United States v. Aaron Smith

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
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No. 12-1642
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
v.
AARON SMITH,
Appellant
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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. Criminal Action No. 2-10-cr-00489-002)
District Judge: Honorable Juan R. Sanchez
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Argued November 1, 2012
Before: SLOVITER, AMBRO, and BARRY, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed: November 30, 2012)
Mark S. Greenberg, Esquire (Argued)
LaCheen Wittels & Greenberg
1429 Walnut Street
Suite 1301
Philadelphia, PA 19102-0000
Counsel for Appellant
Zane David Memeger
Robert A. Zauzmer
Salvatore L. Astolfi
Bernadette A. McKeon, Esquire (Argued)
Office of the United States Attorney
615 Chestnut Street
Suite 1250
Philadelphia, PA 19106
Counsel for Appellee
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OPINION
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AMBRO, Circuit Judge
Aaron Smith was convicted of conspiracy to interfere with interstate commerce by
robbery, and interference with interstate commerce by robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C.
§ 1951(a), and using and carrying a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence
in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c). He was sentenced to 360 months’ imprisonment.
Smith appeals two evidentiary decisions made by the District Court during his
trial: (1) the denial of his motion to suppress a witness identification, and (2) the
inclusion of testimony about his past infractions at a halfway house where he was
residing at the time of the robbery. Although we hold that the identification testimony
was properly admitted, we conclude that the Court should not have admitted the
infraction testimony and this error was not harmless.
I. Background
Around 10:00 a.m. on October 27, 2008, the Fox and Hound restaurant in
Philadelphia was robbed. While one robber, a taller, heavier-set man—later identified as
Omar Hopkins—led restaurant manager Lenny Lowe at gunpoint into a back office to get
money from the restaurant safe, a second robber took employees Valin Barfield and
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Tyrone Jenkins, and later delivery person Adam Conley, to the same office and tied them
with duct tape.
Hopkins was arrested shortly after the robbery and cooperated with investigators,
admitting to the robbery and identifying a third participant who never entered the
restaurant. He told police that he had known both co-conspirators for only a week, and
that he knew them only as ―Snipes‖—later identified as Kareem Watson—and ―A-Dub.‖
In 2011, police identified Smith as A-Dub based on a report that Smith went by
that nickname and in fact had ―A-Dub‖ tattooed on his arm. FBI Agent Stephen
McQueen showed two photographs of Smith to Hopkins. He identified one as A-Dub.
McQueen also created a photo array containing Smith’s photograph and showed it to
Lowe, Barfield, and Jenkins. Only Jenkins was able to identify one of the pictures as the
second robber, and identified Smith. Before trial, Smith moved to exclude Jenkins’s
identification, arguing that the identification of him in the photo array was the result of
Agent McQueen’s influence and thus unreliable. The District Court held a hearing at
which Jenkins and McQueen testified, and the motion was denied.
At trial, Jenkins and Hopkins identified Smith as the second robber. When asked
if he was ―absolutely certain‖ that Smith was A-Dub, Hopkins responded ―[i]t look like
him, yes.‖ App. at 465. On cross-examination, however, Hopkins testified that he
identified Smith because Smith looked like the pictures he (Hopkins) was shown. On re-
direct, Hopkins reconfirmed that Smith was A-Dub, yet conceded he was struggling with
that identification because it had been so long since the robbery. At trial, Lowe, Barfield,
and Jenkins described the second robber as somewhere between 5’8‖ and 5’10‖, wearing
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tan clothing, and having some facial hair, either a goatee or sideburns. Smith is 5’11‖.
Hopkins also testified that the three robbers met at a bar on the evening of October 27 to
celebrate their success.
In addition to contesting his involvement in the robbery, Smith presented an alibi
defense. At the time of the robbery, he was a resident at a halfway house called Kintock,
and attended job training at a facility called Connections. Kintock director Frank Guyon
testified that, on the day of the robbery, Smith had signed out of Kintock at 7:00 a.m. to
go to Connections, signed back into Kintock at 4:22 p.m., and did not sign out again that
day. Guyon also testified about Kintock’s security, which includes manned entrances and
barbed wire surrounding the property. As for the time Smith was signed out of Kintock,
Gervin Modest, a computer instructor at Connections, testified that he recorded Smith as
present in the Connections computer lab some time between 9:00 and 11:00 a.m. on the
morning of the robbery, but did not know how long Smith was at Connections that day.
