Court Opinion

ID: 9474722
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:07:01.218577+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:17.880204
License: Public Domain

ORDER DENYING PETITION FOR REHEARING
The defendant has filed a forceful petition to rehear attacking the Court’s intellectual honesty in sustaining the conviction in the court below. The Court remains unconvinced that the conviction should be reversed.
In response to the defendant’s insistence that Brown’s testimony concerning Castile’s prior arson is inadmissible, we would point out that the issue at trial was whether White sought Castile’s help in burning his neighbor’s house. White’s knowledge of Castile’s previous conduct gives rise to an inference that this knowledge prompted White to seek Castile’s help which in turn supports a second inference that they joined together to cause the arson. Thus, White’s knowledge of Castile’s past gives rise to an inference, when combined with other evidence, that the two did in fact commit the crime. “Knowledge” under rule 404(b) may be of a fact that is part of a chain of inferences that tends to prove an element of the offense.
Similarly, the check kiting and American Express fraud tend to show that White and Castile owed each other favors which would lead them to cooperate with each other in the crime charged.
Fed.R.Crim.P. 52 admonishes the Courts of Appeals to sustain the judgment of the trial court in criminal cases unless a substantial error has been made which would affect the outcome of the criminal trial. Our review of the record, and reconsideration of the case upon petition to rehear, convinces us that no such serious error was committed which affected the outcome of the trial.
Accordingly, the petition to rehear is denied.