Court Opinion

ID: 9498509
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:19:34.15581+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:52.699733
License: Public Domain

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I do not agree that evidence of Chavis’s 1997 conviction of a drug crime was admissible to show intent (or, as the government has also argued, knowledge). Chavis’s defense was that although he was present at the scene of the drug sale, he did not supply the drugs at issue to Jefferson or Thompson. As the majority puts it, Chav-is claimed that “he was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.” His defense, then, is that the drugs were not his, not that he did not realize that drugs were involved. Although “[a] prior conviction may be relevant to show intent if the defendant concedes that he possessed the drugs but denies that he planned to distribute them, or if he denies knowing that the substance was contraband,” neither of those scenarios is presented here. United States v. Jones, 389 F.3d 753, 757-58 (7th Cir.2004). The analysis would be different, and intent or knowledge as discrete issues might be implicated, if Chavis had *673admitted to involvement in the transfer but asserted that he thought the stuff transferred was not crack cocaine but cough drops.
The government describes Chavis’s defense as an assertion “that he just happened to stumble upon the scene of a drug deal, and that someone just happened to hand him crack cocaine, but that he never intended to possess or distribute the crack.” This description is an attempt to shoehorn the prior conviction into the intent or knowledge exception by painting his defense (the drugs weren’t mine) as a lack of intent (I had them, but I wasn’t going to sell them) or a mistake (I thought they were cough drops). But again, Chav-is never claimed that he had mistakenly sold anything or that he was unaware of what crack cocaine looked like. As in Jones, the government here has failed to articulate how the prior conviction established specific intent or some other state of mind as a concept discrete from Chavis’s propensity to commit drug crimes. Id.
This, I think, is the essential point. To meet the test of Rule 404(b), there must be a showing that an issue has been joined as to intent, or another of the 404(b) categories, discrete from a showing of mere propensity. E.g., id. at 757 (“the government must affirmatively show why a particular prior conviction tends to show the more forward-looking fact of purpose or design, or volition to commit the new crime”); United States v. Macedo, 371 F.3d 957, 967 (7th Cir.2004) (“when a defendant is charged with a specific intent crime, such as possession with intent to distribute, we have reasoned that evidence of a past action is probative if used to establish an essential element of the crime charged”); United States v. Best, 250 F.3d 1084, 1091 (7th Cir.2001) (“evidence of prior convictions or other misconduct is not admissible to show that a defendant has a propensity to commit crime and that he acted in conformity with that propensity on the occasion in question”). It is not enough that one or more of these categories (like specific intent) be a formal element of the crime. These categories must be discretely placed in issue to be a basis of 404(b) relevance. If not, the only plausible reason for introducing prior conviction evidence is to show propensity. The prior convictions tell the jury in fairly blatant terms that a defendant is not to be believed when he says the drugs were not his because he has done it before. This evidence, then, violates basic principles of criminal justice. Jones, 389 F.3d at 757.
Although I believe that there is error here as to the 404(b) issue, the other evidence is more than sufficient to support the judgment. I therefore join the majority in all but Part II.A.1 of the opinion.