Court Opinion

ID: 9486373
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 11:46:33.654749+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:51:41.652043
License: Public Domain

REINHARDT, Circuit Judge,
concurring specially:
I fully concur in Judge T.G. Nelson’s opinion for the court. I write separately, however, in order to express my concern over two aspects of the prosecution’s conduct: first, overcharging, second, the improper introduction into evidence of unrelated bad acts. These practices unfortunately appear all too frequently in prosecutions these days.
The defendant in this case was deeply involved in the illegal drug trade. He also owned an unprofitable but legal gold mine. Rather than simply prosecuting the defendant on the basis of the overwhelming evidence of his illicit drug activity, the prosecutors — perhaps because of RICO’s severe imprisonment and forfeiture provisions,1 per*876haps because the use of that statute permits the prosecution to introduce evidence of criminal acts that would otherwise be barred2 — decided to turn the defendant’s ownership of a gold mine into the centerpiece of his prosecution. Notwithstanding the gold mine’s tenuous nexus with interstate commerce, Robertson was charged with investing income derived from a pattern of racketeering activity in an “enterprise ... engaged in, or the activities of which affect interstate or foreign commerce,” in violation of the RICO statute. In doing so, the prosecution immeasurably complicated the trial and substantially increased the burden on the defendant.
The practice of overcharging a defendant3 involves an abuse of the prosecutor’s generally unreviewable discretion. Of necessity, courts are reduced to expressing concern over the practice and their inability to do anything about it. See, e.g., Bordenkircher, 434 U.S. at 368 n. 2, 98 S.Ct. at 670 n. 2 (Blackmun, J., dissenting); United States v. Andrews, 612 F.2d 235, 241-42 n. 7 (6th Cir.1979), reh’g en banc, 633 F.2d 449 (1980), cert. denied sub nom. Brooks v. United States, 450 U.S. 927, 101 S.Ct. 1382, 67 L.Ed.2d 358 (1981); Andrews, 612 F.2d at 256 n. 23 (Keith, J., dissenting).4 The result is that “overcharging ... continue^] to occur *877regularly, without meaningful judicial review or correction.” Gershman, The New Prosecutors, 53 U.Pitt.L.Rev. 393, 408 (1992); see generally A. Goldstein, The Passive Judiciary: Prosecutorial Discretion and the Guilty Plea (1981).
While it is impossible to gauge precisely how often overcharging occurs, it is easy to understand some of the reasons why it occurs. Plea bargaining is now the mainstay of our criminal law system, and excessive charges give the prosecutor added leverage in the plea bargaining process. Because of the threat of prosecution on such charges, defendants may be induced to plead guilty on more unfavorable terms than might otherwise be fair or reasonable. The risk of going to trial may simply become too great, even in cases in which the defendant may arguably be innocent of some of the charges. Moreover, beyond the plea bargaining stage, overcharging may facilitate a compromise verdict in which the jury channels its doubt as to the defendant’s guilt into acquitting him on some charges but not others. Thus, while a defendant who chooses not to proffer a guilty plea may successfully resist prosecutorial overcharging by winning a judgment of acquittal, or, as in this case, having his conviction overturned on appeal, these possibilities hardly amount to adequate protection against the practice. Primarily, defendants must rely for fair treatment on the prosecution’s responsible use of its discretion.
The RICO statute seems particularly susceptible to prosecutorial abuse, given that its scope is broad and somewhat ill-defined, and its penalties are severe. Although the Second Circuit has led the way in attacking misuse of RICO, this circuit too has acknowledged the problem. See, e.g., United States v. Malizia, 720 F.2d 744, 745 (2d Cir.1983); United States v. Ivic, 700 F.2d 51, 64-65 (2d Cir.1983); United States v. Thordarson, 646 F.2d 1323, 1329 n. 10 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 1055, 102 S.Ct. 601, 70 L.Ed.2d 591 (1981); United States v. Huber, 603 F.2d 387, 395-96 (2d Cir.1979), cert. denied, 445 U.S. 927, 100 S.Ct. 1312, 63 L.Ed.2d 759 (1980). At any rate, the fact of overzealous prosecutions under RICO at this late date is even less justifiable than with these earlier cases. With a growing body of case law to delineate the statute’s scope, it is reasonable to expect greater prosecutorial restraint in its application.
Besides overcharging, there is another respect in which the prosecution in this case strayed dangerously close to the line separating a fair conviction from an unfair one. Not content to rely on the overwhelming legitimate evidence of Robertson’s drug trafficking, the prosecution submitted evidence implicating' Robertson in murder, spousal abuse and drug use.5 As Justice Jackson explained in Michelson v. United States, 335 U.S. 469, 476, 69 S.Ct. 213, 218, 93 L.Ed. 168 (1948), a jury presented with evidence of such “bad acts” is liable “to prejudge one with a bad general record and deny him a fair opportunity to defend against a particular charge.” Faced with a defendant who they suspect is a murderer, wife-batterer and drug addict, jurors might well believe they are letting him off easy by convicting him for the crimes charged in the indictment.
Accordingly, the Federal Rules of Evidence declare as a general principle that “[ejvidenee of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show action in conformity therewith.” Fed.R.Evid. 404(b). As. a subset of the larger rule that evidence of bad character is not ordinarily admissible to support an inference of bad conduct, the rule barring bad act evidence possesses “almost *878constitutional proportions.”6 It helps preserve one of the most fundamental precepts of our system of criminal law: the requirement that criminal punishment be based on the commission of specific prohibited acts, not on the defendant’s perceived bad character or tendency to commit crime.7 .
Unfortunately, prosecutors — with some encouragement from the courts8 — are too often tempted to read the exceptions to this rule as the rule itself. As a result, what ought to be a narrow evaluation of the evidence relevant to particular incidents that took place at a particular moment in time is broadened into an examination of the defendant’s lifestyle, habits and character. In effect, the defendant as criminal is on trial, not simply the defendant in relation to a specific crime. Although bad act evidence, when relevant for demonstrating, for example, motive, opportunity, or intent, is nonetheless inadmissible under Rule 403 of the Federal Rules of Evidence if the danger of unfair prejudice substantially outweighs its probative value, this is hardly a powerful safeguard. First, some unfair prejudicial effect is explicitly anticipated, even for evidence found admissible under Rule 403; only when the danger of unfair prejudice reaches an unacceptable level is the evidence barred, and prosecutors tend not to recognize when that level has been reached. Second, the weighing of prejudice versus probative value is inherently imprecise, for no matter how conscientious and careful the district court may be, it cannot calibrate its measurements to adjust for the unpredictable and subjective sensitivities of different jurors. Moreover, the exercise of discretion of district judges in this area is rarely overturned by the court of appeals. While these considerations are relevant for any Rule 403 evaluation, they are particularly salient with regard to bad act evidence, the prejudicial effect of which is a given, and the admission into evidence of which turns the focus of the trial from the crime to the criminal.
"Whether it be misuse of the charging power or reliance on improper character evidence, the problem — and the solution — is essentially the same. Prosecutors know the utility of such abusive methods in winning a conviction; they need to be equally aware of the unfairness and the harm caused to our system of justice when convictions are won in this manner. Prosecutors must keep in mind that they are differently situated than defense counsel, whose responsibility to defend their clients means that within the limits of the law they should do their utmost to win a case. The prosecutor’s client is the justice system. Accordingly, “[t]he duty of the prosecutor is to seek justice, not merely to convict.” ABA Standards Relating to the Function of the Prosecutor 3 — 1.1(e).9 Winning a conviction because of overcharging or presenting the jury with evidence of the defendant’s extrinsic bad acts does not serve the ends of justice.10
Although we reverse Robertson’s RICO conviction for the reasons explained in Judge Nelson’s unanimous opinion for the court, the overwhelming evidence supporting his drug convictions necessitates a finding of harmless error with respect to some of the bad acts evidence and precludes us from reversing the district court’s judgment on those counts. It should be emphasized, however, that in a closer case a full reversal might well have been warranted. Future prosecutors faced with similar circumstances would be well-*879advised to focus their attention more carefully on prosecuting the defendant under charges appropriate to his crimes, and on distinguishing legitimate substantive evidence from evidence of bad acts that serves principally to prejudice the jurors.

