Court Opinion

ID: 9365302
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-01-23 18:00:46.605173+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:15:42.396445
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 21-12489    Document: 33-1      Date Filed: 01/23/2023   Page: 1 of 17

                                                   [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                    In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                         For the Eleventh Circuit

                           ____________________

                                 No. 21-12489
                           Non-Argument Calendar
                           ____________________

        UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
                                                       Plaintiff-Appellee,
        versus
        PAUL STEPHEN VALDEZ,

                                                    Defendant-Appellant.

                           ____________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Northern District of Florida
                    D.C. Docket No. 3:20-cr-00039-MCR-1
                           ____________________
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        2                      Opinion of the Court               21-12489

        Before LUCK, LAGOA, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
              Paul Stephen Valdez appeals his conviction for theft of gov-
        ernment property. He argues the district court abused its discre-
        tion by admitting rule 404(b) prior-bad-acts evidence because the
        evidence’s probative value was substantially outweighed by undue
        prejudice. After careful review, we affirm.
            FACTUAL BACKGROUND AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

               In July 2020, Valdez was charged by superseding indictment
        with theft of government property valued at more than $1,000, in
        violation of 18 U.S.C. section 641. Valdez was accused of stealing
        eight ballistic plates—protective ceramic inserts that fit four to a
        body armor vest and are worth $625 each—from his military unit
        at Eglin Air Force Base. Valdez pleaded not guilty and opted for a
        trial.
               As trial approached, the government notified Valdez of its
        intent to introduce evidence of three prior bad acts under Federal
        Rule of Evidence 404(b). The first was testimony that Valdez ad-
        mitted to stealing a combat helmet a Special Forces soldier had
        placed on the ground during a training exercise. The second was
        evidence that Valdez stole smoke grenades. And the third was tes-
        timony about Valdez’s professed plans to steal night-vision goggles
        and ammunition from his military unit.
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        21-12489                Opinion of the Court                         3

               Valdez moved to exclude evidence of the helmet, night-vi-
        sion goggles, and ammunition under rule 404(b). He argued there
        was insufficient evidence the helmet had been stolen and that any
        such evidence was relevant only to his character. He also argued
        that any banter about stealing night-vision goggles and ammuni-
        tion was simply part of the Army’s joking culture, so admitting that
        evidence would be highly prejudicial but “only minimally proba-
        tive.”
               The district court found the evidence admissible and so de-
        nied Valdez’s motion. It concluded that: (1) the prior-bad-acts ev-
        idence was relevant to intent, knowledge, motive, opportunity,
        preparation, and planning; (2) Valdez’s admission—even if “puff-
        ery”—was sufficient proof (for rule 404(b) purposes) that he stole
        the helmet; (3) whether Valdez was joking when he talked about
        plans to steal the goggles and ammunition went to the evidence’s
        weight rather than its admissibility; and (4) any unfair prejudice—
        which was unlikely because the bad acts weren’t heinous—could
        be mitigated by cautionary jury instructions.
                At trial, the jury heard that, in 2019, Valdez was stationed at
        Camp Rudder at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida as part of the
        United States Army’s 6th Ranger Training Battalion. On the even-
        ing of August 27, Valdez was hanging out at the bar across the
        street from the barracks with Specialist Dylan Sitzler. Around
        10:00 p.m., Valdez asked Sitzler to go with him to a nearby building
        where his unit had staged equipment—including ballistic plates—
        for field training the next morning.
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        4                      Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

                Sitzler testified that, while he acted as a lookout, Valdez—
        dressed in sweatpants and a black hoodie—climbed through the
        building’s unlocked rear window and retrieved two ballistic plates.
        Valdez went back into the building twice and took six more plates,
        then used his hoodie to wipe away any fingerprints he might’ve
        left. Sitzler carried two of the plates back to his barracks room, but
        late that evening Valdez stopped by and asked him to keep two
        more. Sitzler took the plates but got nervous about keeping them,
        so he stashed all four in a tire in the motorcycle parking area.
               The battalion didn’t immediately recover the missing plates
        the next day, and Valdez called Sitzler to ask “where the plates
        were and if they were ready to be moved off site.” Sitzler told Val-
        dez he didn't know, then anonymously called the camp’s staff duty
        desk to report the plates’ location. The staff duty sergeant recov-
        ered the four plates from inside the tire.
               Over the next few weeks, Valdez admitted to numerous
        members of his unit that he had taken the ballistic plates. On Au-
        gust 28—the day after the theft—he told Specialist Timothy Prater,
        but Prater thought Valdez was joking. About a week later, Valdez
        told Prater again, “with a more serious demeanor” this time.
        Around the same time, Valdez also told his eventual co-defendant,
        Specialist Timothy Johnson. According to Johnson, Valdez said he
        wanted to obtain a set of plates for his personal use before leaving
        active duty in December, so he didn’t leave the Army “with noth-
        ing to show for it.” Valdez confessed again in front of Johnson and
        Specialist Alejandro Perez following a training exercise a few weeks
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        21-12489               Opinion of the Court                         5

