United States v. Shields, No. 14-10561 (9th Cir. 2016)
Annotate this CaseDefendants Shields and Sims appeal their convictions for multiple counts stemming from the capitalization and operation of their real estate development business, which lost millions of investors’ dollars from 2007 to 2009. Defendants challenge their convictions based on several claimed trial errors, including admission of prejudicial evidence, failure to sever the joint trial, ineffective assistance of counsel, inadequate jury instructions, and denial of the right to be present at a critical stage. The court held that the district court erred by failing to instruct the jury that it must find a duty to disclose in order to convict defendants of wire fraud based on a material omission. However, there was no plain reversible error because the error was not clear and obvious, and is unlikely to affect the outcome of the proceedings. The court rejected defendants' remaining challenges in an unpublished memorandum disposition.
Court Description: Criminal Law The panel affirmed Melvin Shields’s and Michael Sims’s convictions arising from the capitalization and operation of their real estate development business, which lost millions of investors’ dollars. The panel held that the district court erred by failing to instruct the jury that it must find a duty to disclose in order to convict defendants of wire fraud based on any material omissions, but that this was not reversible plain error because the instruction was not clearly required by this court’s precedent and the error most likely did not affect the outcome of the proceedings. The panel rejected the defendants’ remaining challenges to their convictions in a concurrently-filed unpublished memorandum disposition.
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