[00:00:00] Speaker 01:
Runners, good morning.

[00:00:02] Speaker 01:
Ben Lechman on behalf of the appellant, Mr. Ruiz, I'd like to request four minutes reserved of rebuttal, please.

[00:00:09] Speaker 01:
Mr. Ruiz was wrongly convicted based on the erroneous admission of evidence under Federal Rule of Evidence 404B in this case.

[00:00:18] Speaker 01:
And that evidence is generally analyzed by this court under a four-part test.

[00:00:24] Speaker 01:
The first part of that test

[00:00:26] Speaker 01:
is a common sense rationale that the evidence tends to prove a material point in the case.

[00:00:32] Speaker 01:
And this evidence fails to meet, as well as the fourth problem, this problem in particular.

[00:00:37] Speaker 01:
In this case, it was Mr. Ruiz's defense that he was not the driver of the car that had actually transported the undocumented people in this case.

[00:00:47] Speaker 01:
His defense was not one of mistake or lack of knowledge.

[00:00:50] Speaker 01:
His defense was, this was the wrong car.

[00:00:53] Speaker 01:
Independent of whether that's his defense wasn't it still the government's obligation to prove knowledge It was but this evidence didn't tend to prove that and for a variety of reasons It doesn't show the knowledge of this prior offense and I do want to sort of and I don't mean to move away But I want to dovetail this with the fourth element, which is a similarity.

[00:01:12] Speaker 01:
It's a very different offense I know statutorily

[00:01:15] Speaker 01:
He was convicted of transportation in both instances.

[00:01:17] Speaker 01:
However, that prior offense was in 2022.

[00:01:20] Speaker 01:
It was really a bring to offense under the 1324 statute.

[00:01:24] Speaker 01:
And it's commonized to practice in Southern District for those cases to be resolved via plea agreement to the transportation.

[00:01:30] Speaker 01:
It doesn't carry the same minimum mandatory penalties as the bring to.

[00:01:34] Speaker 01:
And that was that offense.

[00:01:35] Speaker 01:
The prior offense was very different factually.

[00:01:38] Speaker 01:
That was offense where Mr. Ruiz was convicted of bringing two minors to the port of entry, lying about their status and attempting to have them enter.

[00:01:46] Speaker 01:
So his knowledge of those two individuals' immigration status doesn't prove a material point in this later prosecution where the

[00:01:55] Speaker 01:
defenses were these people even in the car.

[00:01:57] Speaker 01:
Never disputed that the people were undocumented in the present case.

[00:02:01] Speaker 01:
Never disputed that they were in a car.

[00:02:04] Speaker 01:
The dispute was whether it was his car that he drove.

[00:02:07] Speaker 00:
Again, I but maybe I'm missing your response here, but it seems like both offenses required him to prove knowledge Required the government to prove that knowledge that the people in the vehicle were illegal Aliens right, I mean we're undocumented undocumented yes, that is true that needs to be proven this evidence doesn't prove that and I would point that

[00:02:30] Speaker 01:
this court to two of its prior decisions where Rendon Duarte is a case where the defendant there was charged with illegal firearms possession and the evidence at trial that was presented under 404B was that

[00:02:45] Speaker 01:
He had been arrested in a car and there had been guns in that car before and the government's argument was the same as the court's question today which is isn't the government required to prove knowledge?

[00:02:56] Speaker 01:
Doesn't this in fact prove that knowledge?

[00:02:58] Speaker 01:
And the answer from this court in that case was no.

[00:03:01] Speaker 01:
Ultimately I think there was other overwhelming evidence and that defendant wasn't convicted but this court has in subsequent decisions found similar evidence.

[00:03:08] Speaker 01:
I think the Schramm case in 2018 from this court

[00:03:12] Speaker 01:
prove that in similar situations when the evidence is a little closer that that does warrant reversal.

[00:03:19] Speaker 01:
This court also made a similar finding in

[00:03:22] Speaker 01:
And in that case, it was the same sort of situation where the defendant was charged with illegally cutting down forestry.

[00:03:32] Speaker 01:
He had a prior incident of cutting down some forestry that he knew was on government land.

[00:03:37] Speaker 01:
The government in that case made the same argument.

[00:03:39] Speaker 01:
Isn't this relevant to prove knowledge?

[00:03:42] Speaker 01:
This court found that it wasn't.

[00:03:43] Speaker 01:
It didn't prove that material point.

[00:03:46] Speaker 01:
In terms of the prejudice in this case, I would say the evidence here wasn't overwhelming.

[00:03:50] Speaker 01:
The undocumented people were not found in Mr. Ruiz's car.

[00:03:54] Speaker 01:
The sort of star witness, the material witness in this case that was allegedly sitting behind the driver in the car in which he drove, he testified he wasn't able to identify Mr. Ruiz.

[00:04:05] Speaker 01:
The footguide in this case, common in these types of cases, had a WhatsApp chat with the person that he was supposed to pick up.

[00:04:12] Speaker 01:
the government presented cellular phone evidence but didn't have, couldn't link that to Mr. Wee.

[00:04:16] Speaker 01:
So this isn't a case like some of those other cases in this court where the evidence is overwhelming and there's no reason to overturn the conviction.

[00:04:25] Speaker 00:
The law enforcement officers saw the white car pull off of the shoulder and then followed that and your client was in that car.

[00:04:33] Speaker 00:
Correct.

[00:04:33] Speaker 00:
And then they went back to the spot where they had seen the white car pulled over and there were footprints leading away from that location, right?

[00:04:40] Speaker 01:
Correct.