Ronnie Dawson, another Connections employee, also testified that attendees were not
supposed to leave without authorization, and that unauthorized absences were
occasionally documented, but not always. Smith did not have authorization to leave
Connections on the robbery date, nor was any absence noted.
Over Smith’s objection, the Government was permitted to elicit testimony from
Guyon that Smith had been a resident of Kintock from May to October of 2007 and again
from August 2008 to February 2009, that he was ultimately removed from the facility in
February of 2009 for failing to return to it, and that he incurred 11 incident reports during
his time there for failing to follow rules and regulations. The District Court prevented the
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Government from referencing the bases of several infractions—such as Smith’s refusal to
give a urine sample or to take a breathalyzer test, possession of a pornographic DVD, and
failure to secure a job—but permitted testimony on other infractions and the total number
of incidents. The Government also had Guyon read statements in Smith’s Kintock
records that he ―was unsuccessfully discharged from the program, due to his inability to
follow the rules and regulations,‖ ―[a]n assessment of Mr. Smith’s residency shows that
he maintained a below-average level of compliance with the policies and procedures of
the program,‖ and ―Mr. Smith’s overall adjustment was poor.‖ Id. at 533–34. The
prosecutor also asked Guyon in a leading manner whether ―it’s pretty clear . . . Mr. Smith
was pretty bad at following the rules at your program?,‖ to which Guyon responded
―[t]hat’s correct.‖ Id. at 535. The prosecutor also asked Dawson whether Smith had an
―accountability problem‖ with Connections, to which Dawson replied that, ―[b]ased on
the records that I reviewed, yes.‖ Id. at 558.
II. Jurisdiction and Standard of Review
The District Court had jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. § 3231. We have appellate
jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291.
We review a district court’s decision to admit evidence for abuse of discretion.
United States v. Lee, 612 F.3d 170, 184 n.14 (3d Cir. 2010).
III. Discussion
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A. Identification Testimony
Smith first challenges the District Court’s decision to admit Jenkins’s
identification testimony. The first question in such a challenge is whether the initial
identification procedure was unnecessarily or impermissibly suggestive. United States v.
Stevens, 935 F.2d 1380, 1389 (3d Cir. 1991). This inquiry considers both the
suggestiveness of the identification and whether there was good reason to depart from
less suggestive procedures. Id. Only if a procedure was too suggestive need a court ask
whether it should nonetheless be admitted as reliable under the totality of the
circumstances. Neil v. Biggers, 409 U.S. 188, 199 (1972).
Following a hearing, the District Court concluded that the initial identification
procedure used with Jenkins was not unnecessarily suggestive. Smith argues to the
contrary because Agent McQueen specifically directed Jenkins to concentrate on the
features of the face that do not change, such as the eyes, nose, and ears. Smith does not
explain how McQueen’s instruction could have directed Jenkins to Smith’s photo. Hence
the Court did not abuse its discretion by denying his motion to suppress Jenkins’s
identification testimony.
B. Infractions Evidence
Smith also argues that the District Court erred by allowing testimony about his
prior bad acts at Kintock and Connections. Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) states that
―[e]vidence of a crime, wrong, or other act is not admissible to prove a person’s character
in order to show that on a particular occasion the person acted in accordance with the
character,‖ but evidence of a crime or wrong can be admitted ―for another purpose‖ such
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as ―motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, …[or] absence of mistake.‖
Fed. R. Evid. 404(b)(1)–(2).