. Enhanced sanctions available under RICO include 20 years imprisonment, a $25,000 fine, or *876both, and forfeiture of ill-gotten gains and of any interest in an enterprise that was used to violate the statute. 18 U.S.C. § 1963. As one commentator noted, “the disparity of scale between the RICO sanctions and those of some of its predicate actions suggests that the prosecutor’s ability unilaterally to declare a crime major or minor has been dramatically increased." Lynch, RICO: The Crime of Being a Criminal (pt. II), 87 Co-lum.L.Rev. 661, 723 (1987).

. RICO's predicate act requirement is satisfied if the prosecution shows at least two acts of racketeering activity occurring within ten years of each other, 18 U.S.C. § 1961(5), so that evidence of crimes that would otherwise be barred by the statute of limitations may be admissible. Thus, in this case, prosecutors were able to offer evidence of crimes occurring in 1983 and 1985, which were not independently charged but were relevant only as RICO predicate offenses. Although the district judge specifically instructed the jury not to allow evidence relevant to one count to taint its consideration of the other charges, the admission of such evidence is, at the veiy least, an added worry for the defense.
In other cases, the addition of an overarching RICO charge may allow prosecutors to join disparate offenses in a single trial, where joinder might otherwise be deemed unduly prejudicial. See Lynch, supra note 1 (pt. Ill),’ at 927-28 (noting that "[tjhis motivation for use of RICO is especially strong where the offenses sought to be joined are very serious and prejudicial, and thus particularly likely to be severed”).

