Refusal to Allow Evidence of Defendant's Good Character Results in Reversal

United States v.Yarbrough, ___ F.3d ___, 2008 WL 2246969 (10th Cir. 2008)

In a fairly surprising defense win, the Court reverses Defendant’s conviction after trial on obstruction of justice-related charges, because the trial court refused to admit Defendant’s evidence of his good character. Defendant was investigated for being a “dirty cop,” based on his giving his buddy tips about ongoing police investigations of the buddy.

First, the Court disposed of two other issues against the Defendant, holding: (1) the government made a prima facie showing that police reasonably minimized interception of non-pertinent phone calls under the wiretap warrant–calls under 2 minutes long are not even considered under minimization analysis; (2) evidence was insufficient to support giving of entrapment instruction–there was no evidence Defendant was induced by the government. The government did not create the crime, but merely gave Defendant the opportunity to participate. There were no coercive actions by the government.

The Court reversed based on the third issue. The defendant proffered character evidence of his integrity and status as a law-abiding, trusted police officer, under FREs 404(a)(1) and 405, and argued that the evidence was directly relevant to the charges that he corruptly impeded an investigation (he admitted the actions, but testified that he told his buddy because they were friends, because his buddy was clean, and because Defendant thought the main investigating cop was overreaching). The Court found that the district court abused its discretion in refusing the evidence, because its reasoning was wrong. Rather, “character evidence is admissible in cases, such as this one, where the sole issue before the jury is whether a defendant undertook his undisputed acts with a prohibited state of mind.” Furthermore, the error was not harmless.