U.S. v. DiDomenico

• Decision Date: 25 January 1993
• Docket Number: D,No. 152,152
• Citation: 985 F.2d 1159
• Parties: 37 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 137 UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Angelina DiDOMENICO, Defendant-Appellant. ocket 92-1206.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

Page 1159

985 F.2d 1159

37 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 137

UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Angelina DiDOMENICO, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 152, Docket 92-1206.

United States Court of Appeals Second Circuit.

Argued Oct. 16, 1992.

Decided Jan. 25, 1993.

Sarah A. Chambers, Asst. Federal Public Defender, New Haven, CT (Thomas G. Dennis, Federal Public Defender, of counsel), for defendant-appellant.

Carl J. Schuman, Asst. U.S. Atty., Hartford, CT (Albert S. Dabrowski, U.S. Atty., D. Conn., Andrew P. Gaillard, Asst. U.S. Atty., of counsel), for appellee.

Before: ALTIMARI and McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judges, and WARD, District Judge. ^*

McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judge:

Defendant Angelina DiDomenico appeals from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut (Jose A. Cabranes, Chief Judge), convicting her, after a jury trial, of one count of wire fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1343 (Supp.1992), and one count of interstate transportation of stolen property, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2314 (Supp.1992). On appeal, DiDomenico contends that the district court erred when it refused to admit expert psychiatric testimony relating to her knowledge of whether certain property was stolen. We disagree and affirm the judgment.

BACKGROUND

More than $5,000 worth of computer equipment was stolen from a professor's office at Yale University. Thomas Parsons, DiDomenico's live-in boyfriend, acquired When the Exchange and a prospective buyer received the equipment, they discovered that some of the equipment had no serial numbers. The Exchange's sales manager then telephoned DiDomenico to confront her with this fact, whereupon she claimed that she had bought the equipment from a Jack Scott who, in turn, had purchased it from Computerland, a computer equipment retailer.

                this equipment shortly after the theft, and he told DiDomenico that he had some computer equipment he wanted to sell.   DiDomenico, at Parsons' suggestion, then telephoned the Boston Computer Exchange, a computer brokerage firm in Massachusetts, where she listed the stolen equipment for sale.   During that phone conversation (and on several subsequent occasions) DiDomenico falsely told the Exchange's employees that the equipment belonged to her brother, Peter.   When she shipped the equipment to the Exchange for sale she continued to use her brother's name as the sender
                

The President of the Exchange informed her that the equipment had come from Yale. DiDomenico replied that she was a graduate student at Yale (untrue) on a scholarship (untrue) and she expressed the fear that this incident might affect her status. Throughout these phone conversations, DiDomenico never mentioned her boyfriend's name, and he never spoke to anyone at the Exchange. After these conversations, the Exchange referred the matter to the F.B.I.

DiDomenico was indicted on one count of wire fraud and one count of interstate transportation of stolen property. Before trial, DiDomenico indicated that she would call a psychiatrist, C. Scott Grove, M.D., as an expert witness to testify that she had a "dependent personality disorder with narcissistic features;" and that a dependent personality is a "mental disease, defect, or condition" which appears as a designation in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Vol. III, Revised ("DSM-III"). The government responded by filing a motion in limine to exclude the testimony.

At a hearing on the motion, DiDomenico's counsel explicitly acknowledged that Dr. Grove would not testify concerning an insanity or lack of capacity defense. Nor would he testify that DiDomenico had an objective, identifiable organic brain injury. Rather, Dr. Grove's testimony would address the psychological implications of DiDomenico's childhood, her relationship with her parents, her idealization of her boyfriend, Parsons, and her sister's attempted suicide. All this was said to be relevant because it would assist the jury to determine DiDomenico's state of mind during the relevant time period. Counsel denied that Dr. Grove would testify on the ultimate issue of whether DiDomenico knew that the computer equipment was stolen.

Judge Cabranes granted the government's motion, ruling in pertinent part:

The fact that certain personality traits or conduct may be identified, categorized or characterized by the psychiatric profession by, for example, inclusion in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3rd Edition 1980) ("DSM-III") promulgated by the American Psychiatric Association, does not necessarily make the traits or conduct a "mental disease" or "mental disorder" that can be the basis of the defense of insanity, [see, e.g., United States v. Torniero, 570 F.Supp. 721 (D.Conn.1983), aff'd on other grounds, 735 F.2d 725 (2d Cir.1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1110, 105 S.Ct. 788, 83 L.Ed.2d 782 (1985) ], much less to be used in the way defendant suggests here.

