United States v. James and Mallay, No. 09-2732 (2d Cir. 2013)
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Defendants James and Mallay appealed from judgments of conviction based on their participation in a wide-ranging conspiracy that involved fraudulently obtained life insurance policies for members of their extended families and others in the Guyanese and Guyanese-American community, and, in several instances, murder of the insured to collect on those policies. The court found no error in the admission of an autopsy report and a toxicology report; there was no error in the district court's decision to exclude the prosecutor's rebuttal statement in a prior, related trial; the district court did not abuse its discretion in disallowing as impeachment evidence certain statements made by a witness; the district court's denial of James' severance motion did not warrant vacatur of the verdict; there was no Sixth Amendment violation in the admission of surreptitious recordings made by a government informant; it was proper to admit that recording; there was no error in denying a motion for a new trial; and there was no cumulative error. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on May 1, 2013.
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09-2732-cr (L) United States v. James and Mallay 1 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 2 FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT 3 August Term, 2011 4 5 (Argued: October 3, 2011; Final submission: July 16, 2012;* Decided: March 28, 2013) 6 Docket Nos. 09-2732-cr (Lead), 09-2804-cr (Con) 7 ------------------------------------- 8 United States, 9 Appellee, 10 - v - 11 Richard James and Ronald Mallay, 12 Defendants-Appellants. 13 ------------------------------------- 14 Before: SACK and RAGGI, Circuit Judges, and EATON, Judge.** 15 Appeal from judgments of the United States District 16 Court for the Eastern District of New York (Sterling Johnson, 17 Judge) convicting defendants on various counts of an indictment 18 including murder, mail fraud, and murder in aid of racketeering, 19 and imposing mandatory life sentences. 20 admission of an autopsy report and a toxicology report without 21 the presence of the individuals who prepared those reports We find no error in the * The Court's consideration of this appeal was suspended pending the Supreme Court's decision in Williams v. Illinois, 132 S. Ct. 2221 (2012), and the parties' subsequent supplemental briefing directed to the significance, if any, of that decision here. ** Judge Richard K. Eaton of the United States Court of International Trade, sitting by designation. 1 inasmuch as they were not testimonial statements because they 2 were not made with the primary purpose of creating a record for 3 use at a criminal trial, and therefore did not require that the 4 defendants have the opportunity to confront the authors of the 5 reports. 6 district court's decision to exclude the prosecutor's rebuttal 7 statement in a prior, related trial; the district court did not 8 abuse its discretion in disallowing as impeachment evidence 9 statements made by a cooperating witness outside of the jury's We further conclude that: there was no error in the 10 presence; the district court's denial of defendant Richard 11 James's severance motion did not warrant vacatur of the verdict; 12 there was no Sixth Amendment violation in the admission of 13 surreptitious recordings made by a government informant; it was 14 proper to admit that recording as a co-conspirator statement 15 against defendant Mallay; there was no error in denying a motion 16 for a new trial based upon post-trial allegations of 17 prosecutorial misconduct; and there was no cumulative error 18 warranting reversal. 19 Affirmed. Judge Eaton concurs in a separate opinion. 20 21 22 23 24 JAMES G. McGOVERN, Susan Corkery, Robert L. Capers, for Loretta E. Lynch, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Brooklyn, New York, for Appellee. 25 26 STEVE ZISSOU, Esq., Bayside, New York, for Defendant-Appellant Richard James. 27 28 29 MICHAEL K. BACHRACH, Esq., New York, New York, for Defendant-Appellant Ronald Mallay. 2 1 SACK, Circuit Judge: 2 Richard James and Ronald Mallay appeal from judgments 3 of conviction based on their participation in a wide-ranging 4 conspiracy that involved fraudulently obtained life insurance 5 policies for members of their extended families and others in the 6 Guyanese and Guyanese-American community, and, in several 7 instances, murder of the insured in order to collect on those 8 policies. 9 10 BACKGROUND After a jury trial in the United States District Court 11 for the Eastern District of New York (Sterling Johnson, Judge), 12 James and Mallay were each sentenced to mandatory terms of life 13 in prison after they were convicted of racketeering, in violation 14 of 18 U.S.C. § 1962(c); racketeering conspiracy, in violation of 15 18 U.S.C. § 1962(d); murder in aid of racketeering, in violation 16 of 18 U.S.C. § 1959(a)(1); conspiracy to commit murder in aid of 17 racketeering, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1959(a)(5); mail fraud, 18 in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1341; conspiracy to commit mail 19 fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371; and conspiracy to commit 20 money laundering, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1956(h). 21 addition, Mallay was convicted of murder for hire and conspiracy 22 to commit murder for hire, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1958. 23 James was also convicted of attempted murder for hire, in 24 violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1958, and solicitation of murder in aid 25 of racketeering, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 373 and 1959(a)(1). 3 In 1 These charges revolved around the murders of four people: Vernon 2 Peter, Alfred Gobin, Hardeo Sewnanan, and Basdeo Somaipersaud. 3 While Mallay was charged in relation to all four murders, James 4 was charged in connection with only the murders of Sewnanan and 5 Somaipersaud. 6 had been charged; James was convicted on all counts with which he 7 had been charged, with the exception of those alleging conspiracy 8 and murder for hire in connection with the deaths of Sewnanan and 9 Somaipersaud. Mallay was convicted on every count with which he The defendants were eligible for the death 10 penalty, but because the jury was unable to reach a unanimous 11 verdict as to that punishment, a sentence of life imprisonment 12 was imposed. 13 On appeal, the defendants do not contest the 14 sufficiency of the evidence of insurance fraud. The issues on 15 these appeals relate largely to the convictions of the defendants 16 for committing four murders that were allegedly part of this 17 scheme, and particularly the murders of Sewnanan and 18 Somaipersaud, both of whom were poisoned to death. 19 we review only that evidence necessary to explain our decision to 20 affirm all counts of conviction. 21 Vernon Peter 22 In 1991, Mallay was convicted of theft from the postal Accordingly, 23 service, for which he worked as a postal carrier, and sentenced 24 to 15 months' imprisonment. 25 States v. James, No. 02 Cr 0778, 2009 WL 763612, at *1, 2009 U.S. 26 Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *3 (E.D.N.Y. Mar. 18, 2009) ("James I"). See Memorandum & Order, United 4 1 While Mallay was incarcerated, his mother died of a heart attack. 2 Id. 3 husband, Vernon Peter, known as "Dilly." 4 sister, Betty Peter, to keep Dilly's life insurance current 5 because he planned to get even. 6 23706, at *4. 7 asked his nephew Baskinand Motillal if he would kill Dilly for 8 Mallay. 9 declined but introduced Mallay to another person, to whom Mallay Mallay blamed his arrest and conviction on his sister's Id. He told his Id., 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS In 1993, after Mallay was released from prison, he Id. at *2, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *4. Motillal 10 paid $10,000 to commit the crime. 11 with which to purchase a weapon. 12 recruited three others to help him carry out the murder. 13 the morning of July 28, 1993, the four murdered Dilly as he 14 walked out of his home. 15 He also gave that person $500 Id. That person in turn Id. On Id. Betty Peter collected $400,000 on an insurance policy 16 on Dilly's life. Id., 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *5. 17 then loaned at least $60,000 of those proceeds to Mallay.1 18 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *5. 19 Id., Alfred Gobin 20 She In September 1993, Mallay met with James, then an 21 insurance agent with MetLife, and Gulabie Gobin, Mallay's 1 Betty Peter and Baskinand Motillal's trials were severed from James and Mallay's trial. Peter was convicted of charges including obstructing the investigation into the murder of her husband in aid of racketeering, and sentenced principally to 60 months' imprisonment. United States v. James, 322 F. App'x 32, 32-33 (2d Cir. 2009). Peter cooperated with the government subsequent to her conviction, and testified at the trial leading to the convictions appealed here. Id. at 35. 5 1 longtime mistress. Id., 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *6. 2 James and Mallay persuaded Gobin to take out two insurance 3 policies on her father, Alfred Gobin, who was murdered in Guyana 4 in January 1996. 5 $200,000 from the policies, and lent James and Mallay nearly 6 $60,000. Id. Gulabie and her family received more than Id. 7 Basdeo Somaipersaud 8 James encouraged a friend of his, Satyanand Arjun, to 9 purchase an insurance policy on the life of Somaipersaud, a heavy 10 drinker who sometimes lived with Arjun. 11 LEXIS 23706, at *6-*7. 12 $100,000 policy on Somaipersaud's life, with double indemnity if 13 Somaipersaud died accidentally. 14 beneficiary. 15 Id., 2009 U.S. Dist. In October 1994, James obtained a It named James's sister as a Id. During the fall of 1997, James offered $10,000 to 16 Kenrick Hassan, a member of James's extended family, to kill 17 Somaipersaud. 18 January 23, 1998, Somaipersaud was found dead in a park in the 19 Borough of Queens, New York City. 20 the Chief Medical Examiner ("OCME") determined that Somaipersaud 21 had died of acute alcoholism in combination with a dose of the 22 drug chlorpromazine.2 Id. Although Hassan declined the offer, on Id. The New York City Office of James contacted Arjun to tell him of 2 Chlorpromazine [brand name: Thorazine] is used to "[t]reat[] mental disorders, severe behavior disorders, severe hiccups, severe nausea and vomiting, and certain types of porphyria. . . ." See PubMed Health, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMHT0009582/?report=deta ils (last visited Mar. 22, 2013). 6 1 Somaipersaud's death, which Arjun found surprising because he was 2 not aware of any connection between James and Somaipersaud and 3 because he had not spoken to James since he had purchased the 4 insurance policy. 5 insurance payments as a result of Somaipersaud's death. Id. James's girlfriend and Arjun received Id. 6 Hardeo Sewnanan 7 In October 1996, James arranged for the purchase of two 8 $250,000 life insurance policies for Hardeo Sewnanan, who was 9 Mallay's nephew, with Betty Peter, Mallay's wife, and Mallay's 10 mistress's daughter named as beneficiaries. 11 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *8. 12 address with the defendant Ronald Mallay, paid the premiums on 13 the policy. 14 kill Sewnanan, who again declined to do so. 15 Mallay in touch with Kenrick's brother, Derick Hassan. 16 Mallay traveled to Guyana to meet with Derick, paying him $10,000 17 to kill Sewnanan. 18 so. 19 commit the murder. 20 Id. Id. Id., at *3, 2009 William Mallay, who shared an In 1999, Ronald Mallay asked Kenrick Hassan to This time he put Id. But Derick Hasan ultimately decided not to do Mallay later told Derick that he had hired others to Id. On January 8, 1999, Sewnanan died in Guyana of what the 21 Guyanese medical examiner determined to be ammonia poisoning. 22 Id.; see also Memorandum & Order, United States v. James, No. 02 23 Cr 0778, 2007 WL 2702449, at *1, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 67538, at 24 *2 (E.D.N.Y. Sept. 12, 2007) ("James II"). Mallay collected 25 $400,000 on the policy on Sewnanan's life. James I, 2009 WL 26 763612, at *3, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *8. 