United States v. Graham , 234 F. App'x 136 ( 2007 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 06-4700
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
versus
CHRISTINA M. GRAHAM,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Alexandria. James C. Cacheris, Senior
District Judge. (1:06-cr-00143-JCC)
Argued: May 25, 2007 Decided: July 24, 2007
Before WILKINSON, NIEMEYER, and GREGORY, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
ARGUED: Scott Anthony Surovell, SUROVELL, MARKLE, ISAACS & LEVY,
P.C., Fairfax, Virginia, for Appellant. Lana N. Pettus, Special
Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES
ATTORNEY, Alexandria, Virginia, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Chuck
Rosenberg, United States Attorney, Alexandria, Virginia, for
Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Christina M. Graham appeals her convictions for driving under
the influence of alcohol and failing to obtain a Virginia driver’s
license within the time required by law. Graham argues that the
magistrate judge before whom her case was first tried erred in
allowing the government to reopen its case-in-chief in order to
correct mistaken testimony regarding the date of Graham’s traffic
stop and arrest, and that the judge should have instead granted a
judgment of acquittal. Graham argues that the new trial that was
subsequently awarded to her on these charges did not cure the
asserted error in granting the motion to reopen. She also contends
that her second trial for driving under the influence of alcohol
violated the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment. We
reject these arguments and affirm.
I.
Shortly after 2 a.m. on October 16, 2004, U.S. Park Police
Officer Kermit Minnick stopped the car being driven by defendant
Christina M. Graham on the George Washington Memorial Parkway,
after observing the vehicle traveling at a high speed. The
defendant told Officer Minnick she had consumed “a few glasses” of
wine. Officer Minnick saw signs of intoxication and performed
three field sobriety tests, which produced further evidence of
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intoxication. Officer Minnick also found that alcohol was present
in the defendant’s breath in a preliminary breath test.
Officer Minnick arrested the defendant. At the Park Police
station, Officer Linda Freedman tested Graham using an instrument
to measure breath alcohol content, and produced two readings that
showed unlawfully high breath alcohol levels. The defendant was
issued four violation notices. She was charged with driving under
the influence of alcohol in violation of 36 C.F.R. § 4.23(a)(1),
which forbids driving while “[u]nder the influence of alcohol, or
a drug, or drugs, or any combination thereof, to a degree that
renders the operator incapable of safe operation,” and with driving
while intoxicated, in violation of 36 C.F.R. § 4.23(a)(2), which
forbids driving when “[t]he alcohol concentration in the operator’s
. . . breath is . . . 0.08 grams or more of alcohol per 210 liters
of breath.” Graham was also issued violation notices for speeding
under 36 C.F.R. § 4.21(c) and for failing to obtain a Virginia
driver’s license after moving to the state under 36 C.F.R. § 4.2(incorporating Va. Code Ann. § 46.2-308).
The charges were tried before a magistrate judge. The
government called both Officer Minnick and Officer Freedman in its
case-in-chief. However, instead of asking the officers about
events on October 16, 2004 -- the date of the stop -- the
government asked the officers about the events of October 26, 2004.
Following the government’s misleading prompts, the witnesses
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described the traffic stop and arrest as having occurred on October
26, 2004.
Graham moved for a judgment of acquittal on the grounds that
because of the erroneous testimony, the government had failed to
present sufficient evidence that Graham committed any offenses on
the date listed on the violation notices under which Graham had
been charged. The government moved to reopen its case to correct
the error, and the trial judge granted the motion. Officer Minnick
took the stand again and testified briefly that he had initially
thought the offenses occurred on October 16, but concluded he was
mistaken based upon the government’s questioning, and only later
realized he had provided the incorrect date on the stand.
The defendant then presented her case. She did not contest
that the traffic stop occurred or that she was the person whom
Officer Minnick had stopped. Rather, she argued that the results
of the field sobriety and breath analysis tests could have been
explained by physical ailments and other causes. The magistrate
judge convicted the defendant of driving under the influence of
alcohol and of failing to obtain a Virginia license within the
period required by law. The court found the defendant not guilty
of driving while intoxicated and speeding.
Graham appealed her convictions to the district court. The
district court stated that the magistrate judge had not erred in
allowing the government to reopen its case, but that “out of an
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abundance of caution,” the defendant’s convictions would be
reversed and remanded for a new trial to ensure that the defendant
had a full and fair opportunity to respond to all of the
government’s evidence in light of the reopening.
On remand, Graham was convicted before a different magistrate
judge of driving under the influence of alcohol and failing to
obtain a Virginia license within the time required. After the
district court affirmed these convictions, Graham filed this
appeal.
II.
