Court Opinion

ID: 9481381
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 08:17:18.551943+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:48:16.812568
License: Public Domain

STEPHEN H. ANDERSON, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent.
Frank Dennis Felix was convicted in the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri of attempting to manufacture methamphetamine. See United States v. Felix, 867 F.2d 1068, 1070 (8th Cir.1989) (affirming the conviction). But nothing in the Double Jeopardy Clause, or the Supreme Court jurisprudence interpreting that provision, barred Felix’s subsequent prosecution in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma for geographically and temporally separate acts that violated federal drug laws. In holding that the Double Jeopardy Clause requires reversal of six of Felix’s drug convictions, the majority overlooks the plain language of the Supreme Court’s recent holding in Grady v. Corbin, — U.S. -, 110 S.Ct. 2084, 109 L.Ed.2d 548 (1990), and adopts a dangerously broad interpretation of the Double Jeopardy Clause.
I. The Grady Rule
The majority relies upon the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Grady v. Corbin, — U.S. -, 110 S.Ct. 2084, 109 L.Ed.2d 548 (1990). This reliance is misplaced. The majority opinion mischaracterizes Grady’s rule. The majority refers to a bar against: “significant duplication of conduct proved,” Majority Opinion at 1529, “counts in the indictment ... based on proof of the same conduct,” id. at 1529, and “successive trialfs] for the same conduct.” Id. at 1531. The majority similarly cites “the clear principle pronounced in Grady against successive prosecutions for the same conduct.” Id. at 1530.
The Grady Court, however, did not establish a “same conduct” rule.1 By its plain language, Grady only bars subsequent prosecutions
in which the government, to establish an essential element of an offense charged in that prosecution, will prove conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted.
Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2093 (emphasis added). This language comprises several crucial elements, none of which the majority discusses or applies because it lumps them together into a “same conduct” test. The majority further confuses the matter by switching, with no explanation, to a comparison of the evidence presented at each trial, an approach explicitly rejected by Grady. 110 S.Ct. at 2093.
Under Grady’s plain language, the proper approach begins by identifying the conduct sought to be proved in the instant prosecution, as set forth in the indictment. Once that is ascertained, two important questions must be answered: (1) is this conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted? and (2) is it being proven to establish an essential element of the offense for which the defendant is being prosecuted? The Grady rule bars the instant prosecution only if the answer to both questions is affirmative. There are important sub-parts to each of the two questions. Under the first question, for example, the conduct may not “constitute an offense.” Or, even if it does constitute an offense, it may not have been an offense “for which the defendant had already been prosecuted.” Under the second question, it may be that the conduct does not “establish” an essential *1533element, or it may establish an element that is not “essential.”
It is not for this court to re-write Grady’s rule. We must give meaning to each of its elements. When that is done, the rule does not bar Felix’s prosecution in Oklahoma.
II. Counts 2 through 6
The majority reverses Felix’s convictions on Counts 2 through 6. The stated rationale is that much of Felix’s conduct serving as the basis for these Oklahoma convictions had been introduced into evidence at Felix’s trial in Missouri.
But the Grady rule does not bar subsequent proof of all conduct introduced into evidence in a previous trial. Grady only bars the prosecution in a subsequent trial from proving “conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted.” Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2093. As the rule suggests, the conduct alleged in the subsequent prosecution in Grady constituted separately cognizable offenses for which Corbin had already been prosecuted.2
In contrast, Felix had never been prosecuted for the conduct alleged in Counts 2 through 6 of the Oklahoma prosecution. Each of those counts was based on Felix’s conduct on or before July 13, 1987, in establishing and operating the methamphetamine lab in Beggs, Oklahoma. R. Vol. I at Tab 1. In the Missouri trial, however, Felix had only been prosecuted for his conduct “[f]rom on or about August 26, 1987, to on or about August 31, 1987,” over a month after the July 13 DEA seizure of the Beggs lab. Missouri Indictment, R.Supp. Yol. II at 1.