7 1 Appeals 2 The defendants raise eight separate issues on their 3 appeals: First, whether a new trial is required based on the 4 district court's error under the Sixth Amendment s Confrontation 5 Clause in admitting forensic reports relating to the deaths of 6 Sewnanan and Somaipersaud -- specifically, the issues are whether 7 one member of the OCME was properly allowed to testify regarding 8 an autopsy conducted by another member of that office in which 9 the witness had not participated, and whether a medical examiner 10 from Guyana was properly allowed to testify to the results of 11 toxicology tests which he had ordered but did not conduct; 12 second, whether the district court erred in excluding the 13 prosecution's statement in the prior criminal trial of Betty 14 Peter, a cooperating witness in the current trial, suggesting 15 greater culpability on her part for Vernon Peter's murder; third, 16 whether the district court abused its discretion in refusing to 17 permit the defendants to impeach Betty Peter's testimony with 18 prior inconsistent statements; fourth, whether James is entitled 19 to a new trial because the district court's refusal to order 20 severance deprived him of a fair trial; fifth, whether the 21 defendants had been deprived of a fair trial because of the 22 district court's refusal to suppress statements elicited from 23 James by a government informant after James's indictment; sixth, 24 whether the district court erred in admitting, against Mallay as 25 a coconspirator, recorded statements of James made 26 surreptitiously by a third party; seventh, whether the district 8 1 court erred in denying a new trial based on allegations by a 2 cooperating witness of prosecutorial misconduct and coercion; and 3 eighth, whether there has been cumulative error sufficient to 4 warrant a new trial. 5 DISCUSSION 6 I. The Confrontation Clause 7 The defendants raise two separate Confrontation Clause 8 issues on their appeals. First, they contend that one member of 9 the OCME could not constitutionally have been permitted to 10 testify as to the results of Somaipersaud's autopsy, which was 11 conducted by another member of that office. 12 that allowing the Guyanese medical examiner who conducted 13 Sewnanan's autopsy to testify to the results of forensic tests 14 conducted by a colleague ran afoul of the Confrontation Clause. 15 Second, they urge The Sixth Amendment provides, among other things, that 16 "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the 17 right . . . to be confronted with the witnesses against him." 18 U.S. Const. amend. VI. 19 jurisprudence has changed considerably since the Supreme Court's 20 decision in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004). 21 after Crawford, however, this court reaffirmed its settled 22 holding that autopsy reports could be admitted as business 23 records without violating the Confrontation Clause. 24 States v. Feliz, 467 F.3d 227, 230 (2d Cir. 2006). 25 urge us to reconsider this precedent in light of Supreme Court The landscape of Confrontation Clause 9 Even See United Defendants 1 decisions since Feliz limning the contours of what constitutes a 2 "testimonial" statement in the context of a laboratory analysis. 3 See Bullcoming v. New Mexico, 131 S. Ct. 2705 (2011); Melendez- 4 Diaz v. Massachusetts, 557 U.S. 305 (2009). 5 even if these cases cast doubt on any categorical designation of 6 certain forensic reports as admissible in all cases, the autopsy 7 reports in this case are nevertheless not testimonial - and 8 therefore do not implicate the Confrontation Clause - because 9 they were not created "for the purpose of establishing or proving We conclude that 10 some fact at trial." Melendez-Diaz, 557 U.S. at 324; see also 11 Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2719-20 (Sotomayor, J., concurring) 12 ("When the 'primary purpose' of a statement is 'not to create a 13 record for trial,' 'the admissibility of the statement is the 14 concern of state and federal rules of evidence, not the 15 Confrontation Clause.'" (quoting Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1155)). 16 A. Confrontation Clause post-Crawford 17 In Crawford, the Court considered whether a tape- 18 recorded statement to police made by the wife of a man being 19 prosecuted for stabbing another man could be entered into 20 evidence against the alleged perpetrator even though he had no 21 opportunity to cross-examine the witness. 22 compelled to testify against her husband under the state's 23 marital privilege. 24 She could not be The Court's analysis relied heavily on the 25 Confrontation Clause's historical background. 26 explained that the Confrontation Clause was designed to protect 10 The Court 1 against the "principal evil" of using ex parte statements against 2 the accused. 3 inquiry should focus not on reliability as contemplated by the 4 law of evidence, but on the witnesses against the accused - in 5 other words, those who bear testimony. See id. at 51. 6 Crawford Court determined that the statement at issue was 7 "testimonial," having been made against an identified suspect 8 while the witness herself was in police custody, and therefore 9 either confrontation, or unavailability and a prior opportunity Id. at 50. Thus, the proper Confrontation Clause 10 for cross-examination, was required. 11 Court "le[ft] for another day any effort to spell out a 12 comprehensive definition of 'testimonial,'" to which its rule 13 applied. 14 covers, it applies at a minimum to prior testimony at a 15 preliminary hearing, before a grand jury, or at a former trial; 16 and to police interrogations. 17 with the closest kinship to the abuses at which the Confrontation 18 Clause was directed."3 Id. at 68. Id. at 65-66. The But the In any event, "[w]hatever else the term These are the modern practices Id. 3 Elsewhere in Crawford, the Court offered a more complete definition of "testimonial": Various formulations of this core class of "testimonial" statements exist: ex parte in-court testimony or its functional equivalent - that is, material such as affidavits, custodial examinations, prior testimony that the defendant was unable to cross-examine, or similar pretrial statements that declarants would reasonably expect to be used prosecutorially . . . extrajudicial statements . . . contained in formalized testimonial materials, such as affidavits, 11 1 In Feliz, we concluded, in light of Crawford, that 2 "autopsy reports are not testimonial . . . and, thus, do not come 3 within the ambit of the Confrontation Clause[.]" 4 at 229. 5 similar to those raised here - one member of the OCME testified 6 as to the findings of another member, and the testifying medical 7 examiner had not participated in the autopsy at issue. 8 remarked upon the sea change that Crawford brought about, but 9 reasoned that it had "declined to 'spell out a comprehensive Feliz, 467 F.3d We examined a situation raising issues strikingly Id. We 10 definition of 'testimonial.'" Feliz, 467 F.3d at 232 (quoting 11 Crawford, 541 U.S. at 68). 12 that a statement produced through the 'involvement of government 13 officers' and with an 'eye towards trial' is testimonial because 14 it 'presents a unique potential for prosecutorial abuse - a fact 15 borne out time and again through a history with which the Framers 16 were keenly familiar.'" 17 Crawford, 541 U.S. at 56 n.7) (brackets omitted). 18 that among the classes of statements that Crawford concluded Crawford, we explained, "indicated Feliz, 467 F.3d at 232 (quoting We observed depositions, prior testimony, or confessions; [and] statements that were made under circumstances which would lead an objective witness reasonably to believe that the statement would be available for use at a later trial. These formulations all share a common nucleus and then define the Clause's coverage at various levels of abstraction around it. Regardless of the precise articulation, some statements qualify under any definition -- for example, ex parte testimony at a preliminary hearing. Id. at 51-52 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). 12 1 would be testimonial were those "made under circumstances which 2 would lead an objective witness reasonably to believe that the 3 statement would be available for use at a later trial." 4 233 (quoting Crawford, 467 F.3d at 52). 5 Id. at We concluded that autopsy reports would nonetheless be 6 admissible as business records under Federal Rule of Evidence 7 803(6) because "a business record is fundamentally inconsistent 8 with what the Supreme Court has suggested comprise the defining 9 characteristics of testimonial evidence." Feliz, 467 F.3d at 10 233-34. 11 business records to be kept in the regular course of a business 12 activity, records created in anticipation of litigation do not 13 fall within its definition." 14 Because the business records exception "requires Id. at 234. We rejected the argument that "autopsy reports must be 15 testimonial because a medical examiner preparing such a report 16 must have a reasonable expectation the reports may be available 17 for use in a subsequent trial." 18 did not opt for an expansive definition [of testimonial] that 19 depended on a declarant's expectations," we said, "we are 20 hesitant to do so here." 21 records fell outside Crawford's definition of testimonial "even 22 where the declarant is aware that it may be available for later 23 use at trial," Feliz, 467 F.3d at 236, and that autopsy reports 24 were business records within the meaning of Rule 803(6), as 25 thousands of autopsies were conducted every year "without regard 26 to the likelihood of their use at trial." Id. Id. at 236. 13 Because "the Supreme Court We concluded that business Id. We further 1 concluded that autopsy reports would be equally admissible as 2 public, rather than business, records because Rule 803(8)(A)-(B), 3 which defines public records, excludes documents prepared in 4 anticipation of litigation and matters observed by police 5 officers. 6 records, like business records, 'bear[] little resemblance to the 7 civil-law abuses the Confrontation Clause targeted.'" 8 (quoting Crawford, 541 U.S. at 51). 9 Id. at 237. "These factors suggest that public Id. In 2009, however, the Supreme Court cast doubt on our 10 post-Crawford jurisprudence in this area. In Melendez-Diaz v. 11 Massachusetts, 557 U.S. 305 (2009), the Court concluded that 12 "certificates of analysis" identifying a seized substance as an 13 illicit drug should not have been introduced against the 14 defendant absent an opportunity for the defendant to confront the 15 person who prepared the certificate. 16 reached this conclusion in part because the certificates "are 17 quite plainly affidavits: declarations of facts written down and 18 sworn to by the declarant before an officer authorized to 19 administer oaths." 20 omitted). 21 live, in-court testimony, doing 'precisely what a witness does on 22 direct examination.'" 23 Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 830 (2006)). 24 that the analysts were aware of the affidavits' evidentiary 25 purpose, since that purpose - as stated in the relevant state- 26 law provision - was reprinted on the affidavits themselves." The Melendez-Diaz Court Id. at 310 (internal quotation marks "The 'certificates' are functionally identical to Id. at 310-11 (quoting Davis v. 14 "We can safely assume 1 Id. at 311. 2 comprehensive definition of testimonial. 3 The Court once again declined to spell out a The Melendez-Diaz Court rejected the government's 4 argument that the evidence should be admitted because it was a 5 business record - the hearsay exception upon which we relied in 6 Feliz - because that exception had never applied "if the 7 regularly conducted business activity is the production of 8 evidence for use at trial." 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Id. at 321. The Court concluded: Business and public records are generally admissible absent confrontation, not because they qualify under an exception to the hearsay rules, but because -- having been created for the administration of an entity's affairs and not for the purpose of establishing or proving some fact at trial -they are not testimonial. Whether or not they qualify as business or official records, the analysts' statements here -- prepared specifically for use at petitioner's trial -were testimony against petitioner, and the analysts were subject to confrontation under the Sixth Amendment. 23 24 25 Id. at 324. 26 for "disregard[ing] a century of jurisprudence" in favor of 27 "formalistic and wooden rules, divorced from precedent, common 28 sense, and the underlying purpose of the Clause." 29 (Kennedy, J., dissenting). 30 at issue did not implicate the Confrontation Clause, Justice 31 Kennedy asserted: 32 33 34 35 Justice Kennedy, in dissent, criticized the majority Id. at 330-31 In explaining why the analyst reports First, a conventional witness recalls events observed in the past, while an analyst's report contains near-contemporaneous observations of the test. . . . Second, an 15 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 analyst observes neither the crime nor any human action related to it. . . . The analyst's distance from the crime and the defendant, in both space and time, suggests the analyst is not a witness against the defendant in the conventional sense. Third, a conventional witness responds to questions under interrogation. . . . Put differently, out-of-court statements should only "require confrontation if they are produced by, or with the involvement of, adversarial government officials responsible for investigating or prosecuting crime." 14 Id. at 345-46 (quoting Carolyn Zabrycki, Comment, Toward a 15 Definition of "Testimonial": How Autopsy Reports Do Not Embody 16 the Qualities of a Testimonial Statement, 96 Cal. L. Rev. 1093, 17 1118 (2008)). In Bullcoming v. New Mexico, 131 S. Ct. 2705 (2011), 18 19 the question presented was whether a "certificate of analyst" 20 containing the results of a blood-alcohol test administered 21 pursuant to a DUI arrest required the testimony of the analyst 22 who conducted the gas chromatograph test. 23 trial court had admitted the test as a business record, and 24 allowed its introduction through the testimony of "an analyst who 25 did not sign the certification or personally perform or observe 26 the performance of the test reported in the certification." 