U.S. v. Litteral

• Decision Date: 30 July 1990
• Docket Number: 89-10039,Nos. 88-1453,s. 88-1453
• Citation: 910 F.2d 547
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Aaron Leon LITTERAL and Dell Rae Wyatt, Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 547

910 F.2d 547

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Aaron Leon LITTERAL and Dell Rae Wyatt, Defendants-Appellants.

Nos. 88-1453, 89-10039.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted Dec. 12, 1989.

Decided July 30, 1990.

Thomas V. Miles, Barry Nix, Mark Coleman, Fresno, Cal., for defendants-appellants.

Carl M. Faller, Asst. U.S. Atty., Fresno, Cal., for plaintiff-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California.

Before CHOY, TANG and FLETCHER, Circuit Judges.

TANG, Circuit Judge:

Aaron Leon Litteral and Dell Rae Wyatt appeal their convictions on various charges relating to methamphetamine manufacturing. We affirm.

FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS BELOW

In December of 1987, an informant told the El Paso, Texas, office of the United States Marshal that Litteral, the subject of a federal arrest warrant, was residing in Mohave, California. The El Paso office relayed this information to its Fresno office. On December 28, 1987, the Fresno office called the informant, a codefendant of Litteral in a prior case. She told the Between 1:30 and 1:45 p.m., law enforcement officers went to the property to execute the outstanding arrest warrant for Litteral. When they entered the property, the law enforcement officers encountered Wyatt who lived there. Soon after entry, the officers conducted a sweep of the mobile home and the adjacent buildings in an attempt to locate Litteral. While in the mobile home, one of the officers observed items in the bedroom which he identified as narcotics paraphernalia. He also observed a white powdery substance on the dresser and approximately $3,000 in cash spread out on the bed.

Fresno Marshal's office that her brother and sister had seen Litteral at a mobile home in Mohave, California. She also said that Litteral had been living at that home for several months. The informant had also seen Litteral in Mohave driving a yellow Chevy Camaro and a blue Ford Bronco. On December 28, 1987, at approximately noon, the informant met with the United States Marshals in Mohave and repeated her information. At approximately 1:00 p.m., the informant went with the law enforcement officers on a drive-by of the residence. During the drive-by, the officers saw both a yellow Camaro and a blue Bronco. The informant told the United States Marshals that if the Bronco was at the residence, Litteral was probably there.

Approximately fifteen minutes after the officers first entered the property, Litteral drove up in a pickup truck. The officers arrested Litteral pursuant to the arrest warrant. Based on what the officer had seen in the mobile home, the law enforcement officials obtained a telephonic search warrant. When the officers executed the search warrant, they found: (1) numerous items of equipment which are used to manufacture methamphetamine, including flasks, a heating mantle, a condenser, a scale and breathing devices; (2) liquid which included methamphetamine; (3) chloropseudoephedrine, a powder which is produced during an intermediate step in the manufacturing of methamphetamine; (4) documents located in a briefcase in the living room which listed chemicals necessary to manufacture methamphetamine as well as an outline of the manufacturing process (subsequent analysis revealed numerous fingerprints of Wyatt on these documents); (5) methamphetamine; and (6) a receipt from a chemical company for the purchase of two chemicals used in a methamphetamine manufacturing process.

After his arrest, Litteral made a number of statements to law enforcement officers. He said that he had been living at the property off and on since August 1987. In addition, he said that the majority of the methamphetamine lab had been moved several days prior to his arrest and that the rest of the lab would have been moved in the next couple of days. He also stated that the laboratory could produce 100 pounds of methamphetamine but that it took more than two people and several days to accomplish that. Finally, he said that the several large drums that were found on the property were used for mixing chemicals during the "chlorination" stage of the methamphetamine manufacturing.

On January 28, 1988, the grand jury indicted Litteral and Wyatt for conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine, as well as for manufacturing methamphetamine. The grand jury also indicted Wyatt for maintaining a place for the manufacturing of methamphetamine.

Wyatt moved to quash the search warrant and suppress evidence. In her motion, Wyatt contended that the officers did not have reason to believe that Litteral was on the property. She also argued that the officers' conduct violated her privacy expectations. Litteral joined Wyatt's motion on the basis that he had standing because he had lived on the premises on and off since August of 1987.

