United States First Circuit

District court's sentence and conviction of defendants for conspiring to possess drugs with the intent to distribute is affirmed where: 1) under the totality of the circumstances, the existence of common purpose, distribution of drugs, interdependence of various elements in the overall plan, and overlap among defendants, a reasonable jury could have convicted each of the defendants of the single conspiracy charge; 2) district court did not err in allowing a witness to testify as the defendant had not preserved a delayed disclosures claim; 3) court did abuse its discretion in admitting evidence of a firearm as it was clearly a relevant evidence and Rule 403 balancing did not weigh in favor of exclusion; 4) district court did not abuse its discretion in ruling that murder evidence was relevant, and even were the circuit court to conclude that the district court erred in admitting the evidence, the error would not be clear or obvious; 5) district court did not err in severing defendant's trial from his codefendants as he did not file a severance motion before trial; and 6) district court did not err in determining the drug quantity findings in sentencing the defendants under the sentencing Guidelines.

Appellate Information

• Decided 08/26/2009
• Published 08/26/2009

Judges

• HOWARD, Circuit Judge., Before LIPEZ and HOWARD, Circuit Judges, and DiCLERICO, District Judge.

Court

• United States First Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Laura Maldonado Rodríguez, for appellant Leonardo Rivera Torres., Saul Roman Santiago, for appellant José A. Rivera Calderón., Rafael Anglada-López, for appellant Jesús Pomales-Pizarro., Judith H. Mizner, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Federal Defender Office, District of Massachusetts, for appellant Luis Daniel Rosario-Rivas.


• For Appellees:
  
• German A. Rieckehoff, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom Nelson Pèrez-Sosa, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief, Appellate Division and Rosa Emilia Rodriguez Velez, United States Attorney, were on brief, for appellee.