United States v. Maloney, No. 11-50311 (9th Cir. 2012)
Annotate this CaseDefendant appealed his conviction and sentence for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. The court held that the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying the defense surrebuttal summation; the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendant's motion to excuse one of the prospective jurors for cause; and the district court did not err in denying defendant's proposed jury instruction. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment.
Court Description: The panel affirmed a jury conviction for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. The panel held: • The district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the defense surrebuttal summation, because the prosecution’s statements in rebuttal summation addressed the arguments made in defense counsel’s closing argument and were based on permissible inferences from the record. • The district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the defendant’s motion to excuse one of the prospective jurors for cause, because finding a prospective juror (who initially admits bias) to be impartial is proper if the prospective juror “ultimately asserts an ability to be fair and impartial.” • Even assuming de novo review, the district court did not err in denying defendant’s proposed jury instruction, because jury instructions that indicate that the jury may “consider character evidence along with all other evidence upon the issue of guilt” sufficiently instruct the jury that character evidence may create reasonable doubt of guilt. Dissenting, Judge Gilman wrote that the district court abused its discretion by refusing the defendant’s request to respond in a surrebuttal to the government’s “lack-of- luggage” argument that was raised for the first time during rebuttal; and that the error warrants a new trial.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on May 30, 2013.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on February 28, 2014.
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