U.S. v. Blanco
| Decision Date | 10 November 1988 |
| Docket Number | D,No. 1187,1187 |
| Citation | 861 F.2d 773 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Griselda BLANCO, Defendant-Appellant. ocket 85-1423. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
Franklin B. Mandel, New York City, for defendant-appellant.
Steven A. Standiford, Asst. U.S. Atty., New York City (Rudolph W. Giuliani, U.S. Atty. for the S.D.N.Y., Linda Imes, Asst. U.S. Atty., New York City, of counsel), for appellee.
Before OAKES, MESKILL and PIERCE, Circuit Judges.
On April 30, 1975, an indictment charging appellant Griselda Blanco and 37 others was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and the case was assigned to Judge John Cannella. The indictment charged the defendants with conspiring to manufacture, import into the United States, and distribute cocaine. By January 1976, twelve of the conspirators had been prosecuted and convicted, and two others had pleaded guilty.
When the indictment was returned in April, 1975, Blanco, a Colombian citizen, was living in Colombia. In May, 1975, the district court issued a warrant for her arrest. That year, Charles Cecil, a special agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration ("DEA"), began investigating Blanco's whereabouts. By 1977, Cecil had learned of her address in Colombia through an informant and he took several measures to keep track of Blanco's whereabouts and to discover whether she entered the United States.
In Colombia, Blanco travelled under a false name and carried a passport bearing that name. In 1977, Cecil's informant told him that Blanco said she would not travel to the United States because she was "wanted" there. Cecil urged the informant to try to persuade Blanco to travel to Costa Rica, a nation from which she might have been extradited. In 1977, Cecil also asked Blanco's lawyer to try to persuade her to surrender to United States authorities. He forwarded her alias to United States Customs. He checked American consulates in Colombia to see whether a visa had been issued to Blanco. In 1977, when he heard that Blanco may have been shot in Miami, he requested that DEA agents search Miami hospitals for a gunshot victim fitting Blanco's description. In 1980, when Cecil heard that Blanco may have been killed in Miami, he asked U.S. Customs officials to check bodies being shipped to Colombia for a body fitting Blanco's description.
After a warrant for Blanco's arrest was issued on October 4, 1974, the DEA issued a fugitive report on Blanco and listed it in the National Criminal Information System and the Treasury Enforcement Communications System. The DEA also put Blanco's name on passport and visa "lookouts" to search for her name and description.
The government did not request the extradition of Blanco from Colombia. According to the trial testimony of John Harris, a senior trial lawyer in the International Affairs Office of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, before 1982 extradition of Colombian citizens to the United States was governed by an 1888 treaty which did not require Colombia to extradite its citizens to the United States. He testified that when faced with extradition requests, the Colombian government looked to domestic Colombian law, which prohibited Colombia, apart from the treaty, from surrendering its citizens to another country. In light of Colombia's policy of denying extradition requests for the surrender of its citizens, the United States before 1982 discouraged prosecutors from submitting such requests to Colombia. Nonetheless, according to Harris, during this pre-1982 period at least two such extradition requests were made and Colombia denied each of them.
In 1982, a new extradition treaty between the United States and Colombia took effect. According to Harris, this treaty required Colombia to surrender drug smugglers to the United States. However, Harris testified, the President of Colombia announced that he did not intend to enforce the new treaty. Harris further testified that, because of the President's position, before April 1984, the United States had no chance of securing the extradition of Colombian citizens. It apparently is undisputed that the first Colombian citizens extradited to the United States under the 1982 treaty were not surrendered until January 1985.
On May 30, 1984, DEA Special Agent Robert Palombo spotted Blanco in Newport Beach, California. Palombo was conducting an investigation of suspected drug smuggling by Blanco's sons when he saw Blanco deliver cash to a DEA informant, in an attempt to launder money. Palombo later testified, at a hearing on November 30, 1987, that the government chose not to arrest Blanco then because to do so would have jeopardized both the life of the DEA informant and the investigation of Blanco's sons. The district court found this testimony credible.