Graham first contends that her convictions must be overturned
because the magistrate judge at her first trial should have granted
her motion for acquittal after the government first rested its
case-in-chief, rather than permitting the government to reopen its
case so that Officer Minnick could testify that he had misstated
the date of the defendant’s traffic stop and arrest. As the
defendant acknowledges, a court may permit the government to reopen
its case-in-chief to present additional evidence after a defendant
moves for a judgment of acquittal, United States v. Gray, 405 F.3d
227, 238 n.5 (4th Cir. 2005), and its decision is reviewed only for
abuse of discretion, United States v. Paz, 927 F.2d 176, 179 (4th
Cir. 1991). We reject Graham’s claim because we agree with the
district court hearing the appeal of Graham’s first convictions
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that the magistrate judge did not abuse his discretion merely
because he permitted the government to reopen its case and correct
its error regarding the date of offense. Moreover, we agree with
that district court that any prejudicial effect from the reopening
was corrected by granting Graham an entirely new trial on the
counts of conviction.
First, we agree with the district court that the magistrate
judge’s permitting the government to reopen its case was eminently
reasonable, such that the only conceivable abuse of discretion
could have come if the magistrate judge reopened the case in a
manner that somehow deprived Graham of an opportunity to adjust her
defense. In exercising its discretion concerning a motion to
reopen, a court
must consider the timeliness of the motion, the character
of the testimony, and the effect of the granting of the
motion. The party moving to reopen should provide a
reasonable explanation for failure to present the
evidence in its case-in-chief. The evidence proffered
should be relevant, admissible, technically adequate, and
helpful to the jury in ascertaining the guilt or
innocence of the accused. The belated receipt of such
testimony should not “imbue the evidence with distorted
importance, prejudice the opposing party’s case, or
preclude an adversary from having an adequate opportunity
to meet the additional evidence offered.”
United States v. Peay, 972 F.2d 71, 73 (4th Cir. 1992) (quoting
United States v. Thetford, 672 F.2d 170, 182 (5th Cir. 1982)).
There is no dispute that a number of considerations supported
granting the government’s motion to reopen. Graham concedes that
the testimony concerning the date of the traffic stop and arrest
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was “relevant, admissible, technically adequate, and helpful . . .
in ascertaining the guilt or innocence of the accused.” Id. In
addition, the government’s motion can hardly be described as
untimely, since the government sought to reopen its case only hours
after resting and before Graham had presented any evidence of her
own.
While Graham contends that the trial court nevertheless abused
its discretion because the government failed to present “a
reasonable explanation” for its failure to introduce evidence of
the correct date of offense in its case-in-chief, id., we cannot
agree. The government’s attorney told the magistrate judge that
the failure to introduce testimony establishing the correct date of
offense was due to her own “mistake,” because she “misled [her]
witnesses by framing the questions with respect to October 26th,”
rather than October 16th. A prompt account of attorney mistake,
akin to a scrivener’s error, is not a per se unreasonable
explanation for a failure to introduce evidence, which can never be
corrected through a prompt motion to reopen. We have previously
found, to the contrary, that trial courts were entitled to grant
motions to reopen when attorney error gave rise to the need to
introduce additional evidence. Gray, 405 F.3d at 238 (holding that
after the government “inadvertently rested without putting [a
witness] on the witness stand . . . the district court did not
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abuse its discretion in permitting the Government to reopen its
case-in-chief to present this evidence”).
Under these circumstances, we agree with the district court
that the only possible abuse of discretion in reopening would have
come if the magistrate judge granted the government’s motion but
somehow prejudiced Graham by preventing her from fully meeting the
government’s evidence. Peay establishes that even if a party’s
motion to reopen its case is timely, supported by a reasonable
explanation, and would lead to the introduction of relevant and
helpful testimony, it is error to reopen the evidence if the other
party is not provided an opportunity to meet the evidence or adjust
its case appropriately in response. 972 F.2d at 73-74. However,
Peay also establishes that the appropriate remedy for such an error
is a new trial. Id. at 74. That is a remedy the district court
already granted the defendant, “out of an abundance of caution,”
and as a result, even if there was prejudice to the defendant in
the manner in which the government’s case was initially reopened,
the defendant is entitled to no further relief.
III.
The defendant also argues that she was subjected to
unconstitutional double jeopardy when she was retried on the charge
of driving under the influence of alcohol. The Double Jeopardy
Clause “has never precluded a second trial for a defendant ‘who has
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succeeded in getting his first conviction set aside.’” United
States v. Bowe, 309 F.3d 234, 238 (4th Cir. 2002) (quoting North
Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711, 720 (1969)). The defendant was
retried only upon the charges for which her prior convictions had
been “set aside” as the result of her initial appeal to the
district court. Id. Therefore, as the district court that
reviewed the defendant’s second set of convictions carefully
explained, Graham’s retrial did not violate the Fifth Amendment’s
Double Jeopardy Clause.
IV.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment below is
AFFIRMED.
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