nor the witness could identify Mr. Delgadillo in a photo lineup, but the

 witness positively identified the other man. Police found two phones—one in

 Mr. Delgadillo’s pocket and another in the van—and took both into evidence.

        At the revocation hearing on June 23, 2022, counsel for the government

 indicated that she was relying on a police report to prove the violations and would

 not call any witnesses involved in the state criminal case. Mr. Delgadillo’s Utah

 probation officer testified about the contents of the police report. She also testified

 that Mr. Delgadillo was employed by the business that owned the van and that the

 business was less than half a mile from the scene. On cross-examination she

 confirmed that her testimony about the incident was based entirely on the police

 report and that she had not talked to the complainant or the witness. She also

 confirmed that the report indicated that the witness did not start videotaping the fight

 until after it had started.

        An investigator for defense counsel—the Federal Public Defender (FPD) in

 Utah—testified about Mr. Delgadillo’s version of how the fight started.2

        2
          Defense counsel indicated that Mr. Delgadillo himself did not testify because
 the state criminal case was still pending and counsel did not want to prejudice his
 defense in that case.

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 Mr. Delgadillo told the investigator he was waiting for his co-worker to come out of

 the store when the complainant “ran up to him . . . yelling” profanities and hit him.

 R., vol. IV at 17. Mr. Delgadillo hit the complainant back and they started fighting.

 The complainant had a knife but Mr. Delgadillo took it from him. When his co-

 worker came out of the store, Mr. Delgadillo threw the knife, and they left in the van.

        In addition to testifying about Mr. Delgadillo’s version of events, the

 investigator testified about the complainant’s criminal history, including that he was

 on probation at the time of the incident and a condition of his probation was that he

 not possess dangerous weapons, such as knives. She also testified that she could not

 locate the witness and he did not respond to her phone message and text. She

 enlisted the help of an investigator for the FPD in Los Angeles who attempted to go

 to the witness’s home, but the address he had given police was “nonexistent.” Id. at

 21. The local investigator also determined that the store did not have a surveillance

 video of the fight.

        Invoking Rule 32.1(b)(2)(C), the government asked the court to admit the

 police report and determine that the interest of justice did not require witnesses from

 California to appear at the hearing. Over Mr. Delgadillo’s objection that allowing the

 government to prove the contested revocation allegations based solely on the police

 report violated his confrontation rights, the court granted the government’s request.

 And, based on the police report, the court found that the government had proved the

 allegations by a preponderance of the evidence. Accordingly, the court revoked

 Mr. Delgadillo’s supervised release under 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e). The court then

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 sentenced him to 18 months in prison for each conviction, with the sentences to run

 concurrently.

       On appeal Mr. Delgadillo challenges only the district court’s

 Rule 32.1(b)(2)(C) ruling; he does not challenge its preponderance determination or

 the length of his prison sentence.

                                      II.   Discussion

       “[T]he Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment does not apply to

 supervised release revocation proceedings and the due process guarantees associated

 with these proceedings are minimal.” United States v. Henry, 852 F.3d 1204, 1206

 (10th Cir. 2017) (internal quotation marks omitted). Under Rule 32.1(b)(2)(C),

 however, the accused in a revocation proceeding “is entitled to . . . an opportunity to .

 . . question any adverse witness unless the court determines that the interest of justice

 does not require the witness to appear” in the revocation hearing. In deciding

 whether the government may rely solely on hearsay evidence or whether a witness

 should appear, a district court must balance the accused’s interest in confrontation

 against the government’s “good cause for denying it.” United States v. Jones, 818

 F.3d 1091, 1099-1100 (10th Cir. 2016) (internal quotation marks omitted). We

 review the district court’s admission of evidence under Rule 32.1(b)(2)(C) for abuse

 of discretion. See Henry, 852 F.3d at 1207.