Evidence regarding Felix’s involvement with the Beggs lab was admitted in the Missouri trial under Rule 404(b) of the Federal Rules of Evidence3 as “highly probative of Felix’s knowledge and intent.” United States v. Felix, 867 F.2d 1068, 1072-73 (8th Cir.1989). In its instructions to the jury, the District Court in Missouri emphasized that Felix was not being prosecuted for the earlier Oklahoma acts:
You have heard evidence that the defendant previously committed a crime similar to the one charged in this case. You may not use this evidence to decide whether the defendant carried out the physical acts involved in the crime charged here. However, if you are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt, by other evidence, that the defendant did carry out the physical acts involved in the crime charged here, then you may consider this evidence only on the question of motive, opportunity, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity or absence of mistake.
United States v. Felix, 867 F.2d at 1074-75 (citing Fed.R.Evid. 404(b)) (emphasis added).
It is clear that Felix was not prosecuted in the Missouri case for the conduct that the government proved with respect to Counts 2 through 6 of the Oklahoma prosecution. Introducing Rule 404(b) evidence of a prior bad act is not prosecution for that act. United States v. Van Cleave, 599 F.2d 954, 957 (10th Cir.1979) (evidence of conduct for which the defendant had already been prosecuted “was not introduced for the purpose of retrying [him;] it was introduced to prove motive and intent in connection with ... the charge for which he was then on trial”). As the Supreme Court explained in Grady,
The critical inquiry is what conduct the State will prove, not the evidence the State will use to prove that conduct. As we have held, the presentation of specific evidence in one trial does not forever prevent the government from introducing the same evidence in a subsequent proceeding. See Dowling v. United *1534States, 493 U.S. -, 110 S.Ct. 668, 107 L.Ed.2d 708 (1990).
Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2093.
In holding that Grady mandates the reversal of Counts 2 through 6, the majority goes far beyond what the Supreme Court intended. First, the majority seems to require what the Supreme Court explicitly rejected: “that all charges against a defendant growing out of a single criminal transaction be tried in one proceeding.” Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2094, n. 15 (quoting Jones v. Thomas, 491 U.S. 376, 109 S.Ct. 2522, 105 L.Ed.2d 322 (1989) (Brennan, J., dissenting), reh’g denied, — U.S. -, 110 S.Ct. 12, 106 L.Ed.2d 627 (1989)). Even this “same transaction” test, however, would not bar Felix’s Oklahoma prosecution for Counts 2 through 6. His involvement in manufacturing methamphetamine at the lab in Beggs, Oklahoma, was temporally and geographically separate from his subsequent attempt to manufacture methamphetamine in Missouri, which occurred over a month after the Beggs lab was raided. In no sense were these events “a single criminal transaction.” Id.4
Second, the majority’s interpretation of Grady effectively eviscerates Fed.R.Evid. 404(b). The majority equates the introduction of Rule 404(b) prior bad act evidence with prosecution for the bad acts. If that were the ease, prosecutors could never introduce Rule 404(b) evidence in situations where the defendant had already been prosecuted for the bad act without violating the Double Jeopardy Clause. Moreover, if Rule 404(b) evidence were allowed (because the conduct had not been prosecuted), it could never be introduced again without violating the Double Jeopardy Clause. It is inconceivable that the Grady Court, without any such indication, would limit so drastically the application of Rule 404(b).
Actually, the Supreme Court implicitly rejected such an incongruous interpretation of Rule 404(b) in Dowling v. United States, 493 U.S. 342, 110 S.Ct. 668, 107 L.Ed.2d 708 (1990).5 At Dowling’s trial for robbing a bank while wearing a ski mask and carrying a small pistol, a witness testified that a similarly masked and armed man broke into her home about two weeks after the bank robbery, that a struggle ensued, and that she unmasked the intruder, whom she identified as Dowling. The government offered this Rule 404(b) evidence in order to strengthen its identification of Dowling as the bank robber. Dowling v. United States, 110 S.Ct. at 670. The residential burglary was an offense for which Dowling had already been prosecuted and acquitted. But the Supreme Court held that introducing the Rule 404(b) testimony did not violate the Double Jeopardy Clause. Id. at 672-73.6
*1535In short, nothing in Supreme Court’s Double Jeopardy jurisprudence supports the reversal of Felix’s convictions on Counts 2 through 6.
III. Count 1: Conspiracy
The majority further demonstrates a disregard for the plain language of Grady’s rule in reversing Felix’s conviction on the conspiracy count. The stated rationale is that the conspiracy count was premised on conduct for which Felix had been previously prosecuted in Missouri. Majority Opinion at 1530. But this is neither a correct statement nor a correct application of Grady’s rule. It bears repeating that Grady’s rule only bars situations in which the prosecution,