Rule 404 is a rule of inclusion rather than exclusion, and evidence should be
admitted unless used merely to show propensity or disposition of the defendant to
commit the crime. United States v. Givan, 320 F.3d 452, 460 (3d Cir. 2003); United
States v. Moore, 375 F.3d 259, 264 (3d Cir. 2004). The admission of Rule 404(b)
evidence is evaluated under the Supreme Court’s four-step test: (1) the evidence must
have a proper purpose under 404(b), (2) it must be relevant, (3) its probative value must
not be outweighed by its potential for prejudicial effect, and (4) the court must charge the
jury to consider the evidence only for the limited purpose for which it is admitted.
United States v. Vega, 285 F.3d 256, 261 (3d Cir. 2002) (citing Huddleston v. United
States, 485 U.S. 681, 691–92 (1988)). ―A proper purpose is one that is probative of a
material issue other than character.‖ United States v. Green, 617 F.3d 233, 250 (3d Cir.
2010) (quotation omitted). Evidence is relevant if it has ―any tendency to make a fact
[that is of consequence to the determination of the action] more or less probable than it
would be without the evidence.‖ Fed. R. Evid. 401. The Government must ―clearly
articulate how that evidence fits into a chain of logical inferences, no link of which can
be the inference that[,] because the defendant committed offenses before, he therefore is
more likely to have committed this one.‖ United States v. Morley, 199 F.3d 129, 137 (3d
Cir. 1999) (quotation and alteration omitted). Where the defendant failed to request a
limiting instruction, we review the lack of such an instruction for clear error. Ansell v.
Green Acres Contracting Co., 347 F.3d 515, 526 (3d Cir. 2003).
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The Government argues that this evidence was admissible because Smith’s alibi
rested on an assumption that he followed the attendance rules of Kintock and
Connections, and evidence of his infractions rebutted that assumption. We disagree.
Smith’s alibi was not that he abided by the attendance rules of either facility. Instead,
Smith presented the facilities’ own records to show that he was at Connections on the
morning of the robbery and at Kintock in the evening when the robbers purportedly met
at a bar. He produced testimony to show that security features prevented him from
leaving Kintock without signing out. He also introduced evidence that he was not
permitted to leave Connections without authorization, and no documentation existed that
he was authorized to leave it, or was absent without authorization, on October 27, 2008.
The Government could—and did—produce testimony to show that it was possible
for Smith to leave Kintock or Connections without either facility knowing or
documenting his absence. But there is no proper purpose under 404(b) for admission of
evidence that Smith generally did not abide by the rules of the facilities because his alibi
was not based on his decision to follow rules, but on records of his presence. Even the
infraction most closely related to the possibility that Smith left the facilities without
authorization—that he absconded from Kintock—occurred months after the robbery and
could not have been relevant to his motive, intent, or state of mind on the day of the
robbery.
Instead, this testimony commented directly, and negatively, on Smith’s character.
Although the District Court excluded testimony of the most prejudicial infractions, the
evidence of other infractions was still relevant only to Smith’s character, precisely the
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evidence Rule 404(b) prohibits. The descriptions from Smith’s Kintock file painted a
picture of Smith as a rule-breaker and person of poor character. Compounding the error,
there was no limiting instruction given to the jury; they may have considered this
character evidence well beyond Smith’s alibi defense in their determination of Smith’s
guilt.
Even if the District Court erred by admitting this evidence of Smith’s bad acts, we
do not reverse a conviction if it is highly probable that the error did not contribute to the
judgment of guilt. United States v. Berrios, 676 F.3d 118, 131 (3d Cir. 2012). The
Government bears the burden of showing harmlessness. United States v. Cross, 308 F.3d
308, 326 (3d Cir. 2002). On this record, we cannot conclude that it was highly probable
the bad acts evidence did not contribute to the judgment of guilt. Evidence connecting
Smith to the robbery is far from overwhelming. It included the two identifications, one
of which was undermined on cross-examination and both of which were made years after
the robbery; the nickname ―A-Dub,‖ supplied by Hopkins, which Smith has tattooed on
his arm; and the proximity of Connections to a store Hopkins testified the robbers
shopped at before the crime. The bad acts evidence—and the inference that Smith was
essentially a bad guy—may have contributed to the jury’s determination of Smith’s guilt.
In this context, we cannot conclude that the District Court’s error was harmless.
We thus vacate Smith’s conviction and remand the case.
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