United States v. Crittenden

• Decision Date: 08 February 2022
• Docket Number: No. 18-50635,18-50635
• Citation: 25 F.4th 347
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff—Appellant, v. Samuel Tanel CRITTENDEN, Defendant—Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

25 F.4th 347

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff—Appellant,

v.Samuel Tanel CRITTENDEN, Defendant—Appellee.

No. 18-50635

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

FILED February 8, 2022

Joseph H. Gay, Jr., Elizabeth Berenguer, Assistant U.S. Attorneys, U.S. Attorney's Office, Western District of Texas, San Antonio, TX, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Mary Stillinger, Esq., Law Office of Mary Stillinger, El Paso, TX, for Defendant-Appellee.

Before Dennis, Elrod, and Costa, Circuit Judges.

Jennifer Walker Elrod, Circuit Judge:

After a jury convicted Samuel Crittenden of possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of methamphetamine, he moved for a new trial under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 33(a). Rule 33 "allows a district court to vacate any judgment and grant a new trial if the interest of justice so requires." Eberhart v. United States , 546 U.S. 12, 13, 126 S.Ct. 403, 163 L.Ed.2d 14 (2005) (quoting Fed. R. Crim. P. 33 ). The district court granted Crittenden's motion and the United States timely appealed.

The panel issued majority and dissenting opinions in August 2020. United States v. Crittenden , 971 F.3d 499 (5th Cir. 2020), withdrawn , 827 F. App'x 448 (5th Cir. 2020). After further reflection, in October 2020, the panel remanded the case for the limited purpose of allowing the district court to clarify whether it had granted a new trial because the evidence was insufficient to support a conviction or that, despite the sufficiency of the evidence, it "preponderated heavily against the guilty verdict."^* See Crittenden , 827 F. App'x at 449 (citing United States v. Herrera , 559 F.3d 296, 302 (5th Cir. 2009) ).

On remand, the district court made clear that, though the evidence was sufficient to support a conviction, the court had cautiously reweighed the evidence and found that it preponderated heavily against Crittenden's guilt. Specifically, the district court concluded that the evidence failed to show that Crittenden had knowledge of the nature of the controlled substance he possessed—as was required to convict him of possessing methamphetamine with the intent to distribute. Thus, the district court had concluded that it would be a miscarriage of justice to let the verdict stand and granted Crittenden's motion for a new trial.

We find no error in the district court's decision, which we review for abuse of discretion. United States v. Hoffman , 901 F.3d 523, 552 (5th Cir. 2018). Under binding Supreme Court and circuit precedent, a district court is permitted to carefully reweigh evidence, make credibility assessments, and act as a "thirteenth juror" in considering a motion for a new trial. Tibbs v. Florida , 457 U.S. 31, 42, 45 n.22, 102 S.Ct. 2211, 72 L.Ed.2d 652 (1982) ; see also United States v. Arnold , 416 F.3d 349, 361 (5th Cir. 2005) (noting that the district "court has the authority to make its own determination regarding the credibility of witnesses" on a Rule 33 motion for a new trial); United States v. Robertson , 110 F.3d 1113, 1117 (5th Cir. 1997) (noting that the district court "may weigh the evidence and may assess the credibility of the witnesses during its consideration of the motion for new trial").

Binding circuit precedent permits a district court to grant a new trial even where "the evidence is sufficient to support a conviction" but nevertheless "preponderate[s] heavily against the guilty verdict." Herrera , 559 F.3d at 302. Here, the district court "did not simply disregard the jury's verdict in favor of one it felt was more reasonable." Robertson , 110 F.3d at 1119. Indeed, the district court cautiously reweighed the evidence, determined that a mistake had been committed, and permissibly granted a new trial to "prevent a miscarriage of justice." Id. at 1119–20.

* * *

The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.

Gregg Costa, Circuit Judge, dissenting:¹

The Constitution twice says that juries decide criminal cases. U.S. CONST. art. III, § 2, cl. 3 ; id. amend. VI. The jury right's reappearance in the Sixth Amendment is no mere encore. The Bill of Rights includes the jury right among many guarantees for criminal defendants, whereas Article III requires juries as a structural protection. This original jury requirement ensures that unelected judges are not the only actors in our judiciary. "Just as suffrage ensures the people's ultimate control in the legislative and executive branches, jury trial is meant to ensure their control in the judiciary." Blakely v. Washington , 542 U.S. 296, 306, 124 S.Ct. 2531, 159 L.Ed.2d 403 (2004) ; see also AKHIL REED AMAR , AMERICA ' S CONSTITUTION : A BIOGRAPHY 237 (2005).