Between May and September 1984, the government did not know where Blanco was located. In September 1984, Blanco was again seen delivering cash to the DEA informant. Between September 1984 and February 17, 1985, the DEA had only intermittent information about Blanco's whereabouts. During this period, Blanco used a false name and avoided disclosing to the informant her telephone number and address. After intensifying its surveillance and investigation of her, the DEA finally arrested Blanco in Irvine, California, on February 17, 1985. Blanco gave a false name to the DEA agents who arrested her and she was found to be carrying false identification papers.
Blanco's jury trial before Judge Cannella commenced on June 25, 1985 and ended July 9, 1985. At trial, the prosecution relied heavily on the testimony of Carmen Caban, a former drug dealer turned government witness. Caban testified at length about the operations between 1972 and 1975 of the cocaine importing ring in which Blanco allegedly participated. On cross-examination of Caban, Blanco's defense counsel inquired about Caban's cooperation agreement with the government, about a grant of immunity for Caban's past crimes, about the government's assistance in vacating a state conviction of Caban, and about financial help the government gave her. Counsel also inquired about Caban's extensive career as a drug dealer and her many past acts of lying, stealing, and defrauding. However, Judge Cannella prevented defense counsel from asking Caban about her alleged participation in a murder, ruling that the prejudice caused by testimony about this matter would far outweigh its probative value. The district judge also prevented Blanco's counsel from cross-examining another government witness, Gloria Caban, Carmen's sister, about her alleged participation in the same murder.
The trial judge allowed the prosecution to introduce evidence that at the time of her arrest Blanco was carrying false identification papers and that she gave the arresting officers a false name. Judge Cannella instructed the jury that this evidence need not necessarily show consciousness of guilt and he suggested to the jury reasons why an innocent person might conceal her identity. In his charge to the jury, the judge told the jury that it had the responsibility of deciding whether Blanco's concealment of her identity indicated consciousness of guilt.
To corroborate Caban's testimony about the existence of a drug importing conspiracy, the prosecution presented evidence of arrests of drug couriers, seizures of drugs, and conversations between suspected drug dealers which occurred between 1972 and 1975. For example, the prosecution introduced evidence of the 1972 arrest of one Antonio Romero, who was apprehended at Kennedy Airport trying to smuggle cocaine into the United States by concealing it in a dog cage. In his charge to the jury, Judge Cannella explained that to find Blanco guilty of conspiracy the jury had to find four elements: an agreement, an overt act, a violation of law, and Blanco's knowing participation. He told the jury:
It may be that you don't find there is any conspiracy at all, or that there is [sic] a number of conspiracies rather than one conspiracy, because the government must prove here there is one conspiracy, namely, that the drugs were gotten in Columbia [sic], brought in through Miami, or other places, and then brought to New York. That is the conspiracy that is charged, and that is the conspiracy they must prove, a single conspiracy....
The jury returned a verdict of guilty on one count of conspiracy to manufacture, import into the United States, and distribute cocaine. Following Blanco's conviction, the district court held a hearing on Blanco's motion to dismiss the indictment on the grounds that she had been denied a speedy trial. The district court denied this motion on November 6, 1985, finding that the delay was of Blanco's own making. Two days later, the court sentenced Blanco to fifteen years in prison and fined her $25,000. Blanco appealed. On December 23, 1985, this court remanded the case for a new hearing on the speedy trial issue, following the unsealing of the government's ex parte affidavits relating to the DEA's 1984 investigation in California of Blanco's sons. On January 26, 1988, the district court again denied Blanco's motion to dismiss the indictment, holding that the government's delay in arresting Blanco in California was justified. This appeal followed.
Blanco argues that the government violated her right to a speedy trial under the sixth amendment, under Fed.R.Crim.P. 48(b), and under this Circuit's former rules on the prompt disposition of criminal cases and that, consequently, the indictment should be dismissed. Alternatively, Blanco argues that she was denied a fair trial because of Judge Cannella's evidentiary rulings and she seeks a reversal of her conviction and a new trial. For the reasons stated below, we affirm.
Under the sixth amendment, all criminal defendants have a right to a speedy trial. In Barker...
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