27 at 2713. 28 nontestimonial: 29 30 31 32 33 34 Id. at 2710-11. The Id. The Court rejected the suggestion that the report was In all material respects, the laboratory report in this case resembles those in Melendez-Diaz. Here, as in Melendez-Diaz, a law-enforcement officer provided seized evidence to a state laboratory required by law to assist in police investigations. Like 16 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 the analysts in Melendez-Diaz, [the analyst] tested the evidence and prepared a certificate concerning the result of his analysis. Like the Melendez-Diaz certificate, [the certificate here] is "formalized" in a signed document. . . . In sum, the formalities attending the "report of blood alcohol analysis" are more than adequate to qualify [the analyst's] assertions as testimonial. Id. at 2717 (citations omitted). Justice Sotomayor concurred, relying largely on a 13 Confrontation Clause opinion she had written earlier in the term 14 in Michigan v. Bryant, 131 S. Ct. 1143 (2011) (concluding that 15 statements made by a dying man to police could be admitted 16 without requiring confrontation). 17 is testimonial, we must decide whether it has 'a primary purpose 18 of creating an out-of-court substitute for trial testimony.' 19 When the 'primary purpose' of a statement is 'not to create a 20 record for trial,' 'the admissibility of the statement is the 21 concern of the state and federal rules of evidence, not the 22 Confrontation Clause.'" 23 (Sotomayor, J., concurring) (quoting Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1155). 24 Noting that Bullcoming was "not a case in which the State 25 suggested an alternate purpose, much less an alternate primary 26 purpose, for the BAC report," such as to provide for medical 27 treatment, Justice Sotomayor concluded that the primary purpose 28 "is clearly to serve as evidence" and its introduction without 29 confrontation was therefore in error. "To determine if a statement Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2720 17 Id. at 2722-23. 1 Last term, in Williams v. Illinois, 132 S. Ct. 2221 2 (2012), the Court returned to consideration of the Confrontation 3 Clause, this time to determine whether it was a violation to 4 allow an expert to testify in a rape case that "a DNA profile 5 produced by an outside laboratory, Cellmark, matched a profile 6 produced by the state police lab using a sample of petitioner's 7 blood." 8 astray when she referred to the DNA profile provided by Cellmark 9 as having been produced from semen found on the victim's vaginal Id. at 2227. The defendant argued that the expert "went 10 swabs," even though she did not conduct or observe any of the 11 work that Cellmark had done in deducing a male DNA profile. 12 at 2227, 2230. 13 constituted a testimonial statement in this context, however, 14 issuing a plurality opinion, two concurrences, and a dissent. 15 Id. The Court came to no clear consensus as to what The plurality opinion by Justice Alito, joined by Chief 16 Justice Roberts, Justice Kennedy, and Justice Breyer -- the 17 dissenters in Melendez-Diaz and Bullcoming -- concluded that the 18 testimony did not run afoul of the Confrontation Clause using two 19 separate paths. 20 accepted that an expert witness may voice an opinion based on 21 facts concerning the events at issue in a particular case even if 22 the expert lacks first-hand knowledge of those facts." 23 2233. 24 an opinion on facts that are 'made known to the expert at or 25 before the hearing,'" even if those facts themselves are First, it noted that "[i]t has long been Id. at Under the Illinois and federal rules, "an expert may base 18 1 inadmissible. 2 Evid. 703). 3 Id. at 2234 (quoting Ill. R. Evid. 703; Fed. R. While in a jury trial the expert would be prohibited 4 from disclosing those underlying facts, in a bench trial, such as 5 that in Williams, the judge would be trusted to understand that 6 those facts were not offered for their truth. 7 The plurality concluded that "it is clear that the putatively 8 offending phrase . . . was not admissible for the purpose of 9 proving the truth of the matter asserted," and "there is no Id. at 2234-35. 10 reason to think that the trier of fact took [the testimony] as 11 substantive evidence to establish where the DNA profiles came 12 from." 13 origin of the DNA profile, and because the trial judge was 14 presumed not to have considered the evidence for its truth, the 15 plurality concluded that there had been no Confrontation Clause 16 violation. 17 and Melendez-Diaz, "there is no question" but that the test 18 results were offered for their truth, whereas in Williams, the 19 report was offered "only for the distinctive and limited purpose 20 of seeing whether it matched something else." 21 (internal quotation marks omitted). 22 Id. at 2237. Because other evidence also established the Id. at 2240. The plurality noted that in Bullcoming Id. at 2240 The plurality next considered whether, even if the 23 testimony had been offered for its truth, there would have been 24 no Confrontation Clause violation. 25 has identified as prompting the adoption of the Confrontation 26 Clause shared the following two characteristics: (a) they 19 "The abuses that the Court 1 involved out-of-court statements having the primary purpose of 2 accusing a targeted individual of engaging in criminal conduct 3 and (b) they involved formalized statements such as affidavits, 4 depositions, prior testimony, or confessions." 5 plurality asserted that "[t]he Cellmark report is very different 6 from the sort of extrajudicial statements, such as affidavits, 7 depositions, prior testimony, and confessions, that the 8 Confrontation Clause was originally understood to reach. 9 report was produced before any suspect was identified. Id. at 2242. The The The 10 report was sought not for the purpose of obtaining evidence to be 11 used against petitioner, who was not even under suspicion at the 12 time, but for the purpose of finding a rapist who was on the 13 loose." 14 of the report did not run afoul of the Confrontation Clause 15 because these purposes were not of the same type that the clause 16 had been enacted to protect against. 17 Id. at 2228. The plurality concluded that the admission Id. In a concurring opinion, Justice Breyer said that he 18 would have set the case for reargument in order to answer the 19 question of what constitutes a "testimonial statement" with 20 regard to "the panoply of crime laboratory reports and underlying 21 technical statements written by (or otherwise made by) laboratory 22 technicians." 23 criticized the Court's evolving Confrontation Clause 24 jurisprudence as offering "no logical stopping place between 25 requiring the prosecution to call as a witness one of the 26 laboratory experts who worked on the matter and requiring the Id. at 2244-45 (Breyer, J., concurring). 20 He 1 prosecution to call all of the laboratory experts who did so." 2 Id. at 2246 (emphasis in original). 3 Justice Breyer did not himself offer a comprehensive 4 definition of testimonial, but said he would continue to adhere 5 to the dissenting views in Bullcoming and Melendez-Diaz. 6 need for cross-examination is considerably diminished when the 7 out-of-court statement was made by an accredited laboratory 8 employee operating at a remove from the investigation in the 9 ordinary course of professional work." Id. at 2249. "[T]he Justice 10 Breyer asserted that "to bar admission of the out-of-court 11 records at issue here could undermine, not fortify, the accuracy 12 of factfinding at a criminal trial," because it would potentially 13 bar autopsy reports: 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Autopsies, like the DNA report in this case, are often conducted when it is not yet clear whether there is a particular suspect or whether the facts found in the autopsy will ultimately prove relevant in a criminal trial. Autopsies are typically conducted soon after death. And when, say, a victim's body has decomposed, repetition of the autopsy may not be possible. What is to happen if the medical examiner dies before trial? Is the Confrontation Clause effectively to function as a statute of limitations for murder? Id. at 2251 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). Justice Breyer proposed as a solution a rebuttable 29 presumption that DNA reports of the type at issue be admissible, 30 with the defendant able to call the technician if he would choose 31 to do so, or to require confrontation upon a showing of a reason 32 to doubt the laboratory's competence or honesty. 21 Id. at 2251-52. 1 Justice Thomas concurred only in the judgment, and, 2 consistent with his prior opinions on the subject, did so because 3 the Cellmark report "lacks the solemnity of an affidavit or 4 deposition, for it is neither a sworn nor a certified declaration 5 of fact. 6 accurately reflect the DNA testing processes used or the results 7 obtained." 8 Further, Justice Thomas explicitly rejected the plurality's 9 requirement that the primary purpose of the statements concern a Nowhere does the report attest that its statements Id. at 2260 (Thomas, J., concurring in the judgment). 10 targeted individual, noting that "[t]here is no textual 11 justification, however, for limiting the confrontation right to 12 statements made after the accused's identity became known." 13 at 2262 (Thomas, J., concurring). 14 Id. In dissent, Justice Kagan, joined by Justices Scalia, 15 Ginsburg, and Sotomayor, characterized Williams as an "open-and- 16 shut case": 17 rape based in part on a DNA profile created in Cellmark's 18 laboratory. 19 question the analyst who produced that evidence." 20 (Kagan, J., dissenting). 21 judgment had been affirmed without a majority settling on a 22 "reason why," Justice Kagan averred that "in all except its 23 disposition, [Justice Alito's plurality] opinion is a dissent." 24 Id. 25 "surrogate testimony" in Bullcoming, Justice Kagan asked, "Have 26 we not already decided this case?" "The State of Illinois prosecuted Sandy Williams for Yet the State did not give Williams a chance to Id. at 2265 Taking note of the fact that the Likening the expert's testimony in Williams to the 22 Id. at 2267. 1 Justice Kagan's opinion roundly rejected the idea that 2 the expert's testimony had not been offered for its truth, noting 3 recent scholarship and case law suggesting that the entire 4 concept of "basis evidence" is illusory. 5 out-of-court statement in this context has no purpose separate 6 from its truth; the factfinder can do nothing with it except 7 assess its truth and so the credibility of the conclusion it 8 serves to buttress." 9 "[A]dmission of the Id. at 2269 (emphasis in original). Justice Kagan then turned to the plurality's conclusion 10 that the DNA report was nontestimonial, joining Justice Thomas's 11 criticism of the reformulated primary purpose test as having no 12 basis in constitutional text, history, or the Court's prior 13 precedents. 14 made for the primary purpose of establishing past events 15 potentially relevant to later criminal prosecution - in other 16 words, for the purpose of providing evidence. 17 has ever suggested that, in addition, the statement must be meant 18 to accuse a previously identified individual." "We have previously asked whether a statement was None of our cases Id. at 2273-74. 19 The dissenters also rejected the plurality's suggestion 20 that the purpose of the DNA testing was "to respond to an ongoing 21 emergency, rather than to create evidence for trial," id. at 2274 22 (internal quotation marks omitted), noting that the expert 23 herself had testified that the DNA report was conducted "'for 24 this criminal investigation . . . and for the purpose of the 25 eventual litigation' - in other words, for the purpose of 23 1 producing evidence, not enabling emergency responders." 2 (citation omitted). 3 Id. Summarizing the current state of Confrontation Clause 4 jurisprudence, Justice Kagan noted that the five Justices who 5 agreed on the judgment "agree on very little," and "have left 6 significant confusion in their wake." 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Id. at 2277. What comes out of four Justices' desire to limit Melendez-Diaz and Bullcoming in whatever way possible, combined with one Justice's one-justice view of those holdings, is - to be frank - who knows what. Those decisions apparently no longer mean all that they say. Yet no one can tell in what way or to what extent they are altered because no proposed limitation commands the support of a majority. Id. 18 B. 19 We are confronted in this case with the puzzle Justice 20 Kagan described: Which of the foregoing principles enunciated by 21 various members of the Supreme Court controls here? 22 Controlling Law We begin by looking to our holding in Feliz -- a case 23 decided on facts very similar to these -- to determine how and to 24 what extent the Supreme Court's intervening decisions have 25 altered the rule we established in that case. 26 concluded that autopsy reports were nontestimonial based in large 27 part on their status as business records. 