to establish an essential element of an offense charged in that prosecution, will prove conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant had already been prosecuted.
Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2093. In reversing the conspiracy count, the majority does not once cite to or apply this actual language. As a result, the majority overlooks both of its crucial elements.
A.
As with Counts 2 through 6, the conduct in question here does not “constitute an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted.” Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2093.
Here, too, the majority mistakenly focuses on the overlap of evidence presented at each trial. See Majority Opinion at 1529-1530. This approach blurs the distinction described in Grady between previously prosecuted conduct and evidence used to prove that conduct. The majority opinion, for example, states “The Missouri prosecution was premised on conduct that occurred from the spring of 1987 to August 31, 1987.” Majority Opinion at 1530. To support this statement, it cites to the Eighth Circuit's review of the Missouri conviction. The cited text, however, is the Eighth Circuit’s discussion of the evidence admitted at trial (including the Rule 404(b) evidence discussed above in Section II). See United States v. Felix, 867 F.2d at 1070. As demonstrated above, the indictment reveals that Felix was only prosecuted for conduct committed “[f]rom on or about August 26, 1987, to on or about August 31, 1987....” R.Supp. Vol. II at 1. Felix had not already been prosecuted for his conduct prior to August 26.
The more difficult question is raised by the two overt acts alleged in Count 1 that did occur between August 26 and 31, 1987. Two of the eighteen overt acts alleged in this conspiracy count were:
17. On August 26, 1987, FRANK DENNIS FELIX, while in Tulsa, Oklahoma, provided money for the purchase of chemicals and equipment necessary in the manufacture of methamphetamine.
18. On August 31, 1987, FRANK DENNIS FELIX, while at a location in Missouri, possessed chemicals and equipment necessary in the manufacture of methamphetamine.
R. Vol. I, Tab 1 at 3-5.
Whether these acts constitute the offense for which Felix had been prosecuted in Missouri depends on how far one is willing to expand the meaning of the word “offense.” Felix was prosecuted for attempt to manufacture methamphetamine. R.Supp. Vol. II at 1. The attempt offense consists of two elements:
(1) an intent to engage in criminal conduct, and (2) conduct constituting a “substantial step” towards the commission of the substantive offense which strongly corroborates the actor’s criminal intent.
United States v. Felix, 867 F.2d at 1071 (quoting United States v. Joyce, 693 F.2d 838, 841 (8th Cir.1982)). Overt acts 17 and 18 of the Oklahoma indictment do not constitute the attempt offense. At most, the two acts constitute the second element of the attempt offense: the “substantial step” towards commission of the substantive crime.
*1536The Second Circuit has interpreted the word “offense” broadly. It has held that Grady bars the subsequent prosecution from proving “conduct constituting the entirety of a previously prosecuted offense (as in Grady), or the entirety of an element of such an offense, or the entirety of an element of a distinct component of such an offense.” United States v. Calderone, 917 F.2d 717, 725 (2d Cir.1990) (Newman, J., concurring). However, in the absence of any indication from the Supreme Court that it intended such a liberal interpretation of the word “offense,” I would not adopt such an expansive holding. Applying Grady’ s plain language, the two overt acts do not constitute the attempt offense for which Felix was already prosecuted in Missouri.
B.
Moreover, proof of the two overt acts at issue did not “establish an essential element” of the offense for which Felix was being prosecuted. Count 1 charged Felix and three other individuals with conspiring to manufacture, possess with intent to distribute, and distribute methamphetamine. R. Vol. I, Tab 1 at 1-2. The essential elements of conspiracy are as follows:
The essence of the crime of conspiracy is an agreement to violate the law. The evidence ... need only establish the existence of a conspiracy and that a defendant knowingly contributed his efforts in furtherance thereof.
United States v. Savaiano, 843 F.2d 1280, 1293 (10th Cir.1988) (citations omitted) (emphasis in original). “[A]n overt act is not a necessary element of conspiracy under the federal drug enforcement statutes.” Id. at 1294 (emphasis added).
One position, then, would be that since overt acts are not an essential element of the conspiracy offense, Grady does not bar their introduction. But such a conclusion does not fully apply Grady’s plain language. It is arguable that the two overt acts, while not themselves an essential element, were introduced by the prosecution to establish an essential element: the agreement to violate the drug laws. Indeed, although “[t]he essence of the crime of conspiracy is an agreement to violate the law[,] ... [t]he nature of the offense of conspiracy with its attendant aspects of secrecy, often requires that elements of the crime be established by circumstantial evidence.” Id. at 1293.