        later. And on September 7, while at a bar in nearby Destin, Valdez
        told Sergeant Luke Harshaney. Harshaney testified that he asked
        Valdez if he took the plates because, several months prior, Valdez
        had told Harshaney that he took a combat helmet from a Special
        Forces soldier training at Camp Rudder. In response, Valdez first
        denied taking the plates, then tapped Harshaney’s chest and asked
        if he was wearing a wire, and finally said yes, he took them by
        climbing through “a back window that people left cracked all the
        time.” Valdez told Harshaney that he planned to ship the plates
        home to Kentucky, just like he did with the helmet. [Id. at 142:5–
        19] Johnson testified that Valdez told him about the combat hel-
        met too—Valdez said he found it “just sitting somewhere [unse-
        cured] and [so] he grabbed it and took it.”
              A few weeks after the ballistic plates were stolen, Perez and
        Johnson helped Valdez move from the barracks to an apartment in
        Pensacola. Perez testified that, during the move, Valdez showed
        him four ballistic plates and four or five smoke grenades in a closet
        in the apartment. Perez recognized the plates and grenades as
        Army property. Valdez told Perez that he and Harshaney took the
        grenades from the military unit.
                On September 21, Valdez asked Perez for help moving the
        ballistic plates. Perez said no, but he later agreed to lend his truck
        to Johnson. Johnson used the truck to help Valdez—who, accord-
        ing to Johnson, thought investigators were onto him—move the
        plates from his apartment in Pensacola. Valdez put the plates in
        Johnson’s backpack along with at least one smoke grenade.
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        6                      Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

        Johnson then stashed the backpack in the outdoor storage closet of
        his girlfriend Paige Powell’s apartment in Crestview, Florida. Pow-
        ell testified that she saw the plates and a smoke grenade in the back-
        pack Johnson left in her storage closet.
                Meanwhile, while Johnson had the truck, Perez followed his
        location on Snapchat: Valdez’s Pensacola apartment and then, a
        bit later, Powell’s Crestview apartment—which she shared with
        Perez’s girlfriend. This made Perez suspicious that Valdez and
        Johnson had used his truck to move the ballistic plates to the
        women’s apartment. So Perez eventually asked his girlfriend to
        allow officers to enter the apartment to seize the plates. She
        agreed, and on October 9, Perez notified Security Forces of where
        he suspected the plates could be found. Officers then went to the
        women’s apartment and recovered the plates and smoke grenades.
               In addition to evidence about the ballistic plates, combat hel-
        met, and smoke grenades, the government presented evidence of
        two plans by Valdez to steal other military equipment. First, John-
        son testified that, a few months before the plates went missing, Val-
        dez discussed with him, Perez, Prater, and Specialist Zachary
        Outen a detailed plan for stealing night-vision goggles from the
        camp’s staff duty desk: Valdez explained that someone could enter
        the building at 5:30 p.m.—when the desk would be unattended
        while the camp’s flag was being lowered—to take the goggles from
        the desk’s safe, and someone else could have a car waiting outside
        to go hide the goggles in the woods just off the camp’s grounds,
        marking the spot using cell phone GPS for later retrieval. Prater,
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        21-12489               Opinion of the Court                         7

        too, recalled Valdez saying he “want[ed] to try to take some” night-
        vision goggles; Prater didn’t know whether Valdez ever followed
        through, though.
               Second, Johnson testified that Valdez talked with him and
        Outen about a plan—but not “like a real plan”—to steal ammuni-
        tion. Outen testified that the men discussed, only hypothetically,
        “how easy it would be for anyone to get in” to the ammunition
        supply point, where “[s]ecurity . . . [wa]s minimal, at best.” Outen
        said “[t]here was a little more thought put into” the conversation
        about stealing night-vision goggles, but even then the idea was
        dropped within a week. According to Security Forces Investigator
        Barton Gonzalez, no night-vision goggles were ever reported miss-
        ing.
               At the conclusion of the three-day trial, a jury convicted Val-
        dez of theft of the ballistic plates. He was sentenced to five years
        of probation, including four months of home detention.
                            STANDARD OF REVIEW

