United States Supreme Court

The Second Circuit's reversal of defendant's forced labor and sex trafficking conviction is reversed where the Second Circuit-s plain error standard, under which a retrial was necessary whenever there was any possibility, no matter how unlikely, that the jury could have convicted based exclusively on defendant's conduct prior to the enactment of the statute under which he was charged, was inconsistent with the Supreme Court's approach to plain error, under which 1) the error must affect the appellant-s substantial rights, which in the ordinary case means it affected the outcome of the district court proceedings and 2) the error must seriously affect the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings.

Appellate Information

• Decided 05/24/2010
• Published 05/24/2010

Judges

Court

• United States Supreme Court

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