Careful scrutiny, however, reveals that the overt acts at issue here did not meaningfully “establish” an essential element of the conspiracy. The indictment reveals that the crux of the Oklahoma conspiracy concerned the conspirators’ activities surrounding the Beggs lab. The two overt acts encompass Felix’s illegal activity after the government seized the Beggs lab. Nothing in the evidence links any of Felix’s co-conspirators to his subsequent attempt to manufacture methamphetamine in Missouri. In other words, the two overt acts do not “establish” an agreement between Felix and his co-conspirators in Oklahoma, nor do they “establish” any contribution to the Oklahoma conspiracy.7
The majority incorrectly relies on United States v. Calderone to support its reversal of the conspiracy conviction. See Majority Opinion at 1527. Examination of the three opinions filed in that case reveals that the Calderone panel would not have reversed Felix’s conviction on this count. Judge Newman, in his concurring opinion, explicitly rejected the interpretation of “establish” that the majority in this case adopts.
[W]e are obliged to apply Grady in a way that gives the “element” component significance. That means barring the second prosecution only when the conduct previously prosecuted is to be used to “establish” the element of the second crime, which I think must mean “constitute the entirety of” the element. If Grady is read more broadly, that is, if the second prosecution is barred whenev*1537er the previously prosecuted conduct is to be used only as evidence of an element of the second offense, then we would almost be applying a “same evidence” test. [It is] more likely that the Supreme Court expected Grady to apply only when the conduct prosecuted at the first trial is or may constitute the entirety of an element of the offense at the second trial.
United States v. Calderone, 917 F.2d at 724 (footnote omitted) (emphasis in original).8 Judge Newman correctly adopted this position in order not to conflict with the Supreme Court’s decision in Dowling. Id. at 724.
In addition, the majority attempts to distinguish the Third Circuit’s interpretation of Grady in United States v. Pungitore, 910 F.2d 1084, 1109 (3d Cir.1990). The majority adopts the interpretation of Grady that the Pungitore court specifically rejected. This is justified, we are told, because the Third Circuit’s approach is based upon a “bifurcation” of the Double Jeopardy analysis that the Tenth Circuit has already rejected. See Majority Opinion at 1527.
In reality, the Third Circuit’s treatment of Grady is less about “bifurcation” than it is about how far Grady’s, rule should be extended beyond its reasoning. The Pun-gitore court’s reluctance to apply Grady “expansively,” id. at 1110, was based on an examination of Grady, its precedential roots, and another Supreme Court case. And our supposed “rejection” of Pungi-tore’s approach, United States v. Savaiano, 843 F.2d 1280 (10th Cir.1988), is a pre-Grady case that confirms the permissibility, under the Double Jeopardy Clause of prosecuting a defendant for both attempt and conspiracy offenses arising from the same conduct.
The question in Pungitore was whether the Grady rule barred a successive prosecution for a compound-complex felony when the defendant had already been prosecuted for one of the predicate offenses. United States v. Pungitore, 910 F.2d at 1109. The Third Circuit noted that both Grady and the cases upon which it relied for its reasoning, Illinois v. Vitale, 447 U.S. 410, 100 S.Ct. 2260, 65 L.Ed.2d 228 (1980) and Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161, 97 S.Ct. 2221, 53 L.Ed.2d 187 (1977), involved a “discrete criminal event.” Id. at 1110. The court also noted that the Brown Court, much like the Grady Court, was concerned with the practice of avoiding the Double Jeopardy Clause by “the simple expedient of dividing a single crime into a series of temporal or spatial units.” Id. (quoting and adding emphasis to Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. at 169, 97 S.Ct. at 2227).