               We, ordinarily, review a district court’s admission of rule
        404(b) prior-bad-acts evidence for a clear abuse of discretion.
        United States v. Elysee, 993 F.3d 1309, 1347 (11th Cir. 2021), cert.
        denied, 142 S. Ct. 2782 (2022) (citation omitted). The government
        suggests, however, that Valdez is entitled only to plain error review
        because he didn’t renew at trial his objections to the disputed evi-
        dence.
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        8                      Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

                The government relies on United States v. Brown, 665 F.3d
        1239 (11th Cir. 2011), but Brown, in turn, relies on a case applying
        a now-outdated version of the Federal Rules of Evidence. See id.
        at 1247 (citing United States v. Khoury, 901 F.2d 948, 966 (11th Cir.
        1990)). Rule 103 was amended in 2000 to add subsection (b):
        “Once the court rules definitively on the record—either before or
        at trial—a party need not renew an objection or offer of proof to
        preserve a claim of error for appeal.” Fed. R. Evid. 103(b) & advi-
        sory committee’s note to 2000 amendment. A district court rules
        definitively when it uses “decisive” (as opposed to equivocal or
        contingent) language to deny or overrule a motion in limine. See
        United States v. Wilson, 788 F.3d 1298, 1313 (11th Cir. 2015). So
        Valdez did not need to renew at trial any objection the district
        court resolved definitively pretrial.
               Valdez moved in limine to exclude evidence of the helmet,
        night-vision goggles, and ammunition, and the district court’s or-
        der denying Valdez’s motion was definitive. The district court con-
        cluded that the helmet-related evidence “satisfie[d] the [r]ule 404(b)
        standard for admissibility” and that evidence of Valdez’s plans to
        steal night-vision goggles and ammunition was likewise “relevant
        and admissible under [r]ule 404(b).” Accordingly, Valdez did not
        need to renew his objections to this evidence at trial, and an abuse
        of discretion standard applies.
              A plain error standard applies with respect to the smoke gre-
        nade evidence, though, because Valdez failed to preserve the issue
        by contemporaneous objection. See United States v. Guevara, 894
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        21-12489                Opinion of the Court                         9

        F.3d 1301, 1309 (11th Cir. 2018) (citation omitted). Valdez’s mo-
        tion in limine didn’t mention the smoke grenades, and he also
        failed to object at trial when witnesses testified about them—or
        when the district court admitted the grenades themselves, as well
        as photographs depicting them.
               A district court abuses its discretion when it “applies the
        wrong law, follows the wrong procedure, bases its decision on
        clearly erroneous facts, or commits a clear error in judgment.”
        United States v. Brown, 415 F.3d 1257, 1266 (11th Cir. 2005) (cita-
        tions omitted). Still, we will only reverse an erroneous evidentiary
        ruling if the resulting error was not harmless. United States v.
        Langford, 647 F.3d 1309, 1323 (11th Cir. 2011) (citation omitted);
        accord Fed. R. Crim. P. 52(a). “An error is harmless unless there is
        a reasonable likelihood that it affected the defendant’s substantial
        rights.” Langford, 647 F.3d at 1323 (quoting United States v.
        Hands, 184 F.3d 1322, 1329 (11th Cir. 1999)). Accordingly, we will
        not reverse “if sufficient evidence uninfected by any error supports
        the verdict, and the error did not have a substantial influence on
        the outcome of the case.” Id. (quoting (United States v. Khanani,
        502 F.3d 1281, 1292 (11th Cir. 2007)).
               “To demonstrate plain error, the defendant must show that
        there is ‘(1) error, (2) that is plain and (3) that affects substantial
        rights.’” Guevara, 894 F.3d at 1309 (quoting United States v.
        Turner, 474 F.3d 1265, 1276 (11th Cir. 2007)); accord Fed. R. Crim.
        P. 52(b). For an error to affect substantial rights, “the error must
        have been prejudicial: It must have affected the outcome of the
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        10                      Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