28 236. 29 and to a lesser extent Williams, call this categorical conclusion 30 into doubt. There, we Feliz, 467 F.3d at But, as we have explained, Melendez-Diaz and Bullcoming, 24 1 In each of these cases, the records were, in some 2 sense, business records - all were made in the course of the 3 regular business that the laboratory in question conducts: 4 forensic testing. 5 Supreme Court concluded that the results of the tests were 6 testimonial because they were completed "for the purpose of 7 establishing or proving some fact at trial," Melendez-Diaz, 557 8 U.S. at 324, or were "affirmations made for the purpose of 9 establishing or proving some fact in a criminal proceeding," Yet, in Melendez-Diaz and Bullcoming, the 10 Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2716 (internal quotation marks 11 omitted).4 12 public records are generally admissible absent confrontation not 13 because they qualify under an exception to the hearsay rules, but 14 because - having been created for the administration of an 15 entity's affairs and not for the purpose of establishing or 16 proving some fact at trial - they are not testimonial." 17 U.S. at 324. 18 "prepared specifically for use at . . . trial[,]" were 19 testimonial "[w]hether or not they qualif[ied] as business or 20 official records." As the Melendez-Diaz Court explained, "[b]usiness and 557 The reports at issue in that case, having been Id. 4 No conclusion was reached in Feliz as to whether the autopsy reports were similarly completed for the purpose of establishing a fact at trial, in part because we did not then think that "the reasonable expectation of the declarant should be what distinguishes testimonial from nontestimonial statements," Feliz, 467 F.3d at 235, rendering that factual inquiry unnecessary. 25 1 We distill from this pre-Williams case law the 2 principle that a laboratory analysis is testimonial if the 3 circumstances under which the analysis was prepared, viewed 4 objectively, establish that the primary purpose of a reasonable 5 analyst in the declarant's position would have been to create a 6 record for use at a later criminal trial. 7 U.S. at 324; Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1155-56 (explaining 8 application of the primary purpose standard); see also 9 Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2720 (Sotomayor, J., concurring) ("To 10 determine if a statement is testimonial, we must decide whether 11 it has 'a primary purpose of creating an out-of-court substitute 12 for trial testimony.' 13 is 'not to create a record for trial,' 'the admissibility of the 14 statement is the concern of state and federal rules of evidence, 15 not the Confrontation Clause.'" (quoting Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 16 1155)). 17 See Melendez-Diaz, 557 When the 'primary purpose' of a statement The question then becomes whether the Court's later 18 decision in Williams changed that rule. We agree with Justice 19 Kagan that this problem is intractable. No single rationale 20 disposing of the Williams case enjoys the support of a majority 21 of the Justices. 22 a case and no single rationale explaining the result enjoys the 23 assent of five Justices, the holding of the Court may be viewed 24 as the position taken by those members who concurred in the 25 judgments on the narrowest grounds." Ordinarily, "[w]hen a fragmented Court decides 26 Marks v. United States, 430 1 U.S. 188, 193 (1977) (internal quotation marks omitted). But 2 what is the narrowest ground in the disposition in Williams? 3 The Williams plurality's first rationale -- that the 4 laboratory report there was offered as basis evidence, and not 5 for its truth -- was roundly rejected by five Justices. 6 Williams, 132 S. Ct. at 2258-59 (Thomas, J., concurring in the 7 judgment); Id. at 2268-69 (Kagan, J., dissenting). 8 we are hard-pressed to read this rationale as controlling this 9 case because the facts before us are in significant respects 10 In any event, different from those presented in Williams.5 11 Nor do we think we can apply the plurality's narrowed 12 definition of testimonial, which would require that the analyst 13 had "the primary purpose of accusing a targeted individual of 14 engaging in criminal conduct[.]" 15 Justices disagreed with this rationale, and it would appear to 16 conflict directly with Melendez-Diaz, which rejected a related Id. at 2242. Again, five 5 For example, Corinne Ambrosi, the OCME's deputy chief medical examiner for Queens County, testified in order to establish Somaipersaud's cause of death, which was not at all obvious and was clearly relevant to the charges against the defendants. No other testimony established that Somaipersaud died of poisoning. By contrast, in Williams, other admissible evidence established that the sample tested by Cellmark came from the victim's vaginal swab. See Williams, 132 S. Ct. at 2239. Also, the plurality in Williams relied at least in part on the fact that Williams was a bench trial, noting that the "[t]he dissent's argument would have force if petitioner had elected to have a jury trial." Williams, 132 S. Ct. at 2236. The case before us was tried to a jury, leaving us less confident that the factfinder would understand the conceptual distinction between basis evidence and evidence offered for its truth. 27 1 argument. 2 dissenting). 3 Justices and conflict with prior precedents that did command 4 majority support - we do not think either Justice Thomas's 5 concurrence on the ground that the analysis was not sufficiently 6 "formalized," or Justice Breyer's new approach to application of 7 the Confrontation Clause, is controlling. 8 9 See Williams, 132 S. Ct. at 2274 (Kagan, J., For similar reasons - lack of support among the Williams does not, as far as we can determine, using the Marks analytic approach, yield a single, useful holding 10 relevant to the case before us. It is therefore for our purposes 11 confined to the particular set of facts presented in that case. 12 We think it sufficient to conclude that we must rely on Supreme 13 Court precedent before Williams to the effect that a statement 14 triggers the protections of the Confrontation Clause when it is 15 made with the primary purpose of creating a record for use at a 16 later criminal trial.7 17 Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1155; see also Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 18 2716; Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 822 (2006); Crawford, 19 541 U.S. at 51-52. See Melendez-Diaz, 557 U.S. at 310-11; 7 Although the law is not well developed in the area of testimonial versus nontestimonial statements, a close analogue may be found in cases examining the applicability of the attorney work-product privilege, which applies when documents are created by an attorney "in anticipation of litigation." See, e.g., Matter of Grand Jury Subpoenas Dated Oct. 22, 1991 and Nov. 1, 1991, 959 F.2d 1158, 1166 (2d Cir. 1992). 28 1 C. Testimony Related to Somaipersaud's Death 2 We address first the defendants' argument that allowing 3 surrogate testimony concerning the autopsy report in 4 Somaipersaud's death was error. 5 objected to at trial. 6 defendants did not raise at trial for plain error. 7 "plain error" requires that This purported error was not We review challenges on appeal that the A finding of 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 (1) there is an error; (2) the error is plain, that is, the error is clear or obvious, rather than subject to reasonable dispute; (3) the error affected the appellant's substantial rights, which in the ordinary case means it affected the outcome of the district court proceedings; and (4) the error seriously affects the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings. 18 United States v. Marcus, 628 F.3d 36, 42 (2d Cir. 2010) (internal 19 quotation marks and bracket omitted). 20 1. Testimony at trial. Corinne Ambrosi, the OCME's 21 deputy chief medical examiner for Queens County, testified at 22 trial regarding Somaipersaud's death. 23 OCME generally performs autopsies "where people died in 24 unexpected circumstances, unnatural deaths, unexpected deaths. 25 Those come to the attention of the medical examiner." 26 4655:18-20. 27 witness on cause and manner of death 106 times. 28 that she did not perform or participate in Somaipersaud's 29 autopsy, which was conducted by Dr. Heda Jindrak, who at the time 30 of trial was no longer employed by the OCME. She explained that the Trial Tr. Ambrosi had previously testified as an expert 29 She testified Ambrosi described 1 at length the results of toxicology tests ordered by Jindrak, 2 which informed the autopsy report. 3 technicians at the OCME's main office in Manhattan. 4 explained that the tests showed that Somaipersaud had elevated 5 levels of alcohol as well as chlorpromazine, which is sometimes 6 used as an antipsychotic drug. 7 the level of alcohol revealed by the tests would not alone have 8 been enough to have killed Somaipersaud. 9 chlorpromazine levels were, however, significant -- more than she 10 would have expected to see from someone regularly taking the drug 11 as medication for a psychiatric illness. 12 testified that the level of chlorpromazine detected in the 13 victim's body combined with the level of blood alcohol in the 14 body would have been enough to have killed the victim, and that 15 the combination had indeed been determined to be the cause of 16 Somaipersaud's death. 17 These tests were performed by Ambrosi She offered her own opinion that She testified that the Ambrosi further The toxicology report was admitted as an exhibit at 18 trial. It indicated .26 blood alcohol content and 1.9 milligrams 19 per kilogram chlorpromazine levels. 20 chlorpromazine levels appeared to be acute because the level in 21 the liver was 75.7 milligrams per kilogram, whereas in someone 22 who was prescribed the drug therapeutically it would not normally 23 be more than 10 milligrams per kilogram. 24 explained that she did not recall ever having seen levels of 25 chlorpromazine in a person that high. 26 Jindrak's autopsy determination that the cause of death was 30 Ambrosi explained that the Ambrosi further She also testified as to 1 "[a]cute intoxication by the ethynel or alcohol and 2 chlorpromazine," and that she agreed with that assessment. 3 Tr. 4678:20-21. 4 cardiovascular disease" were also contributing factors. 5 Tr. 4679:2-3. 6 Trial "[H]ypertensive and arteriosclerotic Trial On cross-examination, Ambrosi confirmed that she had 7 not participated in the autopsy. 8 review of the case file before testifying. 9 2. Analysis. Her testimony was based on her To resolve this case we must determine 10 whether, under the circumstances, the autopsy report (including 11 the toxicology report) was prepared with the primary purpose of 12 creating a record for use at a later criminal trial.8 As we 8 It is worth noting that courts throughout the country have applied various approaches and reached differing conclusions when considering Confrontation Clause challenges to the introduction of autopsy reports. Compare United States v. Moore, 651 F.3d 30, 73 (D.C. Cir. 2011)(concluding that Chief Medical Examiner's surrogate testimony on autopsy reports prepared by others violated the Confrontation Clause where law enforcement officers observed the autopsies and participated in the creation of the reports -- circumstances that "would have signaled to the medical examiner that the autopsy might bear on a criminal investigation" -- and each autopsy "found the manner of death to be a homicide caused by gunshot wounds") with State v. Locklear, 363 N.C. 438, 452, 681 S.E.2d 293, 305 (2009)("Thus, when the State seeks to introduce [autopsy reports], absent a showing that the analysts are unavailable to testify at trial and that petitioner had a prior opportunity to cross-examine them such evidence is inadmissible under Crawford."(quotation marks, citation, and brackets omitted)). There is also academic debate on the subject. Compare Zabrycki, supra, cited by the Supreme Court in both Melendez-Diaz and Williams, in which the author proposed a definition of testimonial similar to that endorsed by the Williams plurality, proposing that "out-of-court statements are testimonial and thus require confrontation if they are produced by, or with the involvement of, adversarial government officials responsible for 31 1 explained in United States v. Burden, 600 F.3d 204 (2d Cir. 2 2010), the examples of testimonial statements outlined in 3 Crawford, are not "more than a set of guideposts [for] courts 4 [to] work through, case-by-case . . . . 5 whether a particular kind of statement is testimonial until it 6 has considered that kind of statement in an actual case." 7 224. 