The Third Circuit recognized, however, that some crimes are “made up of ‘a series of temporal or spatial units,’ ” id., and that the Supreme Court’s decision in Garrett v. United States, 471 U.S. 773, 105 S.Ct. 2407, 85 L.Ed.2d 764 (1985), reh’g denied, 473 U.S. 927, 106 S.Ct. 20, 87 L.Ed.2d 698 (1985), was “more closely analagous” to the question before them. In Garrett, the Supreme Court held that a continuous criminal enterprise (CCE) offense and its predicate offenses are separately punishable, and that “prosecution for a CCE offense after an earlier prosecution for a predicate offense is constitutional under the Double Jeopardy Clause.” Garrett v. United *1538States, 471 U.S. at 786, 105 S.Ct. at 2415. Although decided before Grady, Garrett distinguished Grady’s predecessor, Brown v. Ohio, as involving a “single course of conduct—driving a stolen car.” Id. 471 U.S. at 787, 105 S.Ct. at 2416. That single act had supported prosecutions of a defendant for both joyriding and theft. This was unacceptable because “[ejvery moment of his conduct was as relevant to the joyriding charge as it was to the auto theft charge.” Id. Conversely, the CCE offense before the Garrett Court “spanned 5V2 years and several states," while the predicate offense indictment specified only several days within a two month period. United States v. Pungitore, 910 F.2d at 1111. The Garrett Court cautioned against “ready transposition” of the “principles of double jeopardy from the classically simple situation presented in Brown to the multilayered conduct, both as to time and to place, involved in this case.” Garrett v. United States, 471 U.S. at 789, 105 S.Ct. at 2416.
The Third Circuit concluded that “Grady, which finds its roots in ‘single transaction’ cases such as Brown, is no more applicable in the instant circumstances than Brown was in Garrett.” United States v. Pungitore, 910 F.2d at 1111. This holding was not based upon “an approach to double jeopardy issues that this circuit has already rejected,” as the majority claims. Majority Opinion at 1527. To the contrary, the Third Circuit’s holding was based upon the Supreme Court’s decision in Garrett. And, as the Third Circuit noted, nothing in Grady indicates an intention to overrule Garrett.9 United States v. Pungitore, 910 F.2d at 1111 n. 29.
The Tenth Circuit case that the majority cites — United States v. Savaiano, 843 F.2d 1280 (10th Cir.1988) — does not reject the approach of either Garrett or Pungitore. In Savaiano, we held that “separate sentences may be imposed for dual convictions of conspiracy and attempt under [21 U.S.C. § ]846,” id. at 1293, regardless of whether the underlying conduct could be characterized as “a single act, course of conduct, or transaction.” Id. at 1292 (citing with disapproval United States v. Touw, 769 F.2d 571, 574 (9th Cir.1985)). We refused to categorize the underlying conduct because its category was irrelevant: “Once conspiracy and attempt are identified as separate crimes, separate punishment follows, just as separate punishment may be imposed for convictions on conspiracy and the completed crime.” Id. at 1293.10 Thus, if it rejects anything, Savaiano rejects the interpretation that the majority adopts today.
The majority could learn from the Third Circuit’s reluctance to extend Grady beyond its roots. The reasoning behind Garrett similarly applies to prosecutions for conspiracy. Like compound-complex felonies, conspiracy often involves “multilay-ered conduct, both as to time and to place.”11 Garrett v. United States, 471 U.S. at 789, 105 S.Ct. at 2416. The majority’s position would prohibit any temporally separate prosecutions for attempt and conspiracy with overlapping evidentiary support.12 I do not believe that either Congress or the Supreme Court intended such a result, particularly in the area of drug offenses.
In sum, when each of its elements is applied, the Grady rule does not warrant reversal of Felix’s conviction on Count 1. *1539Applying Grady’s plain language, conduct constituting the offense for which Felix was prosecuted, i.e., conduct constituting an attempt to manufacture methamphetamine between August 26 and 31, 1987, was not proven in Felix’s Oklahoma prosecution to establish an essential element of the conspiracy charge.
CONCLUSION
The majority adopts an interpretation of Grady so expansive that it casts a shadow over a great part of accepted criminal law and procedure. There is no indication in Grady that the Supreme Court intended such a result.
Examination of Grady’s actual holding reveals that it stands for a relatively narrow proposition: prosecutors may not, to establish an essential element of a charge, attempt to prove conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted. This squares with Fed.R.Evid. 404(b), Dowling, Garrett, and the rest of our jurisprudence. The majority’s holding does not.
I am mindful of the abuses of successive prosecution that the Double Jeopardy Clause is intended to prevent. The State must “not be allowed to make repeated attempts to convict an individual for an alleged offense, thereby subjecting him to embarrassment, expense and ordeal and compelling him to live in a continuing state of anxiety and insecurity.” Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2091 (quoting Green v. United States, 355 U.S. 184, 187, 78 S.Ct. 221, 2 L.Ed.2d 199 (1957)). But the Oklahoma prosecution was in no way an attempt to re-convict Felix for the same offense, or even the same conduct. The “ordeal” Felix underwent was the natural result of committing a series of separate federal drug offenses during the summer of 1987.
Accordingly, I dissent. The judgment of the district court should be Affirmed.

