Court Opinion

ID: 9478936
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:03:18.243588+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:46:42.939858
License: Public Domain

KENNEDY, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur that there was a modification of Count III of the indictment which requires retrial. Because I believe that the evidence of five prior violent felonies was extremely prejudicial, I would also require a new trial on Counts I and II as well.
As pointed out by the majority, this Circuit has twice held that the indictment may charge more than one felony conviction and the government is not limited to establishing only a single conviction. In both of those cases there were only two prior convictions, not six as there are here. No interest of the government is served by the evidence of so many additional convictions. Prejudice to the defendant is clear, especially where five are of a violent nature. Convictions of that magnitude might well cause a jury to “feel that incarceration is justified because the accused is a ‘bad man’ without regard to his guilt of the crime currently charged.” Spencer v. Texas, 385 U.S. 554, 575, 87 S.Ct. 648, 659, 17 L.Ed.2d 606 (1967) (Warren, C.J., dissenting).
We recognized the prejudice in requiring evidence of three violent felonies in Brewer II. Had not the District Court believed that the government was required to prove three violent felonies to establish the elements of Count III, there is little likelihood that it would have admitted evidence of all six convictions. Under our supervisory responsibility I would find it an abuse of discretion to admit evidence of the six convictions to establish that the defendant was a convicted felon.