United States v. Peterson

• Decision Date: 16 December 2019
• Docket Number: No: 18-4270,No. 18-4269,18-4269,: 18-4270
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff – Appellee, v. James Robert PETERSON, Defendant – Appellant. United States of America, Plaintiff – Appellee, v. Sok Bun, a/k/a Friday, Defendant - Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

945 F.3d 144

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff – Appellee,

v.James Robert PETERSON, Defendant – Appellant.

United States of America, Plaintiff – Appellee,

v.Sok Bun, a/k/a Friday, Defendant - Appellant.

No. 18-4269

No: 18-4270

United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.

Argued: October 30, 2019

Decided: December 16, 2019

ARGUED: Howard W. Anderson III, LAW OFFICE OF HOWARD W. ANDERSON III, LLC, Pendleton, South Carolina, for Appellants. Kathleen Michelle Stoughton, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: C. Carlyle Steele, LAW OFFICE OF C. CARLYLE STEELE, Greenville, South Carolina, for Appellant Sok Bun. Sherri A. Lydon, United States Attorney, Brook Bowers Andrews, Assistant United States Attorney, Robert Frank Daley, Jr., Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Before WILKINSON, MOTZ, and FLOYD Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by published opinion. Judge Wilkinson wrote the opinion, in which Judge Motz and Judge Floyd joined.

WILKINSON, Circuit Judge:

This case arises from the prosecution of two state inmates who were federally indicted for coordinating a methamphetamine distribution ring from prison. The overarching prosecution spanned three separate indictments; ensnared 15 other co-conspirators; and spawned some 50,000 pages of discovery. At the end of it, James Peterson and Sok Bun were tried together and found guilty. On appeal, they raise numerous claims, some jointly and others individually. One claim rises above the rest: They argue that the district court should have dismissed their initial indictment with prejudice because they were improperly transferred from federal to state custody in violation of the Interstate Agreement on Detainers Act (IADA). We disagree. The district court did not abuse its discretion in dismissing the indictment without prejudice, having carefully weighed the relevant set of non-exclusive factors set out in the IADA. Finding defendants’ remaining five claims without merit, we affirm the district court’s judgment.

I.

On September 14, 2016, Peterson and Bun, already inmates in the South Carolina Department of Corrections (SCDC), were indicted on a series of federal offenses for participating in a methamphetamine trafficking conspiracy while they were in prison. On September 25-29, 2017, the two were tried in connection with their involvement in this scheme. In those intervening twelve months, a litany of motions and procedural wrinkles bogged down the prosecution’s pace, the details of which the parties continue to debate. For purposes of this appeal, there are three key points to follow.

First, the parties disagreed extensively over where Peterson and Bun should have been held, consistent with federal law, in the leadup to their federal trial. Recall that defendants were indicted when they were already serving sentences in South Carolina state prison. This is important because the Interstate Agreement on Detainers Act generally requires an indicting jurisdiction (here, the federal government) to retain custody, once a detainer is filed, of a prisoner until disposing of his charges. 18 U.S.C. app. 2, § 2, art. IV(e). This dictate is often referred to as the IADA’s "anti-shuttling" provision. And here, on two occasions in November 2016, at least one defendant was transferred from federal custody to state detention facilities. See J.A. 274, 338. In particular, on November 30, 2016, Peterson was transferred from federal to state custody under circumstances that, as all parties now agree, were in violation of the IADA’s anti-shuttling provision. See J.A. 331.

In December 2016, defendants tried to have the charges against them dismissed with prejudice on the ground that the government violated the IADA by improperly transferring them from federal to state custody. They argued that the federal government had regularly violated the IADA in the District of South Carolina and that its conduct here was particularly egregious because it purportedly contravened a magistrate judge’s order directing Peterson to be held in federal custody until the end of proceedings. The United States moved to dismiss the indictment against both Peterson and Bun without prejudice. For reasons explained below, the district court decided that the IADA was violated only with respect to one defendant (Peterson), but dismissed without prejudice as to both. J.A. 338.

Second, there were a series of disputes over whether defendants were indicted properly and in a timely fashion. As noted, defendants were initially indicted in September 2016. Two other indictments followed. After the district court dismissed the charges against Peterson and Bun without prejudice under the IADA in January 2017, the government re-indicted defendants on the same charges on February 15, 2017. They were formally arrested on February 24, 2017. Then, on June 13, 2017, a grand jury returned a superseding indictment that added two new co-defendants but alleged the same substantive charges.

Defendants attempted to dismiss each of these indictments. They argued that the reindictment should be dismissed because the federal government violated the IADA’s requirement that defendants be brought to trial within 120 days of being transferred to federal custody once a detainer is filed. In addition, they claimed that the superseding indictment should be dismissed because it was filed too late under the Speedy Trial Act (STA). For reasons discussed below, the district court rejected both these claims in June and July 2017. Before trial, the court also granted three continuances, two of them over the objection of defendants.

Third, there were a few issues relating to the trial itself. As noted, defendants were eventually tried starting on September 25, 2017. After a four-day jury trial, Peterson and Bun were found guilty of all offenses. The district court sentenced Peterson to 330 months imprisonment and 5 years of supervised release, consecutive to the thirty-five year state sentence he was serving. Bun was sentenced to 360 months imprisonment and 5 years of supervised release, also consecutive to his state sentence of life in prison. Peterson alone challenges several evidentiary rulings made by the trial court.

We address the joint claims first—that is, the claims involving the IADA’s anti-shuttling provision, the Speedy Trial Act, and the IADA’s speedy trial rights—and then turn to the individual claims—that is, Peterson’s various evidentiary arguments.

II.

Peterson and Bun’s primary challenge is to the district court’s decision to dismiss the initial indictment without prejudice under Section 9(1) of the Interstate Agreement on Detainers Act. 18 U.S.C. app. 2, § 9(1). None of the parties contest that the government violated the IADA on November 30, 2016 when it transferred Peterson from federal custody to state prison after a pretrial hearing in federal court. See J.A. 331. The issue here is whether the district court abused its discretion in choosing, as provided for under the statute, to dismiss the indictment without rather than with prejudice. We conclude that it did not.

A.

The federal government and most states—South Carolina included—are signatories to the IADA, which sets out procedures by which one jurisdiction can resolve its charges against a prisoner in another jurisdiction’s custody. New York v. Hill , 528 U.S. 110, 111, 120 S.Ct. 659, 145 L.Ed.2d 560 (2000). In broad strokes, this compact aims to remove uncertainties surrounding out-of-jurisdiction charges against a prisoner, and to prevent interruptions to programs of treatment and rehabilitation. 18 U.S.C. app. 2, § 2, art. I.

Two main provisions of the IADA work in tandem to accomplish these goals. Article III provides prisoners with certain speedy trial rights. Packaged with these guarantees are the protections of Article IV, which include the anti-shuttling provision. Under that section, as noted, the indicting jurisdiction must retain custody of a prisoner and dispose of his charges before transferring him back to the sending jurisdiction. 18 U.S.C. app. 2, § 2, art. IV(e). Articles III and IV are both set in motion when the indicting jurisdiction files a detainer and the prisoner is sent to that jurisdiction. United States v. Mauro , 436 U.S. 340, 343-44, 98 S.Ct. 1834, 56 L.Ed.2d 329 (1978).

Ordinarily, a violation of the anti-shuttling provision visits strict consequences—a dismissal of the indictment with prejudice. 18 U.S.C. app. 2, § 2, art. IV(e). But Congress carved out an exception to this general rule for when the United States is the jurisdiction receiving a prisoner. 18 U.S.C. app. 2, § 9(1). In this circumstance, the statute empowers the district court to decide whether dismissal with or without prejudice is appropriate, after considering a non-exclusive list of statutory factors. These are (1) "the seriousness of the offense"; (2) "the facts and circumstances of the case which led to the dismissal"; and (3) "the impact of a reprosecution on the administration of the agreement on detainers and on the administration of justice." Id.

This court has not yet adopted a standard of review for Section 9 dismissals. But the right choice naturally flows from the principle that "whenever possible, the interpretation of the [IADA and the STA] should not be discordant." United States v. Odom , 674 F.2d 228, 281-32 (4th Cir. 1982). Because the IADA has a dismissal clause nearly identical to that of the STA, 18 U.S.C. § 3162(a), and because we review a district court’s decision to dismiss an indictment under the STA for abuse of discretion, United States v. Jones , 887 F.2d 492, 494 (4th Cir. 1989), we now hold the same standard applies in the IADA context. The decisions of our sister circuits are in accord. See United States v. Kelley , 402 F.3d 39, 41 (1st Cir. 2005) ; United States v. McKinney , 395 F.3d 837, 840 (8th Cir. 2005) ; United States v. Kurt , 945 F.2d 248,...