Court Opinion

ID: 9492419
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 14:40:59.100523+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:55:18.039796
License: Public Domain

D.W. NELSON,
Dissenting in part, Concurring in part.
Because I think that the panel has underestimated the risk of prejudice and overstated the strength of the government’s case, I respectfully dissent from the portion of the panel’s opinion holding that the error was harmless. It is undisputed that the district court’s admission of the stipulation that Blanco-Gallegos had been convicted of an aggravated felony, which was referenced at several points during the trial, was error. See United States v. Alviso, 152 F.3d 1195, 1199 (9th Cir.1998). I am compelled to dissent because the government has failed to carry its burden of proving that the prejudice was harmless. See id.
First, I disagree with the majority’s assertion that “any prejudice to Blanco-Gallegos was minor and sanitized.” This conclusion is at odds with the Supreme Court’s decision in Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U.S. 224, 118 S.Ct. 1219, 140 L.Ed.2d 350 (1998), in which the Court emphasized that it has “long recognized” that “the introduction of evidence of a defendant’s prior crimes risks significant prejudice.” Id. 118 S.Ct. at 1226 (emphasis added). The Court went on to caution that:
*1078Even if a defendant’s stipulation were to keep the name and details of the previous offense from the jury, jurors would still learn, from the indictment, the judge, or the prosecutor, that the defendant had committed an aggravated felony.... [TJhere can be no question that evidence of the nature of the prior offense, here, that it was aggravated or serious, carries a risk of unfair prejudice to the defendant.
Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Therefore, the fact that Blanco-Gallegos could have been prejudiced to an even greater extent by introducing more details about his prior conviction in no way diminishes the seriousness of the risk of prejudice created by admitting the nature of his prior offense.
Second, the error was not harmless because the admission of the prior conviction likely undermined Blanco-Gallegos’ credibility. In order to prove that Blanco-Gallegos attempted to reenter the United States, the government had to prove every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt, including that Blanco-Gallegos possessed the specific intent to enter the United States. See United States v. Hadley, 918 F.2d 848, 853 (9th Cir.1990) (“[A]t-tempt includes an element of specific intent even if the crime attempted does not.”) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Blanco-Gallegos’ defense was that he drank an extreme amount of alcohol in the hours prior to the alleged attempt to reenter and thus was too intoxicated to form specific intent. Cf. United States v. Sneezer, 900 F.2d 177, 180 (9th Cir.1990) (defendant was entitled to present defense of voluntary intoxication to negate specific intent element). I fail to see how the majority can characterize the evidence as “overwhelming” as it relates to this element. Although Blanco-Gallegos may have offered no evidence other than his own testimony, the government offered no evidence directly contradicting Blanco-Gallegos’ specific intent defense. The jury’s assessment of the specific intent element thus hinged on its evaluation of Blan-co-Gallegos’ credibility.
Contrary to the majority’s argument, Blanco-Gallegos’ defense was not too farfetched for a jury to accept. The fact that Blanco-Gallegos initially stated that he was from Puerto Rico does not necessarily contradict his intoxication defense. The evidence at trial demonstrated that claiming Puerto Rican heritage to an immigration inspector well-versed in different Hispanic accents was an implausible means of obtaining entry to the U.S. In fact, the immigration inspector immediately recognized that Blanco-Gallegos, who is Mexican, did not have a Puerto Rican accent. In light of Blanco-Gallegos’ unequivocal testimony that he was drunk and never intended to enter the U.S., the jury could have reasonably concluded that his statement about Puerto Rico was a clumsy comment consistent with his claim that he was not “thinking straight.” Ultimately, the jury’s resolution of this element boiled down to a credibility determination, and the admission of Blanco-Gallegos’ aggravated felony conviction unfairly slanted it in the government’s favor.
Our decision in United States v. Garciar-Orozco, 997 F.2d 1302 (9th Cir.1993), is instructive. In Garcia-Orozco, we reversed a conviction because the defendant’s prior conviction had been erroneously admitted, and his “defense rested largely on his own testimony.” Id. at 1305. We concluded that the admission of the prior conviction “more than likely affected the jury’s measure of Garcia-Or-ozco’s credibility.” Id. In light of the centrality of Blanco-Gallegos’s credibility in this case and the Supreme Court’s admonition in Almendarez-Torres, I cannot agree with the majority’s conclusion that the error was harmless. I therefore dissent in part.