        district court proceedings.” United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725,
        734 (1993) (citations omitted). “If all three conditions are met, an
        appellate court may then exercise its discretion to notice a forfeited
        error, but only if (4) the error seriously affects the fairness, integ-
        rity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings.” Guevara, 894
        F.3d at 1309 (quoting Turner, 474 F.3d at 1276).
                                   DISCUSSION

               Although two different standards of review apply here, we
        discuss the challenged evidence together because we conclude
        that, even under the more Valdez-friendly abuse-of-discretion
        standard, the district court did not abuse its discretion in admitting
        the rule 404(b) evidence.
                Rule 404(b) prohibits the use of extrinsic “[e]vidence of any
        other crime, wrong, or act . . . to prove a person’s character in or-
        der to show that on a particular occasion the person acted in ac-
        cordance with the character” but permits such evidence for any
        other purpose, including “proving motive, opportunity, intent,
        preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, absence of mistake, or lack
        of accident.” Fed. R. Evid. 404(b)(1)–(2); United States v. Edouard,
        485 F.3d 1324, 1344 (11th Cir. 2007) (citation omitted). We apply a
        three-part test to analyze the admissibility of bad-acts evidence un-
        der rule 404(b): “(1) it must be relevant to an issue other than [the]
        defendant’s character; (2) there must be sufficient proof to enable
        a jury to find by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant
        committed the act(s) in question; and (3) the probative value of the
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        21-12489                Opinion of the Court                         11

        evidence cannot be substantially outweighed by undue prejudice,
        and the evidence must satisfy [r]ule 403.” Edouard, 485 F.3d at
        1344 (citation omitted). On appeal, Valdez disputes only the third
        prong of this test, arguing that the extrinsic evidence at issue “had
        little probative value to the charged offenses, while unduly preju-
        dicing the jury against” him.
                                   Probative value
                We assess prior-bad-acts evidence’s probative value by
        “evaluat[ing] the [g]overnment’s incremental need for the evi-
        dence to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, ‘the overall simi-
        larity of the extrinsic and the charged offenses[,] and the closeness
        or remoteness in time of the charged to the extrinsic offense.’”
        United States v. Ellisor, 522 F.3d 1255, 1268 (11th Cir. 2008) (quot-
        ing United States v. Parr, 716 F.2d 796, 805 (11th Cir. 1983)). “[I]f
        the government can do without such evidence, fairness dictates
        that it should; but if the evidence is essential to obtain a conviction,
        it may come in.” United States v. Calderon, 127 F.3d 1314, 1332
        (11th Cir. 1997) (quoting United States v. Pollock, 926 F.2d 1044,
        1048 (11th Cir. 1991)).
               Importantly, a defendant who pleads not guilty “makes in-
        tent a material issue which imposes a substantial burden on the
        government to prove intent . . . absent affirmative steps by the de-
        fendant to remove intent as an issue.” Edouard, 485 F.3d at 1345
        (quoting United States v. Zapata, 139 F.3d 1355, 1358 (11th Cir.
        1998)). And, “[b]ecause it is difficult to prove intent by direct evi-
        dence, it normally must be inferred from circumstantial evidence.”
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        12                      Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

