United States First Circuit

Conviction of conspiring to distribute cocaine is affirmed, where the district court did not abuse its discretion when: 1) it allowed the government to introduce the lay opinion testimony of Trooper Cepero, who identified defendant as the speaker in the intercepted telephone conversations; 2) it allowed the government to provide the jury with transcripts of the intercepted phone conversations which identified one of the speakers by his first name, i.e. Hipolito; 3) it admitted evidence of unrelated drug seizures; 4) it refused to provide the jury with defendant's requested instruction on race, ethnicity and national origin, and to determine the drug quantity attributable to defendant; and 5) it found that the ledgers were sufficiently reliable to hold defendant accountable for at least five kilograms of cocaine, as required to sentence him to the mandatory minimum of ten years.

Appellate Information

• Decided 04/29/2013
• Published 04/29/2013

Judges

• TORRUELLA

Court

• United States First Circuit

Counsel