8 [N]o court can say Id. at Key to determining the resolution of the case before us 9 is the particular relationship between the OCME and law 10 enforcement both generally and in this particular case. 11 the OCME is an independent agency,9 the police are required to 12 notify it when someone has died "from criminal violence, by While investigating and prosecuting crime," 96 CAL. L. REV. 96 CAL. L. REV. 1118, but arguing that medical examiners are "public health officials," rather than law enforcement officers, and therefore, unless the medical examiner "writes an autopsy report in response to police interrogation," the report is non-testimonial, id. at 1128-29, with Professor Richard Friedman, who argued in a petition for writ of certiorari from a decision of the Supreme Court of Ohio, State v. Craig, 110 Ohio St.3d 306, 853 N.E.2d 621 (2006), cert. denied, 549 U.S. 1255 (2007), that while "[t]here are, of course, situations in which coroners write autopsy reports without anticipation that they will likely be used in forensic proceedings, and for other purposes . . . ," id. at *13*14, "where, as here, the coroner concludes that the decedent was clearly a victim of homicide, there can be no genuine doubt that a reasonable person in the position of the coroner understands that there will be forensic proceedings and intends that the report will be used in them," id. at *14, and they are therefore testimonial. 9 See People v. Freycinet, 11 N.Y.3d 38, 42, 862 N.Y.S.2d 450, 453 (2008) (concluding than an autopsy report was not testimonial, in part because the OCME is "by law, independent of and not subject to the control of the office of the prosecutor" and "not a law enforcement agency" (internal quotation marks omitted)); People v. Hall, 84 A.D.3d 79, 83, 923 N.Y.S.2d 428, 431 (1st Dep't 2011). 32 1 accident, by suicide, suddenly when in apparent health, when 2 unattended by a physician, in a correctional facility or in any 3 suspicious or unusual manner or where an application is made 4 pursuant to law for a permit to cremate a body of a person." 5 N.Y.C. Charter § 557(a),(f)(1); see also N.Y.C. Admin Code § 17- 6 202. 7 such instances, and must "fully investigate the essential facts 8 concerning the circumstances of the death" and interview 9 witnesses and collect evidence that "may be useful in The OCME is required to "take charge of the dead body" in 10 establishing the cause of death." 11 202(a). 12 N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 17- It is the OCME that determines whether to conduct an 13 autopsy based on whether "it may be concluded with reasonable 14 certainty that death occurred from natural causes or obvious 15 traumatic injury[.]" 16 autopsy is deemed necessary, it "shall include toxicologic, 17 histologic, microbiologic and serologic examinations," the 18 results of which must be written down and filed with the OCME, 19 regardless of whether any further investigation results. 20 "Such medical examiner, medical investigator or lay medical 21 investigator shall take possession of any portable objects which, 22 in his or her opinion, may be useful in establishing the cause of 23 death, and except as provided in subdivision c hereof [relating N.Y.C. Admin Code § 17-203. 33 Whenever an Id. 1 to suicide notes], shall deliver them to the police 2 department."10 3 Id. § 202(a). Because the defendants failed to object to the 4 introduction of Ambrosi's testimony during trial, there is scant 5 record of the circumstances under which Jindrak produced her 6 autopsy report. 7 objections to the testimony of Dr. Vivikand Brijmohan -- whose 8 testimony on the cause of death of another victim, Sewnanan, is In its written ruling on the defendants' 10 We similarly explained in United States v. Rosa, 11 F.3d 315 (2d Cir. 1993), that the Medical Examiner's Office is required simply to investigate unnatural deaths; it refers a death bearing any indicium of criminality to the appropriate district attorney and has no responsibility for enforcing any laws. The chief medical examiner and his assistants are required to be physicians and pathologists; there is no requirement in the Charter that they be attorneys or that any employees of the office have any law enforcement training. Even when a matter is referred to the district attorney because of an indication of criminality, the Charter does not give the medical examiner any responsibility for collecting evidence or determining the identity of the perpetrator. Further, though law enforcement activities are typically accusatory and adversarial in nature, a medical examiner's reported observations as to a body's condition are normally made as part of an independent effort to determine a cause of death. Indeed, "a medical examiner, although often called a forensic expert, bears more similarity to a treating physician than he does to one who is merely rendering an opinion for use in the trial of a case." Id. at 332 (2d Cir. 1993)(citation omitted) (quoting Manocchio v. Moran, 919 F.2d 770, 777 (1st Cir. 1990) (internal quotation marks omitted)). 34 1 discussed below -- the district court noted that "Jindrak 2 conducted an internal and external examination as well as a 3 toxicology analysis," and that Ambrosi described these steps as 4 "routine." 5 do not argue in either of their briefs, or in the supplemental 6 letter briefs submitted in response to the request by this Court 7 after Williams, that Somaipersaud's autopsy was anything other 8 than routine - there is no suggestion that Jindrak or anyone 9 else involved in this autopsy process suspected that Somaipersaud 10 had been murdered and that the medical examiner's report would be 11 used at a criminal trial. 12 are often undetermined in cases like this because it could have 13 been a recreational drug overdose or a suicide. 14 report itself refers to the cause of death as "undetermined" and 15 attributes it both to "acute mixed intoxication with alcohol and 16 chlorpromazine" combined with "hypertensive and arteriosclerotic 17 cardiovascular disease." 18 James II, 2007 WL 2702449, at *2 n.1. The defendants Ambrosi testified that causes of death The autopsy The autopsy was completed on January 24, 1998, and the 19 report was signed June 16, 1998, substantially before any 20 criminal investigation into Somaipersaud's death had begun. 21 During the course of Ambrosi's lengthy trial testimony, neither 22 the government nor defense counsel elicited any information 23 suggesting that law enforcement was ever notified that 24 Somaipersaud's death was suspicious, or that any medical examiner 25 expected a criminal investigation to result from it. 35 Indeed, 1 there is reason to believe that none is pursued in the case of 2 most autopsies.11 3 In short, the autopsy report was not testimonial 4 because it was not prepared primarily to create a record for use 5 at a criminal trial.12 6 plain error, in admitting the autopsy report into evidence, or 7 allowing Ambrosi to testify regarding it, although she did not 8 conduct it herself. D. 9 10 There was therefore no error, much less Testimony Related to Sewnanan's Death In contrast to Ambrosi's testimony relating to 11 Somaipersaud's death, the defendants vigorously objected to Dr. 12 Vivikand Brijmohan's testimony as to a toxicology test relating 11 The OCME performs an average of 5,500 autopsies each year, and in 2010, for example, 533 New York City residents' causes of death were listed as homicides. See OCME, General Information Booklet, http://www.nyc.gov/html/ocme/downloads/pdf/ General%20Information/OCME%20General%20Information%20Booklet.pdf (last visited Mar. 22, 2013); Deaths and Death Rates by Selected Causes New York City - 2010, http://www.health.ny.gov/statistics/ vital_statistics/2010/table33c.htm (last visited Mar. 22, 2013). This suggests, although the data is of course insufficient to demonstrate conclusively, that something in the order of ten percent of deaths investigated by the OCME lead to criminal investigations. The statistics from Los Angeles tell a similar story: "In 2004, the Los Angeles Medical Examiner's office conducted 4,180 complete autopsies out of 9,465 cases taken by the office. Of the 9,465 total cases, 1,121 died from homicide, 709 from suicide, 3,090 from accidents, and 4,256 from natural causes." Zabrycki, 96 Cal. L. Rev. at 1125. 12 No contrary conclusion is warranted by United States v. Ignasiak, 667 F.3d 1217 (11th Cir. 2012). Although that case holds that "[f]orensic reports constitute testimonial evidence," id. at 1230, the decision was based in part on the fact that the Florida Medical Examiner's Office "was created and exists within the Department of Law Enforcement," id. at 1231. Here, the OCME is a wholly independent office. 36 1 to the death of Hardeo Sewnanan, which was based on forensic 2 testing conducted by Dr. Leslie Mootoo. 3 that the defendants did raise at trial, we review for 4 harmlessness, which requires us to ask whether we are satisfied 5 "upon a review of the entire record . . . beyond a reasonable 6 doubt that the error complained of . . . did not contribute to 7 the verdict obtained." 8 Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted). 9 to find the [error] harmless we must be able to conclude that the When analyzing error United States v. Lee, 549 F.3d 84, 90 (2d "In other words, 10 evidence would have been unimportant in relation to everything 11 else the jury considered on the issue in question, as revealed in 12 the record." 13 omitted). 14 prosecution's case; (2) the prosecutor's conduct with respect to 15 the improperly admitted evidence; (3) the importance of the 16 wrongly admitted testimony; (4) whether such evidence was 17 cumulative of other properly admitted evidence." 18 quotation marks omitted). 19 Id. (internal quotation marks and citations We consider "(1) the overall strength of the 1. Testimony at trial. Id. (internal Brijmohan testified regarding 20 Sewnanan's cause of death, in part based on toxicology tests 21 conducted by Mootoo, who had died between his performance of the 22 test and the time of trial. 23 pathologist for the region of Guyana where Sewnanan's death 24 occurred. 25 of the need for an autopsy by a coroner affiliated with the 26 police department. Brijmohan was the chief forensic Brijmohan testified that he would normally be informed Typically, autopsies in Guyana are performed 37 1 when there are "unnatural deaths," i.e., "accidents, murders, 2 strangulations, drowning, . . . and of course including cases of 3 poisoning." 4 conducting Sewnanan's internal examination, he discovered 5 "extensive submucosal hemorrhages," which "is not definitely a 6 normal finding. 7 thinks of extraneous ingestion and one thinks definitely of 8 poisoning." 9 Trial Tr. 3266:12-17. Brijmohan explained that in Whenever such a finding occurs, one immediately Trial Tr. 3265:13-14, 22-24. Brijmohan then sent the post-mortem contents of 10 Sewnanan's stomach for toxicology testing. 11 contents were taken by a police officer to the Guyanese police 12 laboratory, the stamp of which appeared on the resultant 13 toxicology report. 14 know who actually performed the toxicology test. 15 Mootoo may have played some role in the testing, Brijmohan was 16 apparently not sure whether Mootoo had conducted the testing 17 himself. 18 He testified that the Brijmohan further testified that he did not While Dr. Brijmohan testified, based on "the scientific evidence 19 of my examination and the toxicology report, that the cause of 20 death of Hardeo Sewnanan was the consequence of the ingestion of 21 a toxic substance with ammoniacal compound." 22 10. 23 potassium and sodium cyanide, in which case there would have been 24 no symptoms prior to death. 25 toxicology report indicated death resulted from ammonia poisoning Trial Tr. 3299:7- Brijmohan said it was probably hydrocyanic acid, or Brijmohan further testified that the 38 1 and, over continued objections, explained that the toxicology 2 report on Sewnanan's stomach indicated ammonia poisoning.13 3 On cross-examination, Brijmohan was questioned 4 extensively as to whether the ammonia found in Sewnanan's body 5 could have been naturally occurring, inasmuch as ammonia often 6 occurs naturally in the human body after death. 7 testified that his knowledge that it was commercially produced 8 was based on the laboratory report. 9 died of commercially-produced ammonia "was based essentially on Brijmohan His conclusion that Sewnanan 10 my observation of the stomach, with the hemorrhages, the 11 laboratory reports that was brought to my attention." 12 3382:23-25. 2. 13 The district court's decision. Trial Tr. The district court 14 rejected the defendants' argument that allowing introduction of 15 the toxicology report into evidence would violate the 16 Confrontation Clause. 17 2007 WL 2792449, at *1, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 39585, at *3-*4 18 (E.D.N.Y. May 31, 2007). 19 allowing introduction of the report, but its decision preceded 20 the Supreme Court decisions in Bullcoming, Melendez-Diaz, and 21 Williams. See Mem. & Order, United States v. James, The district court relied on Feliz in 13 Over repeated objections, Brijmohan testified that test results from two bottles sent to the police lab, one of which tested positive for ammonia, informed his analysis. The record does not conclusively reveal whether the contents of the bottles derived from the victim's body though that appears the logical inference. 39 1 The district court did base its decision, however, in 2 large part on its conclusion that the toxicology report was not a 3 "'chemist's' report created by 'law enforcement.'" 