Article III's command that all trials "shall be by Jury" is why, for the first century of our Republic, a defendant could not elect to have a judge decide his fate. See Thompson v. Utah , 170 U.S. 343, 353–55, 18 S.Ct. 620, 42 L.Ed. 1061 (1898) ; Home Ins. Co. v. Morse , 87 U.S. (20 Wall.) 445, 451, 22 L.Ed. 365 (1874) (citing Cancemi v. People , 18 N.Y. 128 (1858) ); see also Patton v. United States , 281 U.S. 276, 50 S.Ct. 253, 74 L.Ed. 854 (1930) (allowing bench trials); Recent Development, Accused in Multiple Prosecution Held to Have Absolute Right to Waive Jury Trial , 59 COLUM. L. REV. 813, 814 (1959) ("Until shortly after the turn of the century, the federal courts and most state courts applied the common law rule that a jury trial can not be waived in a felony case in which the defendant enters a plea of not guilty."). In other words, the jury right is as much about jurors as it is about defendants. Cf. Powers v. Ohio , 499 U.S. 400, 409, 111 S.Ct. 1364, 113 L.Ed.2d 411 (1991) (holding that prospective jurors have the right not to be excluded based on race).

The jury's constitutional role in deciding criminal trials leaves little room for judicial second-guessing. Our review of verdicts is therefore quite limited. See, e.g., Burks v. United States , 437 U.S. 1, 16–17, 98 S.Ct. 2141, 57 L.Ed.2d 1 (1978). Likewise, the authority to grant a new trial when there is enough evidence to support the verdict, but the judge would weigh the evidence differently, is in some tension with Article III and the Sixth Amendment. As a result, although we review the grant of a new trial only for abuse of discretion, we have repeatedly warned that its discretion is not unbridled. United States v. Arnold , 416 F.3d 349, 360 (5th Cir. 2005) ; United States v. Robertson , 110 F.3d 1113, 1118 (5th Cir. 1997). Above all, a district court cannot use the new-trial power to "usurp the jury's function." United States v. Tarango , 396 F.3d 666, 672 (5th Cir. 2005) ; see also Arnold , 416 F.3d at 360 ; Robertson , 110 F.3d at 1118. Only "exceptional" circumstances warrant the strong medicine of a "thirteenth juror." United States v. Sinclair , 438 F.2d 50, 51 n.1 (5th Cir. 1971) (Wisdom, J.) (quoting 2 CHARLES ALAN WRIGHT , FEDERAL PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE § 553, at 487 (1969) ).

To prevent judges from too often taking a seat in the jury box, a district court may grant a new trial only when the evidence weighs so heavily against the verdict "that it would be a miscarriage of justice to let the verdict stand." Arnold , 416 F.3d at 360 (citation omitted); see also FED. R. CRIM. P. 33(a) (allowing court to grant new trial if "the interest of justice so requires"). Those words bear repeating: a miscarriage of justice. The jury's verdict in this case comes nowhere close to that. Indeed, far from a case in which the evidence "preponderate[s] heavily against the verdict," Arnold , 416 F.3d at 360, the great weight of the evidence supports this one.

Beaucoup evidence shows that Crittenden knew he possessed a controlled substance. I'll start with what should end the matter: Crittenden said as much. When agents confronted him about handing the bag to his wife, Carla Dominguez, he told them that he "thought" or "believed" it contained marijuana. The district court reasoned that, "if anything," Crittenden's confession showed merely that he "believed the bags contained marijuana." So apparently the validity of the verdict rendered by twelve citizens turns on whether the defendant said "I believed" instead of "I knew." This belief/knowledge distinction defies real life. People don't use the mens rea terms found in the United States Code when confessing. And they often try to hedge their culpability. The jury recognized Crittenden's confession for what it was. It's because of their broader understanding of everyday situations and language that jurors are better positioned to decide the facts than judges trained in the law. As this case shows, we have a proclivity for how-many-angels-can-dance parsing.

Crittenden's wife also admitted Crittenden's knowing participation in drug trafficking. The jury heard recordings of her telling the buyer that she was "working with her husband" and mentioning "trafficking marijuana with her husband."

The statements of Crittenden and his wife are direct evidence of his knowledge.

Standing alone they are strong evidence of guilt.

But wait—there's more.

Most drug cases rely on circumstantial evidence to prove state of mind. See United States v. Cano-Guel , 167 F.3d 900, 904 (5th Cir. 1999). There was plenty of that here. Yet the district court ignored most of it, focusing only on the confession that the court rationalized away. That failure to grapple with other incriminating evidence alone is an abuse of discretion. See Hernandez v. Lynch , 825 F.3d 266, 271–72 (5th Cir. 2016) (holding that the BIA abused its discretion when it ignored evidence that counseled against its ruling); United States v. Ouedraogo , 531 F. App'x 731, 745 (6th Cir. 2013) (unpublished) (reversing grant of new trial because the district court's "rationale ... overlook[ed], or improperly discount[ed], much of the evidence").

Overlooking the circumstantial evidence is a more glaring problem because it is so compelling. Dominguez testified that she and Crittenden were worried about having the plastic tub...