. The majority begins its double jeopardy analysis on the wrong foot when it equates the term “same offense” found in North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711, 717, 89 S.Ct. 2072, 2076, 23 L.Ed.2d 656 (1969), with "same conduct.” Majority Opinion at 1525. Although both the Second Circuit, United States v. Calderone, 917 F.2d 717 (1990), and the Third Circuit, United States v. Pungitore, 910 F.2d 1084 (1990), also style the Grady rule as the “same conduct” test, they do not apply the majority’s simplified analysis to the facts of those cases. As the majority opinion evidences, this characterization risks misapplication of the rule because it suggests that the Double Jeopardy Clause analysis entails a simple comparison between any conduct that the government seeks to prove in two prosecutions.

. Those separately cognizable offenses were 1) driving while intoxicated, and 2) failing to keep right of the median. Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2088, 2094.

. Fed.R.Evid 404(b) provides, in pertinent part:
"Evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is ... admissible ... as proof of motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence or mistake or accident."

. The majority obfuscates the delineation between Felix’s involvement in the Beggs laboratory and his subsequent attempt to set up another laboratory by describing the facts as a "course of conduct and events.” Proposed Majority Opinion at 1524. One could characterize a lifetime criminal’s entire career in this fashion, but it would not mean the government, under the Double Jeopardy Clause, could only prosecute him once.

