Court Opinion

ID: 9658605
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 21:06:13.842184+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:56.984788
License: Public Domain

VANDE WALLE, Justice,
concurring specially.
I concur in the result. Although it appears Tracy was attempting by implication to place responsibility for the heroin on Wayne, I agree that “a mere showing of some antagonism and prejudice is insufficient to require overturning a denial of severance by the district court ... to compel severance the defenses must be more than merely antagonistic — they must be antagonistic to the point of being mutually exclusive or irreconcilable.” United States v. Berkowitz, 662 F.2d 1127, 1133 (5th Cir.1981). Accord United States v. McClure, 734 F.2d 484, 488 (10th Cir.1984) [“mere conflicting defenses do not, standing alone, constitute the showing of prejudice necessary for judicial severance,” but “irreconcilable differences may require that defendants be tried separately.” Record failed to demonstrate even general antagonism toward each of them at trial and sole defense of defendants was not the guilt of the other. Neither defendant’s abstract assertions of innocence necessarily tended to prove the other guilty. Either, neither, or both defendants could have logically been convicted or acquitted. Both defendants asserted their innocence and the jury could have logically accepted both theories by laying blame on third person].
I do not join that portion of the opinion which aligns this Court with those jurisdictions which appear to hold that opposition to a severance motion must be renewed at the appropriate time during the trial to preserve the issue for appeal. Notwithstanding that renewal of the objection to severance is the preferable procedure for defense counsel to follow, I would not foreclose consideration of the issue on appeal in every instance in which the objection is not renewed.
LEVINE, J., concurs.