4 While acknowledging that the defendants had described the "close 5 proximity" between the medical examiner's office and the Guyanese 6 police station, and the cooperation between those two agencies, 7 the court concluded that "the critical inquiry is not the 8 physical proximity of two agencies, or their level of 9 cooperation, but rather whether the agency that created the Id. at *2. 10 report can be characterized by its duties and purposes as law 11 enforcement." 12 effect that the OCME is not a law enforcement agency, and then, 13 noting that the Guyanese medical examiner operates as part of the 14 Guyanese Ministry of Health and Georgetown Hospital, observed 15 that "[t]here is no indication that Dr. Mootoo was employed by a 16 law enforcement agency or was responsible for enforcing any 17 laws. . . . 18 Medicine, for which Drs. Brijmohan and Mootoo worked, is directly 19 analogous to the [OCME]." 20 Id. The district court cited Rosa's dictum to the [I]t appears that the Guyanese Office of Forensic Id. The court therefore concluded that the forensic records 21 did not fall under the "law enforcement" exception to the 22 business records rule that permits admission of the documentary 23 evidence despite the absence of the document's preparer. 24 Furthermore, the court noted that a toxicology report is "not 25 separate and distinct" from the autopsy report, which bolstered 26 its admissibility as a business record. 40 Id. Id. 1 3. Analysis. First, in light of the foregoing 2 analysis, it is apparent to us that the district court's 3 rationale for allowing the forensic report into evidence is of 4 questionable validity because of the doubt subsequent Supreme 5 Court jurisprudence has cast on Feliz, on which the district 6 court relied. 7 conclusion sound. 8 9 Nevertheless, we think the district court's There is no indication in Brijmohan's testimony or elsewhere in the record that a criminal investigation was 10 contemplated during the inquiry into the cause of Sewnanan's 11 death.14 12 poisons taken is pretty high . . . within the East Indian 13 community," Trial Tr. 3253:15-17, suggesting accidental ingestion 14 or suicide rather than homicide.15 15 autopsy, Brijmohan observed symptoms consistent with poisoning, 16 including congestion in the lungs and hemorrhaging in the 17 stomach, and ordered toxicology tests on that basis. For example, Brijmohan testified that "the rate of During the course of the Brijmohan 14 We note, as did the district court, that the police were unquestionably involved in the Guyanese autopsy process, including, for example, transporting forensic samples for testing. As five Justices in Williams made clear, however, the involvement of "adversarial officials" in an investigation is not dispositive as to whether or not a statement is testimonial. In this case, it appears that was simply the routine procedure employed by the Guyanese medical examiner in investigating all unnatural deaths, and does not indicate that a criminal investigation was contemplated. 15 Brijmohan was interviewed by a publication called "Hinduism Today" regarding the high rate of suicides, particularly among East Indian males, in Guyana, which he attributed to "cultural problem[s]" and alcoholism. Trial Tr. 3375:15-3377:12. 41 1 further noted that there were other potential "natural" causes of 2 the types of symptoms that led him to suspect poisoning in 3 general -- not murder in particular -- including alcoholism. 4 short, we see nothing to indicate that the toxicology report was 5 completed primarily to generate evidence for use at a subsequent 6 criminal trial. 7 nontestimonial, and the district court therefore did not err in 8 allowing its introduction without requiring confrontation of the 9 individual who prepared it. 10 In We conclude that the toxicology report was As Justice Breyer pointed out in Williams, it is still 11 unsettled under the Court's recent Confrontation Clause 12 jurisprudence whether there is a "logical stopping place between 13 requiring the prosecution to call as a witness one of the 14 laboratory experts who worked on the matter and requiring the 15 prosecution to call all of the laboratory experts who did so." 16 Williams, 132 S. Ct. at 2246 (Breyer, J. concurring). 17 Brijmohan's testimony implicates that question -- he suggested 18 that someone other than Mootoo may also have participated in the 19 preparation of the toxicology report -- we find it unnecessary to 20 answer it in light of our conclusions as to the nature of the 21 report. 22 rules regarding "basis evidence," we also decline to decide 23 whether the toxicology test was properly offered as such here, 24 where the testifying expert had personal involvement in the 25 autopsy process, and he himself ordered the toxicology tests at 26 issue. While To the extent that question implicates the evidentiary 42 1 II. Exclusion of the Government's Prior Jury Argument 2 The defendants contend that the district court abused 3 its discretion in denying their request to introduce an excerpt 4 of the prosecutor's rebuttal summation in the trial of Betty 5 Peter, a cooperating witness, which largely blamed her, and not 6 the defendants in the instant case, for Vernon Peter's murder. 7 "The defense is allowed to introduce a prosecutor's statement 8 from a prior trial when: (1) the prosecution offered an 9 inconsistent assertion of fact at the prior trial; and (2) the 10 prosecution can offer no 'innocent' explanation for the 11 contradiction." 12 Cir. 1994)(citations omitted); see also Fed. R. Evid. 801(d)(2); 13 United States v. McKeon, 738 F.2d 26, 32-33 (2d Cir. 1984). United States v. Orena, 32 F.3d 704, 716 (2d 14 In McKeon, upon which the defendants principally rely, 15 the court's reasoning was based in large part upon the fact that 16 it was the same defendant on trial in a subsequent proceeding. 17 McKeon, 738 F.2d at 31 (noting the relationship to admissions of 18 a party-opponent in civil proceedings). 19 requires that, in order to admit such evidence, the district 20 court must "determine by a preponderance of the evidence that the 21 inference the [party] seeks to draw from the inconsistency is a 22 fair one and that an innocent explanation for the inconsistency 23 does not exist. 24 preponderance favors an innocent explanation, the . . . statement 25 should be excluded." In any event, McKeon Where the evidence is in equipoise or the Id. at 33. 43 Here, the government explained 1 that the change in its view towards Peter resulted from a series 2 of proffer sessions after her conviction on various charges 3 including mail fraud, money laundering, and obstruction of 4 justice. 5 corroborated by other witnesses led the government to a different 6 view as to her culpability for Vernon Peter's murder. 7 The information gleaned from these sessions and We conclude that the district court did not commit 8 clear error in deciding by a preponderance of the evidence that 9 there was an "innocent explanation" for the inconsistency between 10 the government's stated position at the trial of Peter and that 11 in the instant case. 12 its discretion in excluding the prior statement. 13 United States v. GAF Corp., 928 F.2d 1253, 1261 n.3 (2d Cir. 14 1991) (affirming exclusion of a prior bill of particulars where 15 the "the inconsistency is plain, the inferences are clear, and 16 the government itself has offered an explanation -- that it no 17 longer believes that the evidence demonstrates" what it had 18 previously). 19 The district court therefore did not abuse See, e.g., Finally, the defendants' argument that a post-trial 20 letter from a cooperating witness implicating Betty Peter in her 21 husband's murder somehow affects the propriety of the district 22 court's ruling is misplaced. 23 district court at the time it made the ruling. 24 not suggest either that the district court's factual finding as 25 to the government's explanation was clearly erroneous, or that it The letter was not before the 44 It therefore does 1 abused its discretion in excluding the prosecution's rebuttal 2 statement. 3 III. Limitation on Cross-Examination 4 The defendants argue that the district court abused its 5 discretion in curtailing their impeachment of Betty Peter with 6 prior inconsistent statements concerning (1) a conversation she 7 had with a member of Sewnanan's family16 and (2) her 8 understanding of the term "double indemnity." 9 Peter testified at trial that she had not spoken to Patricia 10 Sewnanan after Hardeo's death, and that she did not know the 11 meaning of the term "double indemnity." 12 In particular, We review for abuse of discretion a district court's 13 decision to preclude evidence offered to impeach a witness. See 14 United States v. Ramirez, 609 F.3d 495, 499 (2d Cir. 2010). A 15 district court "is 'accorded broad discretion in controlling the 16 scope and extent of cross-examination.'" 17 Caracappa, 614 F.3d 30, 42 (2d Cir. 2010) (quoting United States 18 v. Wilkerson, 361 F.3d 717, 734 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 543 U.S. 19 908 (2004)); accord, e.g., United States v. Whitten, 610 F.3d 20 168, 182 (2d Cir. 2010). 21 'reasonable limits' on cross-examination to protect against, 22 e.g., harassment, prejudice, confusion, and waste." 23 States v. Cedeno, 644 F.3d 79, 82 (2d Cir. 2011) (quoting 24 Delaware v. Van Arsdall, 475 U.S. 673, 679 (1986)). United States v. Therefore, a "district court may impose 16 United "In the Precisely what her relationship to Hardeo Sewnanan was is not reflected in the record. 45 1 exercise of discretion, a district court should consider the need 2 to 'ascertain [the] truth,' 'avoid needless consumption of time,' 3 and 'protect witnesses from harassment or undue embarrassment.'" 4 Whitten, 610 F.3d at 182-83 (quoting Fed. R. Evid. 611(a)). 5 A district court should afford "wide latitude to a 6 defendant in a criminal case to cross-examine government 7 witnesses," Cedeno, 644 F.3d at 82 (internal quotation marks 8 omitted), because the Confrontation Clause gives a defendant the 9 right not only to cross-examination, but to effective cross- 10 examination, see United States v. Figueroa, 548 F.3d 222, 227 (2d 11 Cir. 2008). 12 Confrontation Clause prevents a trial judge from imposing any 13 limits on defense counsel's inquiry [in cross-examining] a 14 prosecution witness." 15 Arsdall, 475 U.S. at 679) (emphasis added). 16 But "[i]t does not follow, of course, that the Figueroa, 548 F.3d at 227 (quoting Van The defense sought to introduce evidence that the 17 Sewnanan family bribed the medical examiner to change Hardeo 18 Sewnanan's cause of death to poisoning, rather than disease, so 19 that they could collect on the insurance policy's double 20 indemnity clause. 21 supporting this theory, however, which the defendants do not 22 challenge. 23 a member of Sewnanan's family, was therefore irrelevant, because 24 the subject of her discussion was not to be introduced in any 25 event. 26 Sewnanan's family member would not have been in front of the The district court excluded evidence Peter's denial that she spoke with Patricia Sewnanan, Moreover, because the subject of Peter's discussion with 46 1 jury, her inconsistency on this collateral matter (whether or not 2 she spoke with the family member) was unlikely to influence the 3 jury's assessment of her credibility, because they were already 4 aware that she was a convicted felon who had begun cooperating 5 with the government. 6 For similar reasons, impeachment of Peter concerning 7 her understanding of the term "double indemnity" would have had 8 little probative value. 9 indeed elicit testimony from Peter in which she explained that 10 she received $400,000 on her husband's $200,000 life insurance 11 policy because "when anybody died accidentally or something, they 12 pay double." 13 in recognizing the term "double indemnity," when it was clear she 14 understood the concept, would therefore also not have affected 15 the jury's assessment of her credibility. In any event, the cross-examination did Eliciting from Peter that she had been inconsistent 16 IV. Motion to Sever 17 Defendant James contends that the district court's 18 denial of his motions for severance of his trial from that of his 19 co-defendant Mallay deprived him of a fair trial. 20 may . . . sever the defendants' trials . . . [if] consolidation 21 for trial appears to prejudice a defendant." 22 14(a). 23 favor of trying jointly defendants who were indicted together, 24 [and] [j]oint trials are often particularly appropriate in 25 circumstances where the defendants are charged with participating "[T]he court Fed. R. Crim. P. "Considerations of efficiency and consistency militate in 47 1 in the same criminal conspiracy . . . ." United States v. 2 Spinelli, 352 F.3d 48, 55 (2d Cir. 2003) (citations omitted). 3 "The decision to sever a joint trial of federal defendants is 4 committed to the sound discretion of the trial judge[, and is 5 c]onsidered virtually unreviewable." 6 F.3d 52, 102 (2d Cir. 1999) (internal quotation marks and 7 citations omitted). 8 heavy burden to show prejudice so severe that his conviction 9 constituted a miscarriage of justice." United States v. Diaz, 176 "[T]o compel reversal, the defendant has the United States v. 10 Ferguson, 676 F.3d 260, 286-87 (2d Cir. 2011) (internal quotation 11 marks omitted). 12 James argues that jointly trying him with Mallay, who 13 was also charged with two murders with which James was not 14 charged - those of Vernon Peter and Alfred Gobin - caused him 15 prejudice. 