....

The circumstances presented here suggest that this testimony would be even more problematical than that offered by the defendant in Torniero. We do not have here an objectively ascertainable organic brain injury, as in [United States v. McBride, 786 F.2d 45, 50 (2d Cir.1986) ], the principal case on which defendant relies.

Defendant here claims no such injury, and does not claim insanity, incompetence or other inability to appreciate the nature of these proceedings. The proffered testimony would show her asserted The trial then proceeded and shortly before the government rested its case, DiDomenico moved for reconsideration of the ruling excluding the disputed testimony, this time producing a written report from Dr. Grove. The report responded to Judge Cabranes's conclusion that the DSM-III's recognition of the dependent personality disorder was not significant and did not necessarily make it a mental disease or disorder for purposes of criminal law. Dr. Grove stated that DSM-III distinguishes between personality traits, which are universal, and personality disorders, which are not, and that DiDomenico's condition was a disorder. The report concluded that "her capacity to recognize ... evidence [that the computer equipment had been stolen] would have been seriously impaired as the direct result of the mental disorder described above." Judge Cabranes remained unpersuaded and excluded Dr. Grove's testimony.

                vulnerability and susceptibility to being duped by her boyfriend.   Expert testimony on this relatively commonplace experience is simply inappropriate.   This so-called disorder is surely one of "the host of attitudes and syndromes that are a part of daily living;"  "opinion evidence [on such matters] for exculpation or condemnation [goes] beyond the boundaries of current knowledge."  [United States v. Bright, 517 F.2d 584, 586 (2d Cir.1975) ]
                

DiDomenico took the stand. She testified that she did not know the equipment was stolen, either when she called the Exchange to list the equipment, or when she later shipped it there. She went on at some length about her lonely childhood, her painful relationship with her uncaring parents, and her relationship with her boyfriend, Tom Parsons. She testified that, at first:

[Parsons] was perfect. He was considerate, kind, he'd open the door for me, he'd make sure that I was comfortable, if I was cold he'd give me his coat. He just did everything right.

And nobody had ever done that for me before. He made me feel special, he made me feel like I mattered.

Even after the relationship soured, and Parsons began to abuse her verbally and physically, DiDomenico could not bring herself to break it off. She testified that:

... I needed him to validate my life. He was, he was the one that was telling me if I was worthy of having, of living, or if I wasn't. He was the primary source of my life. He was, like, my life.

The jury also heard about the effect that her losing a brother in his infancy had on DiDomenico's relationship with Parsons, and the enormous guilt DiDomenico felt over her younger sister's suicide attempt.

Over government objection, Judge Cabranes allowed DiDomenico to call Lisa Valentovish, a Yale University graduate and New Haven alderwoman, who also had a romantic relationship with Parsons. Valentovish testified that she met Tom Parsons in June 1989, some six months after the events at issue in this case, and found him to be intelligent, clean-cut, and sensitive. Moreover, she believed Parsons' stories that he was a U.C.L.A. engineering graduate, and that he owned a Jaguar and some computer equipment. Only after Parsons was arrested for stealing the Jaguar, did Valentovish discover that he had a criminal record, that the computer equipment was probably stolen, and that he had not completed high school but had acquired his knowledge of science from self-study in prison.

After Parsons was released from jail, Valentovish began dating him again. She testified that Parsons preyed upon her sense of guilt and convinced her that the only reason she was reluctant to resume dating was her fear that his criminal record would hurt her political career.

The jury found DiDomenico guilty on both counts of the indictment. Judge Cabranes departed downwardly from the Sentencing Guidelines and imposed a sentence of five years' probation, with the condition that DiDomenico obtain mental health counseling as deemed necessary by the United States Probation Office.

DISCUSSION

The only issue on appeal is DiDomenico's claim that the district court improperly excluded Dr. Grove's psychiatric testimony relating to her allegedly impaired ability to know that the computer equipment was stolen. She contends that the testimony would have presented an expert basis for her defense that she was manipulated by Parsons and that she lacked knowledge of Parsons' criminal activity.

A district court may admit the testimony of a qualified expert if his knowledge "will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact...