United States v. Robertson

The Ninth Circuit affirmed defendant's conviction for theft of mail by a postal employee and possession of stolen mail. The panel held that the district court did not err in denying defendant's motion to dismiss the indictment on due process grounds based on the government's failure to preserve a video of a Postal Service employee parking lot. In this case, the investigating agent did not act in bad faith and the exculpatory value of the video was speculative. The panel also held that the district court did not abuse its discretion by failing to instruct the jury on lost or destroyed evidence as a sanction for the government's failure to preserve the parking lot video; a conversation between the prosecutor and two investigating agents outside the courtroom did not violate Fed. R. Evid. 615; the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendant's request for production of an agent's notes under the Jencks Act; and the district court did not err by adopting a jury instruction on embezzlement of mail by a postal employee. View "United States v. Robertson" on Justia Law