United States v. Torres

Torres was convicted of knowingly transporting 73 kilograms of cocaine across the U.S.-Mexico border concealed in a specially constructed compartment of his pickup truck, 21 U.S.C. 952, 960. At his first trial, which ended in a hung jury, the district court permitted Torres to testify that his friend in Tijuana, Griese, borrowed his truck on several occasions and that the modifications and concealment could have been made to his truck without his knowledge. On retrial, Torres attempted to testify about other requests made to him by Griese, who Torres claimed was manipulating him into unknowingly carrying drugs across the border by asking him for favors running errands in San Diego. The district court precluded this line of questioning as hearsay and irrelevant. The Ninth Circuit affirmed. While some questions may constitute non-hearsay, where the declarant intends the question to communicate an implied assertion and the proponent offers it for this intended message, the question falls within the definition of hearsay. Even if the district court erred in sustaining the hearsay objection, the exclusion did not amount to constitutional error; exclusion of the testimony about the friend’s requests would also have been harmless under the non-constitutional error standard View "United States v. Torres" on Justia Law