. While the dissenters in Grady express their opinion that the decision is inconsistent with Dowling, see 110 S.Ct. at 2095-96 (O’Connor, J., dissenting); id. at 2102 (Scalia, J., with whom Rehnquist, C.J., and Kennedy, J., join, dissenting), the Grady majority gives no such indication. In fact, the opinion cites to Dowling for the proposition that "the presentation of specific evidence in one trial does not forever prevent the government from introducing that same evidence in a subsequent proceeding.” Grady v. Corbin, 110 S.Ct. at 2093. Given this citation, and, "in the face of the challenge raised in the dissents, [Grady ] should be read, if at all possible, not to overrule Dowling." United States v. Calderone, 917 F.2d 717, 724 (2d Cir.1990) (Newman, J., concurring).

.The majority attempts to distinguish Dowling by suggesting that it only involved a question regarding the admissibility of evidence. The evidentiary question, however, was whether admission under Rule 404(b) of Dowling’s prior bad act, for which he had already been tried and acquitted, violated the Double Jeopardy Clause.
In holding that it did not, the Court pointed to one of the many differences between introducing Rule 404(b) evidence of a bad act and prosecution for that act; Rule 404(b) evidence is governed by a lesser standard of proof. Dowling v. United States, 110 S.Ct. at 672-73. The standard for Rule 404(b), recently reaffirmed in Huddleston v. United States, 485 U.S. 681, 689, 108 S.Ct. 1496, 1501, 99 L.Ed.2d 771 (1988), is whether "the jury can reasonably conclude that *1535the act occurred and that the defendant was an actor." This is obviously far less exacting than the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard applicable to the actual offense.

. Obviously, the contours of what conduct "establishes" an essential element will have to be determined by courts applying Grady's rule. I do not dispute that some line-drawing will eventually be necessary. This, however, does not present a close case. In no sense did the two overt acts at issue “establish” the conspiracy, or any of its essential elements.

. It is clear that Judge Miner, in dissent, not only agrees with this interpretation of "establish,” but also holds to the literal language of the rest of the Grady rule. Id. at 726-29 (Miner, J., dissenting). Judge Pratt, who wrote the opinion of the court, does not explicitly address the “establish” element of Grady. He repeatedly emphasizes his concern, however, that the two prosecutions in that case — which were both for drug conspiracies — were prosecutions for the same offense disguised only by different descriptions of the requisite conspiracy agreement. Id. at 721 (“this conduct may not be prosecuted a second time in order to establish an 'agreement' that differs from the first crime only in that the indictment happens to describe it differently”). Here, not only are the substantive offenses different, they also contemplate different times, places, and actors.
The Second Circuit has subsequently expanded Calderone beyond the limitations of Judge Newman’s concurrence. In United States v. Gambino, 920 F.2d 1108 (2d Cir.1990), the panel abandoned any analysis of the "establish” element. Id. at 1112. To the extent Gambino declines to correctly apply this and other elements of the Grady rule, I find the decision incorrect.

. The Third Circuit also applied Garrett in United States v. Esposito, 912 F.2d 60, 63-65 (1990) (rejecting a Double Jeopardy challenge to prosecution for predicate acts after the RICO prosecution and discussing both Garrett and Grady at length).

. While we further commented that the Ninth Circuit's categorization approach guaranteed additional litigation and provided little guidance to the parties or the district courts, United States v. Savaiano, 843 F.2d at 1293, this dicta did not constitute our ratio decidendi, and was limited to the narrow issue before us in Savaiano. At any rate, we were (and are) not in a position to "reject” the Supreme Court precedent embodied in Garrett.

. Here, Felix's Oklahoma conspiracy indictment spanned four months, while the prior Missouri attempt indictment confined itself to acts committed within a six-day period.

. Moreover, in rejecting Pungitore’s analysis, the majority's interpretation of Grady risks stifling prosecution of all complex, continuing criminal offenses.