        United States v. Hurley, 755 F.2d 788, 790 (11th Cir. 1985) (citation
        omitted). So, “[a] similarity between the other act and a charged
        offense will make the other offense highly probative with regard to
        a defendant’s intent in the charged offense.” United States v.
        Ramirez, 426 F.3d 1344, 1354 (11th Cir. 2005) (citation omitted);
        accord United States v. Baker, 432 F.3d 1189, 1205 (11th Cir. 2005)
        (“[W]e have generally held that if the extrinsic act requires the
        same intent as the charged offenses[,] and if these acts are proxi-
        mate in time to the charged offenses, then the extrinsic act is highly
        probative.” (cleaned up)).
               Here, the government had to prove beyond a reasonable
        doubt that Valdez knowingly and willfully intended to deprive the
        United States of the use or benefit of the ballistic plates. See Moris-
        sette v. United States, 342 U.S. 246, 263 (1952); United States v.
        McRee, 7 F.3d 976, 980 (11th Cir. 1993); Eleventh Circuit Pattern
        Jury Instructions (Criminal Cases) § O21 (2022). And Valdez
        pleaded not guilty, thereby making his intent a material issue
        which he did not affirmatively remove before or at trial. See Edou-
        ard, 485 F.3d at 1345.
               Evidence that Valdez knowingly and willfully deprived—or
        planned to deprive—the United States of other military equipment
        was highly probative of his intent with regard to the ballistic plates.
        The combat helmet, smoke grenade, night-vision goggles, and am-
        munition evidence was very similar to Valdez’s charged offense.
        All involved the actual or planned theft of high-value military
        equipment. Valdez removed both the smoke grenades and four of
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        21-12489               Opinion of the Court                      13

        the ballistic plates from Camp Rudder. The government intro-
        duced Valdez’s admissions (to Harshaney) that he did the same
        with the combat helmet—shipping it home to Kentucky—and that
        he planned to ship the plates back home too. As for the night-vision
        goggles, Valdez planned in detail how to get the equipment off-
        camp undetected, then mark its hiding spot for later retrieval. That
        same plan leveraged a vulnerability he’d spotted—the daily period
        when the duty desk was unmanned while the camp’s flag was low-
        ered—just like he leveraged his knowledge of “a back window that
        people left cracked all the time” to steal the ballistic plates. And
        Valdez’s plan to steal ammunition likewise leveraged a known vul-
        nerability: lax security at the ammunition supply point.
                The prior bad acts were also close in time to the charged
        offense. The smoke grenades were found with the ballistic plates.
        Harshaney estimated that Valdez told him he took the combat hel-
        met several months before the ballistic plates went missing. And
        although trial testimony didn’t pin down when the conversations
        about Valdez’s plans to steal night-vision goggles and ammunition
        occurred, Outen recalled Johnson and Prater being present for
        both. Johnson and Prater were assigned to Camp Rudder in No-
        vember 2018 and February 2019, respectively, meaning the conver-
        sations couldn’t have happened more than six months before the
        ballistic plates were stolen—well within time periods we’ve found
        sufficiently proximate for rule 404(b) purposes. See, e.g., Edouard,
        485 F.3d at 1345–46 (finding two years’ distance sufficient); United
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        14                      Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

        States v. Diaz-Lizaraza, 981 F.2d 1216, 1225 (11th Cir. 1993) (same);
        Ellisor, 522 F.3d at 1268 (three years).
                In short, the strong similarities between the prior bad acts
        and Valdez’s charged offense—coupled with the events’ temporal
        proximity—add up to evidence “highly probative” of Valdez’s in-
        tent to steal the ballistic plates. See Ramirez, 426 F.3d at 1354. Val-
        dez argues the evidence wasn’t essential to the government’s case
        at trial and so was nonetheless insufficiently probative to satisfy
        rule 404(b), citing the numerous witnesses who saw Valdez take
        the plates, heard him admit to doing so, saw the plates in his pos-
        session, or helped him move the plates to where they were even-
        tually found.
               But the government’s witnesses weren’t impervious to im-
        peachment. Cf. Calderon, 127 F.3d at 1332. Indeed, during his
        opening statement, Valdez urged the jury to critically assess the
        witnesses’ credibility—particularly given the lack of DNA evidence
        physically tying Valdez to the ballistic plates. Valdez hammered at
        the witnesses’ credibility on cross-examination too, challenging the
        accuracy of their memories and raising (particularly as to Sitzler
        and Johnson) their prior inconsistent statements and self-interest.
        And Valdez reinforced these credibility issues during his closing ar-
        gument, reminding the jury how key witnesses’ stories changed
        (sometimes repeatedly) and how self-interest may have led wit-
        nesses to minimize their own involvement in the charged offenses.
              At bottom, the government needed to prove that Valdez in-
        tended to deprive the United States of the ballistic plates, and
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        21-12489               Opinion of the Court                      15