. justice Blackmun has described prosecutorial overcharging as when prosecutors bring "charges more serious than they think appropriate for the ultimate disposition of a case.” Bor-denkircher v. Hayes, 434 U.S. 357, 368 n. 2, 98 S.Ct. 663, 670 n. 2, 54 L.Ed.2d 604 (1978) (Blackmun, J., dissenting). Similarly, the commentary to the ABA Standards Relating to the Function of the Prosecutor notes that:
[ajlthough it is difficult to give a definition of "overcharging,” the heart of the criticism is the belief that prosecutors bring charges not in the good faith belief that they are appropriate trader the circumstances and with an intention of prosecuting them to a conclusion, but merely as a harassing and coercive device in the expectation that they will induce the defendant to plead guilty.
Id. § 3-3.10 commentary at 3.59. As such, pros-ecutorial overcharging includes but is not limited to bringing charges unsupported by probable cause.

.Practical problems of proof, bolstered by prudential and arguably constitutional concerns, have led the judiciary effectively to tolerate the practice. As Justice Blackmun pointed out in Bordenkircher, prosecutorial overcharging is difficult or even impossible to prove. See 434 U.S. at 368 n. 2, 98 S.Ct. at 670 n. 2 (Blackmun, J., dissenting). If the defendant is acquitted of a charge, the original charging decision escapes appellate review. In other circumstances, the rule of deference to the prosecutor is so firmly established that judicial review of the prosecutor's charging decisions is, in effect, an empty exercise. See, e.g., Wayte v. United States, 470 U.S. 598, 105 S.Ct. 1524, 84 L.Ed.2d 547 (1985) (explaining that prosecutor’s "broad discretion rests largely on the recognition that the decision to prosecute is particularly ill-suited to judicial review"). A recent decision of this court, decided on review of a plea bargain, particularly illustrates the judicial reluctance to interfere in matters involving the prosecutor's charging discretion and suggests its constitutional underpinnings. In United States v. Redondo-Lemos, 955 F.2d 1296 (9th Cir.1992), the court rejected a defendant's constitutional challenge to the prosecutor’s charging decision and refused to evaluate whether the prosecutor's discretion had been exercised in an arbitrary and capricious manner. The court reasoned that charging decisions "involve exercises of judgment and discretion that are often difficult to articulate in a manner suitable for judicial evaluation,” and that, furthermore, serious separation of powers questions would be raised by judicial supervision of prose-cutorial charging discretion. Id. at 1299-1301. *877The court did, however, distinguish the requirement of probable cause for prosecution, for which, as past cases establish, judicial scrutiny is appropriate. Id. at 1300 n. 5.; see also United States v. Sanchez, 908 F.2d 1443, 1445 (9th Cir.1990).

. Given the liberal abuse of discretion standard applicable to the evidentiary decisions of the district court, and the facts of in this particular case, we do not hold that the admission of evidence of spousal abuse was error. Our failure to reverse on this issue, however, should not be interpreted as tacit approval of the admission of such evidence generally. Instead, it should be emphasized that the admission of evidence of spousal abuse will often be error. Recent, entirely commendable, public awareness of the wrongfulness of spousal abuse means that evidence of such acts may be extremely prejudicial.

. Fed.R.Evid. 404 notes of Advisory Committee on 1972 Proposed Rules at 228 (1993).

. The constitutional status of this transaction-based model of criminal law is evident in Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 82 S.Ct. 1417, 8 L.Ed.2d 758 (1962). See Lynch, supra note 1, at 934.

. See Huddleston v. United States, 485 U.S. 681, 108 S.Ct. 1496, 99 L.Ed.2d 771 (1988); Dowling v. United States, 493 U.S. 342, 110 S.Ct. 668, 107 L.Ed.2d 708 (1990).

. As this court has recently found it necessary to remind prosecutors (see United States v. Kojayan, 8 F.3d 1315, 1324 (9th Cir.1993), the desire to win a conviction should never eclipse the more important responsibility of serving justice.

. See United States v. Jones, 559 F.2d 960, 961 (5th Cir.), reh’g denied, 564 F.2d 98 (1977), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 1021, 98 S.Ct 747, 54 L.Ed.2d 769 (1978); “It would be a miscarriage of justice if a defendant were found guilty of one offense simply because the jury felt he should be punished because of participation in other offenses for which he is not on trial.”