16 racketeering charges against James to prove the formation, 17 existence, and nature of the racketeering enterprise, which 18 involved the murder of individuals to collect on their insurance 19 policies, as well as to show the pattern of racketeering 20 activity. 21 590 F.3d 93, 123-24 (2d Cir. 2009) ("[T]he fact that testimony 22 against a codefendant may be harmful is not a ground for 23 severance if that testimony would also be admissible against the 24 moving defendant tried separately." (internal quotation marks 25 omitted)). That evidence, however, was relevant to the See Diaz, 176 F.3d at 103; United States v. Stewart, 48 1 James's argument that there was an irreconcilable 2 conflict between him and Mallay based on Mallay's initial 3 opposition to the introduction of evidence regarding a plot to 4 bribe the Guyanese medical examiner is also without merit. 5 Mallay later joined James in seeking to introduce that evidence. 6 And in any case, "[t]o obtain a severance on the ground of 7 antagonistic defenses, a defendant must show that the conflict is 8 so irreconcilable that acceptance of one defendant's defense 9 requires that the testimony offered on behalf of a codefendant be 10 disbelieved." United States v. Benitez, 920 F.2d 1080, 1085-86 11 (2d Cir. 1990) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). 12 That is not the case here. 13 V. Refusal to Suppress Recorded Statements 14 The defendants object to the denial of a motion to 15 suppress statements made by James to Derick Hassan, a government 16 informant wearing a recording device, concerning a plot to murder 17 John Narinesingh. 18 already subject to a sealed indictment at the time those 19 statements were recorded, doing so violated his Sixth Amendment 20 right to counsel. 21 The defendants argue that because James was The defendants waived this argument by failing to 22 object to the magistrate judge's recommendation that the motion 23 to suppress be denied, which was adopted by the district court. 24 United States v. James, 415 F. Supp. 2d 132, 137 (E.D.N.Y. 2006). 25 See also Wagner & Wagner, LLP v. Atkinson, Haskins, Nellis, 49 1 Brittingham, Gladd & Carwile, P.C., 596 F.3d 84, 92 (2d Cir. 2 2010) ("[A] party waives appellate review of a decision in a 3 magistrate judge's Report and Recommendation if the party fails 4 to file timely objections designating the particular issue."). 5 Even so, as Magistrate Judge Pollack explained at 6 length, the Sixth Amendment right is "offense specific," and the 7 statements James made to the informant were not used to support 8 the charge for which he had been indicted at the time he made 9 those statements -- that charge was subsequently dropped. 10 415 F. Supp. 2d at 158-61. 11 James, Therefore, the Sixth Amendment did not bar their introduction into evidence. 12 VI. Admission of Recorded Statements against Mallay 13 Defendant Mallay contends that the conversation between 14 James and Hassan, recorded by Hassan -- also referred to in the 15 previous section -- should not have been admitted against him 16 because that conversation indicates Mallay's withdrawal from the 17 conspiracy, and thus is not admissible as a co-conspirator 18 statement. 19 statement is offered against an opposing party and . . . was made 20 by the party s coconspirator during and in furtherance of the 21 conspiracy." 22 court declaration under this rule, the district court must find 23 by a preponderance of the evidence '(a) that there was a 24 conspiracy, (b) that its members included the declarant and the 25 party against whom the statement is offered, and (c) that the "A statement . . . is not hearsay if . . . [t]he Fed. R. Evid. 801(d)(2)(E). 50 "To admit an out-of- 1 statement was made during the course of and in furtherance of the 2 conspiracy.'" 3 Cir. 2011) (quoting United States v. Al-Moayad, 545 F.3d 139, 173 4 (2d Cir. 2008)). 5 determined by the district court by "a preponderance of the 6 evidence." 7 Africa, 552 F.3d 93, 137 (2d Cir. 2008) (citing Fed. R. Evid. 8 104(a)). 9 clear error. 10 United States v. Farhane, 634 F.3d 127, 161 (2d These three factual predicates must be In re Terrorist Bombings of U.S. Embassies in E. We review the district court's findings as to each for See id. First, the conspiracy must be proven by a preponderance 11 of the evidence to involve both the declarant and the defendant. 12 The district court "may properly find the existence of a criminal 13 conspiracy where the evidence is sufficient to establish, by a 14 preponderance of the evidence, that 'the . . . alleged 15 coconspirators entered into a joint enterprise with consciousness 16 of its general nature and extent.'" 17 552 F.3d at 137-38. 18 both the declarant and the party against whom the statement is 19 offered be members of the conspiracy, there is no requirement 20 that the person to whom the statement is made also be a member.'" 21 Id. at 139 (quoting United States v. Beech-Nut Nutrition Corp., 22 871 F.2d 1181, 1199 (2d Cir. 1989). 23 In re Terrorist Bombings, Although Rule 801(d)(2)(E) "'requires that Second, to be admissible, the statement must be made 24 "in furtherance of the conspiracy." 25 must in some way have been designed to promote or facilitate 26 achievement of the goals of the ongoing conspiracy[.]'" 51 In general, "'the statements United 1 States v. Diaz, 176 F.3d at 85 (quoting United States v. Tracy, 2 12 F.3d 1186, 1196 (2d Cir. 1993)). 3 statement might "promote or facilitate" the conspiracy include, 4 among others, "seeking to induce a coconspirator's assistance," 5 id.; "informing coconspirators as to the progress or status of 6 the conspiracy," id.; and prompting a non-coconspirator to 7 respond in some way that "promotes or facilitates the carrying 8 out of a criminal activity," Tracy, 12 F.3d at 1196. 9 generally, e.g., In re Terrorist Bombings, 552 F.3d at 139; Diaz, The ways in which a See 10 176 F.3d at 85; United States v. Gigante, 166 F.3d 75, 82 (2d 11 Cir. 1999). 12 furtherance of a conspiracy is essentially a question of fact, we 13 will reverse a decision to admit co-conspirator statements only 14 if it is clearly erroneous." 15 at 139 (internal quotation marks omitted). 16 "Because what constitutes a statement that is in In re Terrorist Bombings, 552 F.3d Mallay contends that at the time of James's and 17 Hassan's conversation regarding the possible murder of 18 Narinesingh he was no longer part of the conspiracy. 19 James notes the indication on the tape recorded statement that he 20 is no longer talking to Mallay, and that the two have had a 21 falling out. 22 disagreement or a falling out is not, however, sufficient to 23 establish withdrawal from the conspiracy. 24 States v. Jackson, 335 F.3d 170, 182 (2d Cir. 2003) ("To withdraw 25 from a conspiracy, a person must take some affirmative action 26 either by making a clean breast to the authorities or As proof, That members of a conspiracy have had a 52 See, e.g., United 1 communicating the abandonment in a manner reasonably calculated 2 to reach co-conspirators." (internal quotation marks and 3 citations omitted)); United States v. Spero, 331 F.3d 57, 60 (2d 4 Cir. 2003) ("[A conspiracy] is presumed to exist until there has 5 been an affirmative showing that it has been terminated," and its 6 members "continue to be conspirators until there has been an 7 affirmative showing that they have withdrawn." (internal 8 quotation marks omitted)). 9 a conspiracy can itself be compelling evidence that the "An internal dispute among members of 10 conspiracy is ongoing and that the rivals are members of it." 11 United States v. Amato, 15 F.3d 230, 234 (2d Cir. 1994). 12 testified that the reason Mallay and James were not talking to 13 one another at the time was not that Mallay had withdrawn from 14 the conspiracy, but rather that Mallay had just undergone heart 15 surgery, a fact stipulated to by the parties. 16 surgery, Mallay procured insurance policies on two persons for 17 more than $2 million, indicating that he continued to participate 18 in the conspiracy at the time of the recorded conversation 19 between Hassan and James. 20 admission of this recording against Mallay. Hassan Shortly before his We therefore find no error in the 21 VII. Denial of New Trial Motion 22 The defendants argue that a post-trial letter from 23 Camuldeen Allie, a cooperating witness, alleging prosecutorial 24 misconduct required a new trial, or at least an evidentiary 53 1 hearing, and that the district court erred in not granting their 2 requests for either. 3 We review the denial of a Rule 33 motion for a new 4 trial for abuse of discretion. See United States v. McCourty, 5 562 F.3d 458, 475 (2d Cir. 2009). 6 Procedure 33(a) provides that "[u]pon the defendant's motion, the 7 court may vacate any judgment and grant a new trial if the 8 interest of justice so requires." 9 "[t]he test is whether it would be a manifest injustice to let Federal Rule of Criminal In deciding a Rule 33 motion, 10 the guilty verdict stand." 11 110, 119 (2d Cir. 2007) (internal quotation marks omitted). 12 a trial judge to grant a Rule 33 motion, he must harbor a real 13 concern that an innocent person may have been convicted." 14 (internal quotation marks omitted). 15 claim of newly discovered evidence, the burden is on the 16 defendant to satisfy five elements: (1) that the evidence is 17 "newly discovered after trial"; (2) that "facts are alleged from 18 which the court can infer due diligence on the part of the movant 19 to obtain the evidence"; (3) that "the evidence is material"; (4) 20 that the evidence "is not merely cumulative or impeaching"; and 21 (5) that "the evidence would likely result in an acquittal." 22 United States v. Owen, 500 F.3d 83, 88 (2d Cir. 2007) (internal 23 citations omitted). 24 United States v. Lin Guang, 511 F.3d "For Id. To merit relief based on a The district court concluded that the allegations 25 contained in Allie's letter - that an Assistant United States 26 Attorney had coerced him into testifying - were "a fabrication." 54 1 James I, 2009 WL 763612, at *7, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at 2 *21. 3 had not yet joined the U.S. Attorney's Office at the time when 4 Allie alleges he was coerced, that Allie had testified that no 5 members of the prosecution team in this case were present during 6 the negotiations that led to his cooperation, and that Allie was 7 represented by counsel when he decided to cooperate. 8 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at *20-*21. 9 Allie does not ever disclaim his testimony, or suggest it was The court found that the AUSA Allie accused of coercing him Id., 2009 Furthermore, in his letter, 10 anything but truthful. 11 at *21. 12 cooperate with the government because it was elicited on cross- 13 examination that the government might let the state parole board 14 know of his cooperation. 15 *21-*22. 16 Id. at *8, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, Finally, the defendants knew that Allie had a motive to Id., 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23706, at While it may be that the contents of the letter provide 17 a reason to doubt Allie's credibility, "a new trial is not 18 required when the suppressed impeachment evidence merely 19 furnishes an additional basis on which to impeach a witness whose 20 credibility has already been shown to be questionable." 21 States v. Parkes, 497 F.3d 220, 233 (2d Cir. 2007) (internal 22 quotation marks omitted). 23 probability" that the outcome of the defendants' trial would have 24 been different had the contents of Allie's letter been disclosed, 25 even if believed. 26 in E. Africa, 552 F.3d at 146. United In any event, there is no "reasonable See In re Terrorist Bombings of U.S. Embassies 55 1 VIII. Cumulative Error 2 Finally, having concluded that there has been no error 3 in the defendants' trial, it follows that we must reject their 4 claim of cumulative error. 5 th[ese] appeal[s]." 6 Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted). 7 8 9 "[That] doctrine finds no foothold in United States v. Fell, 531 F.3d 197, 233 (2d CONCLUSION For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the judgments of the district court. 