United States Ninth Circuit

In this case, defendant challenges his conviction for being a felon in possession of a firearm on grounds that there was insufficient evidence that he possessed the firearm and that the district court erred by failing to call for closing arguments from the parties before rendering its guilty verdict. The judgment is affirmed, where: 1) waiver of the right to give a closing argument may be implicit and inferred from counsel's conduct, so long as there was a meaningful opportunity to request argument and the trial judge does nothing to prevent counsel from giving a closing argument; 2) defendant implicitly waived his right to give a closing argument in this case; and 3) the evidence presented at trial was sufficient to support the conviction.

Appellate Information

• Decided 04/02/2015
• Published 04/02/2015

Judges

• Orrick

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel