USA v. Aponte

• Decision Date: 01 September 2010
• Docket Number: Nos. 09-3461, 09-3569.,s. 09-3461, 09-3569.
• Citation: 619 F.3d 799
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Luis Jose APONTE, Appellant. United States of America, Appellee, v. Christian Tapia-Valentin, Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

619 F.3d 799

UNITED STATES of America, Appellee,

v.Luis Jose APONTE, Appellant.

United States of America, Appellee,

v.Christian Tapia-Valentin, Appellant.

Nos. 09-3461, 09-3569.

United States Court of Appeals,Eighth Circuit.

Submitted: April 16, 2010.

Filed: Sept. 1, 2010.

Clarence E. Mock, III, argued, Oakland, NE, for appellant Tapia-Valentin.

Karen Marie Shanahan, AFPD, argued, Omaha, NE, for appellant Aponte.

Robert C. Sigler, AUSA, argued, Omaha, NE for appellee.

Before LOKEN, BRIGHT, and MELLOY, Circuit Judges.

MELLOY, Circuit Judge.

Luis Jose Aponte and Christian Tapia-Valentin were traveling in a sport utility vehicle near Omaha, Nebraska when law enforcement officers stopped them for a traffic violation. The officers found approximately one kilogram of a methamphetamine mixture inside the plastic lining of a round cooler located in the cargo area of the vehicle. Both men were convicted of possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of a methamphetamine mixture in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) and (b)(1)(A)(viii). In this appeal, Aponte and Tapia-Valentin contend that the district court should have granted their motions for a judgment of acquittal because the evidence was insufficient for a jury to reasonably conclude that they knew of the drugs inside the lining of the cooler. We reverse.

I.

At approximately 2:30 P.M. on January 13, 2009, Deputy Jason Bargstadt of the Douglas County Sheriff's Department stopped a Nissan Xterra because the state name on the license plate was obstructed and because it was following closely behind another vehicle. Aponte was driving the vehicle and Tapia-Valentin was a front-seat passenger. Bargstadt asked Aponte if the vehicle belonged to him. He replied that the vehicle belonged to a friend, “Victoria, Victoria, Maria Maria, Victoria Ashaga.” Aponte then produced an Illinois driver's license and an Illinois registration showing that the car belonged to Maria V. Usuga. Tapia-Valentin said he did not have a driver's license, but he provided a valid passport as identification.

Aponte then accompanied Bargstadt back to the cruiser, where Bargstadt asked where the two men were going and why. Aponte stated that the two men were traveling to Cheyenne, Wyoming-although he mispronounced “Cheyenne”-to visit Aponte's cousin for a couple of days. Bargstadt then asked Aponte about the owner of the vehicle. Aponte explained that her name was Victoria and that she used to work for Aponte at a restaurant that he owned in Chicago. Aponte could not recall Victoria's last name, but he responded affirmatively after Bargstadt asked, “Is it Usuga?” Aponte offered to call the owner of the car, but Deputy Bargstadt said “that's fine.” Bargstadt then asked if Aponte was employed, and Aponte explained that he had sold his restaurant in Chicago. Next, Bargstadt asked Aponte about his relationship with Tapia-Valentin. Aponte responded that the two knew each other for about two years and that Tapia-Valentin previously lived in New York. Aponte added that Tapia-Valentin was also a former employee at the restaurant.

Another Sheriff's Department officer arrived on the scene, and Bargstadt asked Aponte to go sit in the recently arrived cruiser. After Aponte exited Bargstadt's cruiser, Bargstadt asked a DEA special agent via telephone to run criminal history checks on Aponte and Tapia-Valentin. Both checks came back negative for any record or warrants. By the time Bargstadt learned the results of the criminal history checks, a third officer arrived on the scene. While Aponte was in the second cruiser, he again said that the two men were traveling to Cheyenne to see Aponte's cousin.

Bargstadt returned Aponte's driver's license and asked if everything in the vehicle belonged to him and Tapia-Valentin, and Aponte said yes. Bargstad asked whether the vehicle contained anything illegal, including drugs, or large amounts of money. Aponte responded no to each question. Bargstad then asked for consent to search the vehicle, which Aponte granted.

Bargstadt then approached the passenger side of the vehicle and had a short conversation with Tapia-Valentin, who stated that the two men were going to Cheyenne for a couple of days to see Aponte's cousin. Tapia-Valentin also said that he lived in Chicago and used to live in New York. Upon Bargstadt's request, Tapia-Valentin exited the Xterra and entered the first cruiser. Aponte remained in the second cruiser while the three officers began searching the vehicle on the side of the highway.