At the hearing on the motion to suppress, Wyatt stated that Litteral did not live on the property but was there from time to time and slept there occasionally. She estimated that Litteral was present at the residence ten percent of the time.

The district court denied Wyatt's and Litteral's motion to suppress. In that denial, the district court stated that the informant's Litteral also filed a motion asking the district court either to declare the Sentencing Guidelines unconstitutional, or in the alternative to find that the Guidelines did not apply to him. Wyatt joined Litteral's motion. The district court sentenced Litteral under both the Guidelines and the preexisting sentencing scheme. The district court also sentenced Wyatt under both the Guidelines and the preexisting sentencing scheme. Both Litteral and Wyatt filed timely appeals.

statement "that Litteral has been residing in the mobile home has not been discredited."

DISCUSSION

Litteral's Appeal

1. Sufficiency of the Evidence

Litteral contends that insufficient evidence supports his convictions for (1) conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine; and (2) manufacturing, or aiding and abetting in the manufacturing of methamphetamine.

In reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence on appeal, "the relevant question is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt." Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2789, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979) (emphasis in original); see also United States v. Luttrell, 889 F.2d 806, 809 (9th Cir.1989).

"The essential elements of a conspiracy are (1) an agreement to engage in criminal activity, (2) one or more overt acts taken to implement the agreement, and (3) the requisite intent to commit the substantive crime." United States v. Meyers, 847 F.2d 1408, 1412-13 (9th Cir.1988). " 'The prosecution need not show the agreement to have been explicit. An implicit agreement may be inferred from the facts and circumstances of the case.' " United States v. Hernandez, 876 F.2d 774, 777 (9th Cir.) (quoting United States v. Monroe, 552 F.2d 860, 862 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 431 U.S. 972, 97 S.Ct. 2936, 53 L.Ed.2d 1069 (1977)), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 179, 107 L.Ed.2d 135 (1989). "Once the existence of the conspiracy is shown, evidence establishing beyond a reasonable doubt a knowing connection of the defendant with the conspiracy, even though the connection is slight, is sufficient to convict him of knowing participation in the conspiracy." Meyers, 847 F.2d at 1413.

To prove that a defendant has manufactured methamphetamine, the government must show that a defendant manufactured the drug and did so knowingly or intentionally. See 21 U.S.C. Sec. 841(a)(1).

"The elements necessary to convict an individual under an aiding and abetting theory are (1) that the accused had the specific intent to facilitate the commission of a crime by another, (2) that the accused had the requisite intent of the underlying substantive offense, (3) that the accused assisted or participated in the commission of the underlying substantive offense, and (4) that someone committed the underlying substantive offense." United States v. Gaskins, 849 F.2d 454, 459 (9th Cir.1988).

We conclude that sufficient evidence supports Litteral's convictions for (1) conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine; and (2) manufacturing methamphetamine, or aiding and abetting in the manufacturing of methamphetamine. A rational jury could have convicted Litteral on both counts based on the following evidence: (1) Litteral admitted he lived at Wyatt's mobile home on and off for four months prior to his arrest; (2) the mobile home contained (i) methamphetamine powder, (ii) a receipt for purchase of chemicals used in methamphetamine production, (iii) chloropseudoephedrine, a chemical produced during an intermediate step in the manufacturing process, (iv) a shopping list of chemicals to produce methamphetamine, (v) an outline of the steps in methamphetamine production, (vi) liquid in the freezer which contained methamphetamine; (3) expert testimony that freezing methamphetamine maximizes the amount of methamphetamine that can be produced; (4) Litteral's statement that most of the laboratory had been dismantled; and (5) Litteral's statements that the This evidence sufficiently supports the conspiracy charge. From the abundant evidence of manufacturing, as well as Litteral's admission of involvement in manufacturing, any rational jury could find that Litteral and Wyatt had agreed to conspire to manufacture methamphetamine. Litteral's admission of involvement provides the knowing connection to the conspiracy.

lab could produce 100 pounds of methamphetamine.

Though the lab may not have been manufacturing drugs at the moment the officers executed the warrant, the evidence found and Litteral's admission provides more than sufficient evidence for a jury to conclude that manufacturing had recently occurred at the site. Indeed, the jury could even...