Court Opinion

ID: 9749613
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 16:53:51.04549+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:53.751084
License: Public Domain

NEWMAN, Associate Judge,
dissenting:
I cannot agree with the majority that Ware’s denial of drug sales to Officer *705Beckwith or anyone else on the day of his arrest “reasonably suggested” the government’s questions concerning the Dilaudid tablets found in his car.
The majority holds that it was permissible for the government to introduce otherwise inadmissible evidence that Dilaudid tablets were found in Ware’s car and bases its holding upon Ware’s testimony denying his involvement with the sale of drugs on the day of his arrest. In my view this holding misapplies the Havens rule.
As the majority points out, Ware testified as follows:
Q. Did you sell any pills or were you involved in the sale of any drugs with anybody else on that day?
A. No, Sir.
In the majority’s view, Ware’s “negative response to that question ... reasonably suggested questions about the presence of the seventeen Dilaudid tablets in the car.” Supra at 703. I disagree.
As I read the direct examination testimony relied upon by the majority, Ware was responding to a question about drug sales and about drug sales only. Having denied involvement in any drug sales that day, Ware opened the door to impeachment by way of any evidence in the government’s possession tending to show the opposite. Havens v. United States, 446 U.S. 620, 627-28, 100 S.Ct. 1912,1916-17, 64 L.Ed.2d 559 (1980). However, that is not what the majority approves today. Instead, the majority approves the introduction of evidence showing Ware’s possession of Dilaudid tablets. In my view, admission of this evidence exceeds the Havens rule.
Structurally, there are striking similarities between this ease and Havens; thus, a comparison of the two is enlightening. First, both men were charged with a pos-sessory offense along with another substantive offense. In Ware’s case, it was distribution of Dilaudid. In Havens’s case, it was importing and conspiring to import cocaine. Second, both men took the stand to deny participation or involvement in the non-possessory offense. Third, in both cases the government was permitted to introduce evidence to rebut the denial. However, when one looks closely at the type of evidence approved for impeachment purposes, the similarity between them abruptly ends.
On direct, Havens was asked whether he had had anything to do with his alleged accomplice’s smuggling operation, which had involved taping or wrapping cocaine around his body and the use of make-shift inner pockets made from patches cut from a T-shirt. Havens denied having anything to do with these operations. On cross, he was again asked about these operations, particularly the use of the make-shift pockets. Again Havens denied involvement. The government was then permitted to introduce evidence of his involvement with the preparation of the make-shift pockets to rebut his denial of such activity. The government was not, as the majority holds today, permitted to introduce evidence of Haven’s possession of cocaine to rebut his denial of engaging in smuggling.
Thus, in my view, Havens does not authorize anything more than the introduction of otherwise inadmissible evidence of a charge denied by the defendant, i.e., Havens denied the charge that he had participated in smuggling; the government was permitted to introduce evidence that he had participated in smuggling. Havens does not authorize what the majority permits today: the introduction of otherwise inadmissible evidence on a charge not denied by the defendant, i.e., Ware denied the charge that he had sold drugs to anyone on the day of his arrest; the majority permits the government to introduce evidence that he possessed Dilaudid tablets on the day of his arrest.
This misapplication of the Havens rule is made even more egregious, in my view, by the manner in which the jury was invited to use it. The jury had before it Ware’s denial that he had sold Dilaudid on that day and the government’s evidence that he had Dilaudid tablets in his car. However, between mere possession and distribution lies possession with intent to distribute. Thus, in order for the jury to view Ware’s possession as negating his denial of distribution, they also would have had to infer that his *706possession was possession with intent to distribute. In short, the jury was being asked to draw a double inference from Ware’s possession of the pills: first, that he possessed them with intent to distribute; second, that he did in fact sell them on that day. What a long way the majority has strayed from the way the evidence was used in Havens!
As I read Havens, the purpose of permitting the government to use otherwise inadmissible evidence to rebut a defendant’s testimony is to counter the defendant’s attempts to commit perjury and to preserve the truth-seeking process of the criminal trial. As the Court put it:
“[Fjorbidding the Government to impeach the [defendant’s] answers to these questions by using contrary and reliable evidence in its possession fails to take account of our cases, particularly Harris [v. New York, 401 U.S. 222, 91 S.Ct. 643, 28 L.Ed.2d 1 (1971)] and [Oregon v.] Hass [420 U.S. 714, 95 S.Ct. 1215, 43 L.Ed.2d 570 (1975)]. In both cases, the Court stressed the importance of arriving at the truth in criminal trials, as well as the defendant’s obligation to speak the truth in response to proper questions.
446 U.S. at 626, 100 S.Ct. at 1916. Thus, although Havens creates an exception to the exclusionary rule, it is a narrow exception created for the purpose of preventing perjury and safe-guarding the truth-seeking process of the criminal trial. In applying that exception, we must, in my view, remain faithful to both the letter and spirit of that purpose or risk undermining the exclusionary rule. Since, in my view, the majority does not do so, I dissent.