The officers focused primarily on the backseat and the area underneath the backseat, where the fuel sending unit is located. One officer opened the vehicle's back hatch and searched the cargo area for approximately forty seconds. Later, a different officer searched the cargo area for fifteen seconds. After about seven minutes of searching the vehicle on the side of the road, the officers found no drugs or money. Due to the cold temperatures, the officers asked Aponte to drive the Xterra to the sheriff's office so the officers could continue the search indoors. Aponte complied and followed Bargstadt's cruiser to the sheriff's office. While en route, Bargstad asked Tapia-Valentin, who was still in the first cruiser, why the two men were going to Cheyenne. Tapia-Valentin responded, “I don't know, because they closed the restaurant ... [inaudible] ... We don't got work now.”

The officers resumed searching the vehicle at the sheriff's office outside the presence of Aponte and Tapia-Valentin. The officers removed all items from the vehicle, but they did not diagram or photograph the location of items prior to removal. Bargstadt and Officer Jarrod Wineinger recalled that one bag containing clothing and toiletries was in the cargo area of the vehicle, but neither officer knew who the bag belonged to, who placed the bag in the cargo area, or where the bag was located in relation to other items in the cargo area.

The officers eventually turned their attention to a round cooler in the cargo area, which contained a bottle of water, two bottles of Gatorade, and water that one officer speculated was from melted ice. The officers first noticed that the cooler's weight “didn't seem right,” and then they noticed some non-factory glue seeping from the seam between the orange/red cooler exterior and the white liner. After dismantling the cooler, the officers found four baggies wrapped around the cooler's inner core. In total, the baggies contained 1,047.7 grams of a substance containing a detectable amount of methamphetamine. No fingerprints of any value were found on the methamphetamine packaging or the outside of the cooler. Three latent fingerprints and one latent palm print were developed on the white liner of the cooler, but the prints did not match Aponte or Tapia-Valentin.

II.

Aponte and Tapia-Valentin were indicted and tried for possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of a mixture or substance containing a detectable amount of methamphetamine, its salts, isomers, or salts of its isomers, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) and (b)(1)(A)(viii). During the government's case in chief, the jury was shown a number of photographs of the vehicle and cooler as well as a video recording from Bargstadt's dashboard camera, which included audio from a microphone on Bargstadt's uniform. ¹ The government supplemented that evidence with testimony from Bargstadt and one of the other officers who participated in the search. In addition to describing the events detailed above, Bargstadt testified about his impressions from his encounters with Aponte and Tapia-Valentin. Specifically, he testified that Aponte and Tapia-Valentin answered all of his questions fully and completely and that Aponte and Tapia-Valentin told him the same thing, albeit with a few differences in pronunciation. Further, he stated that neither Aponte nor Tapia-Valentin appeared to be nervous or under the influence of drugs.

The government's final witness was Mark Lang, a criminal investigator and former police officer. Lang testified about the characteristics of a drug “mule,” which he identified as a person who knowingly transports drugs from one point to another. Lang testified that, in his experience, several of the circumstances in this case were not unusual for drug mules. For example, Lang stated it is not unusual for (1) two mules to be in a car owned by an absent third party, (2) none of the mule's fingerprints to be found on the contraband, and (3) the mule to consent to search the vehicle. Lang further testified that the street value of the methamphetamine in the cooler was between $25,000 and $30,000, and that he has never encountered a situation where a drug dealer misplaced $25,000 worth of methamphetamine. On cross-examination, Lang admitted that he had no knowledge about Aponte or Tapia-Valentin and that he had no statistical data relating to the characteristics of drug mules.

At the close of the government's case, Aponte and Tapia-Valentin each moved for a judgment of acquittal, claiming that the evidence was insufficient to establish that they knew about the methamphetamine in the cooler. The district court overruled the motions, finding that there was enough evidence to satisfy the government's “fairly minimal” burden on an acquittal motion. The court stated:

I agree with Mr. Lang's assessment that drug dealers don't usually lose track of $20,000 or $15,000 worth of drugs. Somebody knew there were drugs in that car and it's got to be one or both these individuals. And the government has proven a relationship between those two individuals. Whether that's enough for a jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt I think is for them to decide at this juncture....

Aponte testified at trial, but Tapia-Valentin did not. Aponte explained that he met Tapia-Valentin while they were playing on the same soccer team in Chicago. He also stated that a third person, Miguel Lira, was supposed...