       The reliability of the government’s evidence is “a very important factor in

 determining the strength of a releasee’s confrontation right.” Id. at 1100 (internal

 quotation marks omitted). “[S]tatements corroborated by detailed police

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 investigative reports” “possess[] recognized indicia of reliability.” Id. at 1098 n.4

 (internal quotation marks omitted). When a victim’s and a witness’s statements

 conveyed in a police report are consistent with the officers’ investigation, “the police

 report provides indicia of reliability to the victim’s statements.” Curtis v. Chester,

 626 F.3d 540, 547 (10th Cir. 2010); see also United States v. Cook, 550 F.3d 1292,

 1297 (10th Cir. 2008).

       In support of her request that the court allow her to rely solely on the police

 report to prove the contested revocation allegations, counsel for the government

 explained that she did not want to subpoena witnesses to travel to Utah “during a

 pandemic” when the county where the hearing was held was “in the high risk

 category.” R., vol. IV at 5. She argued that Mr. Delgadillo’s interest in cross-

 examination was minimal given that the incident had been recorded, police identified

 him based on screenshots from the recording, and he was apprehended less than half

 a mile from the scene in the van shown in the video. And because the complainant’s

 and the witness’s statements to police, the video, the van, and the officers’

 observations all “matched up,” id. at 27, she argued that the police report was

 sufficiently reliable to be admitted under Rule 32.1(b)(2)(C) without affording

 Mr. Delgadillo an opportunity for cross-examination.

       Mr. Delgadillo disputed that the government had good reasons for not

 presenting witnesses at the hearing, noting that doing so via video would have been

 an appropriate solution. He also argued that his interest in confronting the

 complainant was significant because although “this fight did occur,” id. at 25, he

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 needed to cross-examine the complainant about how the fight started, his criminal

 history, and the fact that he had a knife during the fight despite his probation status.

 Mr. Delgadillo maintained that “without [the complainant] here, the evidence

 provided in this police report . . . is just not reliable enough.” Id. at 26. He did not

 argue that he needed an opportunity to cross-examine either the witness or the

 officers.

        The district court concluded that, given “the difficulties of the pandemic” and

 “of reaching these people, their unresponsiveness,” the government had “plenty of

 good cause for denying” Mr. Delgadillo’s opportunity for confrontation of the

 complainant. Id. at 29. Based on that finding, the court held that the government had

 met its burden under Rule 32.1(b)(2)(C).

        The district court did not abuse its discretion. Mr. Delgadillo complains that

 the government did not “speak with any potential witnesses” or “explain why

 witnesses could not have appeared by video.” Aplt. Br. at 8. Counsel for the

 government explained that she had been unable to contact witnesses with the LAPD,

 but she did not say what efforts, if any, had been made to contact the complainant

 and the witness. Mr. Delgadillo did not argue at the hearing and does not argue on

 appeal that he needed to cross-examine the witness, so we are not concerned about

 the government’s failure to subpoena him to appear at the hearing by video. We are

 troubled by the government’s failure to explain what efforts, if any, it made to

 contact the complainant and why it did not subpoena him to appear by video. But

 given the corroboration of his statement to police by the witness’s statements, the

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 video and photos, and the investigation—including that police found two of the items

 the complainant said had been stolen from him in Mr. Delgadillo’s pocket and in the

 van—we conclude that the district court acted within its discretion in admitting the

 police report as reliable hearsay evidence. See Curtis, 626 F.3d at 547; Cook,

 550 F.3d at 1297. And given the inherent reliability of the police report, we also find

 no abuse of discretion in the district court’s conclusion that the government’s reasons

 for not presenting witnesses at the hearing outweighed Mr. Delgadillo’s interest in

 cross-examining the complainant about how the fight started and to test his

 credibility, particularly since the complainant never identified Mr. Delgadillo as the

 culprit.

                                   III.   Conclusion

        Because we find no abuse of discretion in the district court’s Rule 32.1(b)(2)C)

 determination, we affirm the judgments revoking Mr. Delgadillo’s supervised release.

                                             Entered for the Court

                                             Harris L Hartz
                                             Circuit Judge

                                            8