56 Case # 09-2732-cr (L) United States v. James EATON, Judge, concurring: Because of the unsettled state of the law, I agree that the admission into evidence of the autopsy report prepared by Dr. Jindrak did not constitute plain error. United States v. Gamez, 577 F.3d 394, 400 (2d Cir. 2009) ( Typically, we will not find plain error where the operative legal question is unsettled. ) (citations omitted). I respectfully part company with the majority, however, on its conclusion that the autopsy report was not testimonial for purposes of the Confrontation Clause. The majority reads recent Supreme Court cases as holding that a statement triggers the protections of the Confrontation Clause when it is made with the primary purpose of creating a record for use at a later criminal trial. This formulation, however, appears to place too much emphasis on future use in a criminal trial being the primary purpose for the creation of a testimonial statement. I would not find that this primary purpose is the common thread in the Supreme Court s jurisprudence.1 Rather, I would find that a testimonial statement is one having 1 The Supreme Court s use of the criminal trial language, while not entirely consistent, tends toward the same idea. Compare Bullcoming v. New Mexico, 131 S. Ct. 2705, 2714 n.6 (2011) (quoting Davis potentially relevant to a later criminal prosecution language in the context of a blood-alcohol test requested by the prosecutor), Michigan v. Bryant, 131 S. Ct. 1143, 1148 (2011) (employing Davis potentially relevant to a later criminal prosecution language in the context of a police interrogation), and Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 822 (2006) (articulating the potentially relevant to a later criminal prosecution language in the context of a 911 call), with Melendez Diaz v. Massachusetts, 129 S. Ct. 2527, 2532 (2009) (quoting Crawford s available for use at a later trial language in the context of a laboratory report requested by the police), and Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 51 52 (2004) (listing available for use at a later trial among the [v]arious formulations of the core class of testimonial statements). 1 an evidentiary purpose, declared in a solemn manner, and made under circumstances that would lead a reasonable declarant to understand that it would be available for use prosecutorially. The point of departure for this analysis is Crawford. As I read that case and those that follow it, there are three key considerations for determining if a statement is testimonial. First, [t]estimony is a solemn declaration or affirmation made for the purpose of establishing or proving some fact. 2 Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 51 (2004) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, at the time of its making, the statement must have an evidentiary purpose. Bullcoming v. New Mexico, 131 S. Ct. 2705, 2717 (2011); Melendez Diaz v. Massachusetts, 129 S. Ct. 2527, 2532 (2009). In other words, to be testimonial the declarant must make the statement to prove past events. Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 822 (2006). Statements relating ongoing events made to achieve some other purpose, such as receiving medical or police assistance, and forward-looking statements, such as those made in furtherance of a conspiracy or to elicit inculpatory statements from others, lack the required purpose. Michigan v. Bryant, 131 S. Ct. 1143, 1157 (2011) (statement made by a mortally wounded victim in need of medical attention did not have an evidentiary purpose); Davis, 547 2 Interestingly, not only did several early American authorities flatly reject[] any special status for coroner statements, the historical precursors of modern medical examiners reports, one of the cases cited in Crawford also stands for the proposition that evidence produced by coroners investigations requires confrontation, even though the purpose of those investigations was not a purely prosecutorial one. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 47 n.2 (citing State v. Campbell, 30 S.C.L. 124, 130 (S.C. App. L. 1844) ( The general object, at least, of our Act, would seem to be, to record the whole of the information obtained upon any inquest concerning the sudden or violent death of a man, for the purpose of a prosecution, for satisfaction, or any investigation of the public, or of individuals concerned. So much is due to the living and the dead. Sudden and unnatural deaths shock us all. . . . And let me here observe, that the information and publication of the kind of death, the wound, time and manner, place and circumstances, may often lead to unlooked for charges against unsuspected persons, and even of men abroad. And shall they all be assumed . . . [not to require] cross-examination? Because our Act is general for all inquests, the examination public, and of high respectability? On the contrary, is there not too much of mere formula, if not fiction, in such a notion? ). 2 U.S. at 822 (statements about ongoing events during a 911 call did not have an evidentiary purpose); United States v. Farhane, 634 F.3d 127, 131 32, 162 63 (2d Cir. 2011) (statements promising future aid in a conspiracy did not have an evidentiary purpose); United States v. Burden, 600 F.3d 204, 225 (2d Cir. 2010) (recorded statements of a cooperating witness made to induce a confession did not have an evidentiary purpose); cf. United States v. Logan, 419 F.3d 172, 178 (2d. Cir. 2005) (finding alibi statements made to police were testimonial). Second, the statement must have been made in a way that is sufficiently solemn so as to make it more like a formal statement to government officers rather than a casual remark [made] to an acquaintance. Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1153 (quoting Crawford, 541 U.S. at 51); Davis, 547 U.S. at 822 (quoting Crawford, 541 U.S. at 51). This does not mean that the statement must be contained in a formal written document, but merely that the circumstances surrounding its utterance must be such that a reasonable declarant would be aware of the serious nature of his or her declaration. Davis, 547 U.S. at 826 (citing Crawford, 541 U.S. at 51). Finally, the statement must reasonably be understood as being available for use at a later trial. Melendez Diaz, 129 S. Ct. at 2532 (quoting Crawford, 541 U.S. at 52). That is, the speaker need not expect that the statement will be used in a criminal trial, or even that it is objectively likely that the statement will be used in a criminal trial, only that it is foreseeable that the statement could be used prosecutorially. Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1169 (Scalia, J. dissenting) ( [H]e must make the statement with the understanding that it may be used to invoke the coercive machinery of the State. ); see also Melendez Diaz, 129 S. Ct. at 2532 ( [T]he affidavits [were] made under circumstances which would lead an objective witness reasonably to believe that the statement would be available for use at a later trial. (quoting Crawford, 541 U.S. at 52)). 3 Applying this formulation, it is evident that the admission of Dr. Jindrak s report triggered the Confrontation Clause. First, the autopsy report was, inarguably, created to establish facts regarding the death of Mr. Somaipersaud. The report and its incorporated laboratory analyses contain five final diagnoses, two statements of cause of death, detailed descriptions of various portions of Mr. Somaipersaud s body, and calculated levels of toxins, all of which are factual statements. Second, the report is sufficiently solemn. All reports generated by the New York City Office of Chief Medical Examiner ( OCME ) are required to be signed by the medical examiner performing the autopsy. N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 17-203 (1998). These reports are made by government officials for use by government officials. See United States v. Feliz, 467 F.3d 227, 2337 (2d Cir. 2006) (observing that OCME reports would qualify for the public records hearsay exception, which requires that the statement be made by a public officer or agency). Indeed, even if OCME did not have a long history of cooperation with law enforcement, all autopsy reports would remain statements made directly to law enforcement insofar as they are statutorily required to be available to law enforcement officers and prosecutors. N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 17-205 (1998) ( The appropriate district attorney and the police commissioner of the city may require from [OCME] such further records, and such daily information, as they may deem necessary. ) Moreover, like the reports in Bullcoming and Melendez Diaz, Dr. Jindrak s report contains a certification. Third, it could have reasonably been anticipated that the autopsy report would be available for use in a criminal trial. Medical examiners working for OCME are statutorily obligated to make conclusions as to causes of death, to record the reasons for those conclusions, and to preserve those records for future use. N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 17-203 ( A detailed 4 description of [those] findings . . . shall be written or dictated. . . . The findings of the investigation at the scene of death, the autopsy and any toxicologic, histologic, serologic and microbiologic examinations, and the conclusions drawn therefrom shall be filed in the office of chief medical examiner. ). Even if it could not have been reasonably foreseen at the outset of the autopsy that the report s results would be used in a later trial, it seems clear that, at some point during her examination, Dr. Jindrak would reasonably have anticipated that it could be used later in a criminal prosecution. That is, once she certified that the primary cause of death was acute mixed intoxication with alcohol and chlorpromazine, i.e., that Mr. Somaipersaud had been poisoned, a reasonable medical examiner would have anticipated that the autopsy report could be used prosecutorially. See Bryant, 131 S. Ct. at 1159 (observing that non-testimonial statements may evolve into testimonial statements as more information is provided (quoting Davis, 547 U.S. at 828 (internal quotation marks omitted))). When a statement such as Dr. Jindrak s autopsy report is introduced against a defendant at a criminal trial, that evidence is functionally identical to live, in-court testimony, because [it does] precisely what a witness does on direct examination, rendering its declarant a witness and triggering the protections of the Confrontation Clause. Melendez Diaz, 129 S. Ct. at 2532 (quoting Davis, 547 U.S. at 830); see also Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2712; Crawford, 541 U.S. at 51. James was both charged with and convicted of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. The prosecution s theory was that Mr. Somaipersaud had been poisoned. The prosecution offered the autopsy report to establish the very same facts, prejudicial to Mr. James, about which Dr. Jindrak would have been expected to testify at trial. Indeed, on direct examination, Dr. 5 Ambrosi was asked both to identify Dr. Jindrak s conclusions as to cause of death and to state whether she agreed with those conclusions. Moreover, I believe that the admission of any medical examiner s report prepared by OCME would trigger the protections of the Confrontation Clause.3 Dr. Jindrak s report was not unique in the sense that the characteristics that made it testimonial are present in all autopsy reports prepared by OCME that are introduced against a defendant at a criminal trial. All such reports are made to establish facts about the cause of death of the decedent; they are made by and to government officials in a formalized recording; they contain statements a medical examiner could reasonably foresee would be used in a criminal prosecution; and if a prosecutor seeks to introduce a report for its truth, it would substitute for live testimony adverse to the defendant. As noted, I believe that the majority s approach goes astray by suggesting that to trigger the Confrontation Clause the primary purpose of an autopsy report must be use at a later criminal trial. This formulation postulates the existence of a medical examiner who gives adverse testimony but who is not a witness for Confrontation Clause purposes because he or she did not prepare the autopsy report primarily for use in criminal proceedings. In doing so, the opinion creates the very third category of witnesses, helpful to the prosecution, but somehow immune from confrontation that Melendez Diaz expressly says does not exist. Melendez Diaz, 129 S. Ct. at 2534. 3 At least two other federal circuits and a number of state courts of last resort have reached a similar conclusion regarding particular reports prepared by the equivalent of OCME in their jurisdictions. See, e.g., United States v. Ignasiak, 667 F.3d 1217 (11th Cir. 2012); United States v. Moore, 651 F.3d 30 (D.C. Cir. 2011); State v. Navarette, 294 P.3d 435 (N.M. 2013); State v. Kennedy, 735 S.E.2d 905 (W. Va. 2012); Conners v. State, 92 So.3d 676 (Miss. 2012) (noting a pre-Crawford decision that held admission of an autopsy report required confrontation); State v. Locklear, 681 S.E.2d 293 (N.C. 2009); see also People v. Lewis, 806 N.W.2d 295 (Mich. 2011) (vacating lower court s holding that an autopsy report was nontestimonial but holding the error harmless without significant discussion); Wood v. State, 299 S.W.3d 200 (Tex. Ct. App. 2009), review denied, 2010 Tex.Crim.App. LEXIS 115 (2010). 6 Finally, as the Eleventh Circuit points out, [m]edical examiners are not mere scriveners and autopsy reports are the product of the skill, methodology, and judgment of the highly trained examiners who actually performed the autopsy. United States v. Ignasiak, 667 F.3d 1217, 1232 (11th Cir. 2012) (holding autopsy reports to be testimonial and requiring confrontation) (citing Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2714). Both Bullcoming and Melendez Diaz hold that a laboratory analyst s report of sufficient solemnity triggers the protections of the Confrontation Clause. It would be incongruous indeed, if an autopsy report requiring numerous skilled judgments on the part of a medical examiner, did not require the same confrontation. 7
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