        essentially all its evidence of intent came from witness testimony.
        But “[t]he jury was entitled to believe as much or as little of the
        witnesses’ testimony as it found credible.” United States v. Mat-
        thews, 431 F.3d 1296, 1312 (11th Cir. 2005). In light of Valdez’s
        substantial efforts to impugn the government witnesses’ credibility
        at trial, we conclude that the rule 404(b) evidence was sufficiently
        probative of Valdez’s intent to be admissible. Cf. United States v.
        Beechum, 582 F.2d 898, 917 (5th Cir. 1978) (en banc) (“Absent the
        credit card evidence, the issue would have been decided wholly by
        the jury’s assessment of the credibility of these witnesses. The
        Government, therefore, did not make out such a strong case of
        criminal intent that the credit card evidence would have been of
        little incremental probity. In fact, the credit card evidence may
        have been determinative.”).
                                 Undue prejudice
               To be admissible under rule 404(b), of course, the prior-bad-
        acts evidence’s probative value “cannot be substantially out-
        weighed by undue prejudice, and the evidence must satisfy [r]ule
        403.” Edouard, 485 F.3d at 1344 (citation omitted). Because “rule
        403 is an extraordinary remedy, which should be used only spar-
        ingly”—with the balance “struck in favor of admissibility”—we
        “look at the evidence in a light most favorable to its admission,
        maximizing its probative value and minimizing its undue prejudi-
        cial impact.” Id. at 1344 n.8 (cleaned up). “[T]he test under rule
        403 is whether the other acts evidence was dragged in by the heels
        solely for prejudicial impact.” Wilson, 788 F.3d at 1314 (quoting
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        16                     Opinion of the Court                 21-12489

        United States v. U.S. Infrastructure, Inc., 576 F.3d 1195, 1211 (11th
        Cir. 2009)). “[I]n a criminal trial relevant evidence is inherently
        prejudicial; it is only when unfair prejudice substantially outweighs
        probative value that [rule 403] permits exclusion.” United States v.
        Spoerke, 568 F.3d 1236, 1251 (11th Cir. 2009) (quoting United
        States v. King, 713 F.2d 627, 631 (11th Cir. 1983)). Moreover, “[a]
        limiting instruction can diminish any unfair prejudice caused by the
        evidence’s admission.” Brown, 665 F.3d at 1247 (citation omitted).
               Here, Valdez argues that the rule 404(b) evidence was
        “highly[] and unduly prejudicial,” contending that “the govern-
        ment encouraged the jury to draw [an] inference of criminal pro-
        pensity” and so “most likely the jury was enticed to draw the pro-
        hibited inference.” But Valdez mischaracterizes the government’s
        closing argument. The government told the jury it could use the
        prior-bad-acts evidence “in deciding whether he had the intent, the
        motive, the opportunity to commit the theft”—precisely the sort
        of non-propensity uses that rule 404(b) permits. More importantly,
        the rule 404(b) evidence was no more heinous or inflammatory
        than evidence related to theft of the ballistic plates themselves, and
        so the extrinsic evidence was unlikely to “incite the jury to an irra-
        tional decision.” See United States v. Mitchell, 666 F.2d 1385, 1390
        (11th Cir. 1982). Instead, to the extent the evidence was prejudicial,
        it was—like any relevant evidence—duly prejudicial because of the
        government’s need to prove intent. See Spoerke, 568 F.3d at 1251.
        At worst, then, the evidence’s unfair prejudice only matched its
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        21-12489               Opinion of the Court                      17

        probative value, rather than being “dragged in by the heels” for a
        purely prejudicial purpose. Wilson, 788 F.3d at 1314.
                Finally, the district court gave numerous limiting instruc-
        tions, both when the evidence was admitted and at the close of
        trial. These instructions—which cautioned the jury that it could
        (but wasn’t required to) consider the bad-acts evidence in deter-
        mining whether Valdez committed the charged offense “willfully,
        that is with bad purpose either to disobey or disregard the law, and
        knowingly, not because of an accident or mistake”—mitigated any
        undue prejudice caused by the evidence. Cf. United States v. Ster-
        ling, 738 F.3d 228, 237 (11th Cir. 2013) (“[W]e assume that the jury
        properly followed the court’s instructions.”). Because rule 404(b)
        excludes evidence only when its probative value is substantially
        outweighed by undue prejudice, we conclude that the district court
        did not err by admitting the challenged evidence here.
              AFFIRMED.