[00:04:41] Speaker 00:
And they followed those footprints and found the undocumented aliens.

[00:04:47] Speaker 01:
True.

[00:04:48] Speaker 01:
And I think there was also testimony, this is a common area for cars to stop to do that.

[00:04:52] Speaker 01:
This is a common thing.

[00:04:54] Speaker 01:
It could have been any one of many cars that transverses very busy highway.

[00:04:58] Speaker 01:
So I think with that, I would reserve the rest of my time for a bottle unless the court has further questions.

[00:05:03] Speaker 01:
OK, thank you.

[00:05:12] Speaker 02:
Good morning.

[00:05:12] Speaker 02:
May it please the court, Peter Horn of the United States.

[00:05:16] Speaker 02:
The district court here did not abuse his discretion in admitting evidence of Ruiz's prior alien smuggling conviction at his trial.

[00:05:23] Speaker 02:
First, the evidence was relevant to material points, including the defendant's knowledge.

[00:05:31] Speaker 02:
It was admissible under 403, and the district court took all appropriate steps to mitigate any unfair prejudice.

[00:05:40] Speaker 02:
And finally, even if this court were to find some error, it was harmless in light of all the other independent and extensive evidence showing Ruiz is guilt.

[00:05:49] Speaker 02:
On the 404B requirements, this went to material points, and in particular, the defendant's knowledge, because it helped to show that he knew what he was doing on the road that day.

[00:05:59] Speaker 02:
A couple miles from the border, relatively remote highway, and failing to yield to law enforcement for miles.

[00:06:06] Speaker 02:
It also helped to show a lack of accident or mistake, that it wasn't just a coincidence, that it was him and his car just yards away from the aliens who were running away from it and ultimately found.

[00:06:18] Speaker 02:
This is the type of evidence that this court has routinely approved in alien smuggling cases, and it was properly admitted here, too.

[00:06:26] Speaker 02:
On the second requirement briefly, it was not too remote in time.

[00:06:29] Speaker 02:
16 months is well within the parameters this court has set, and there's no bright line rule on that.

[00:06:36] Speaker 02:
Also, in Ruiz's particular case, it really couldn't have been any closer when he, in fact, was still serving part of his sentence at a reentry center at the time he committed this offense.

[00:06:47] Speaker 02:
There's more than sufficient evidence to show that he committed it with the undisputed conviction documents and the party stipulation.

[00:06:55] Speaker 02:
In this court, going to Ruiz's counsel's point about the similarity, this court hasn't required similarity when the evidence goes to a defendant's knowledge.

[00:07:05] Speaker 02:
Even if this court does look to that, to the extent it does, these offenses are more than similar enough.

[00:07:11] Speaker 00:
So what exact knowledge would this prior conviction help to prove in the government's view?

[00:07:18] Speaker 00:
What's the exact bit of knowledge that you think this is relevant to?

[00:07:23] Speaker 02:
That he was knowingly transporting people and he was knowingly transporting aliens.

[00:07:29] Speaker 02:
And he was doing so for money.

[00:07:32] Speaker 02:
And there was evidence of the payment that came out in both cases as well.

[00:07:40] Speaker 02:
given the facts of this case where he's but it isn't that just to say that you think the fact that he committed that prior offense makes it more likely that he acted the same way here that sounds like when you describe it that way it sounds like propensity it's not what what it helps to show is that with him being the driver of the car car riding low in this area not yielding to law enforcement and then aliens are found within yards fifty yards from where they're running away from the car

[00:08:10] Speaker 02:
And as a converse, it wasn't just an accident.

[00:08:13] Speaker 02:
But he knew what he was doing there and what he was doing and why he was acting that way is because he was driving people illegally.

[00:08:24] Speaker 02:
And his prior commission of that helps to show that he knew what it meant, he had done it before, to transport people illegally into or within the United States.

[00:08:36] Speaker 02:
And as to mistake or lack of accident,

[00:08:39] Speaker 02:
Sort of the converse of that is, again, that it wasn't just by chance.

[00:08:43] Speaker 02:
It wasn't just a coincidence that he was there and within yards of those people.

[00:08:47] Speaker 02:
But it's because he was transporting them.

[00:08:49] Speaker 02:
And as Gomez, the guy testified, he had told them to get out once they were pursued.

[00:08:54] Speaker 02:
He told them to get down and then get out.

[00:08:58] Speaker 02:
On similarity, just to address that briefly,

[00:09:04] Speaker 02:
And this court hasn't required it, but in both of these cases, this isn't just to show propensity, but they're more than similar enough with Ruiz being the driver of the car with the aliens inside of it at or near the border and in both cases for payment.

[00:09:18] Speaker 00:
Under 403... Could any of the aliens identify him as the driver at the trial?

[00:09:23] Speaker 00:
Did any of them say, yeah, that's the guy?

[00:09:24] Speaker 02:
They did not.

[00:09:25] Speaker 02:
So Gomez was the only one of them who testified at trial.

[00:09:28] Speaker 02:
He was separately prosecuted as a guide.

[00:09:31] Speaker 02:
There was a stipulation as to the other material witnesses who did not testify at trial.

[00:09:36] Speaker 02:
There wasn't a particular identification from them.

[00:09:39] Speaker 02:
But three of the four border patrol agents who testified at trial did identify Ruiz as the driver, the driver of the Civic, who they followed and apprehended that day.

[00:09:50] Speaker 00:
Although that was based on?

[00:09:53] Speaker 00:
the identification they did when they pulled him from the car.

[00:09:56] Speaker 00:
They hadn't identified him earlier in the chase, right?

[00:09:59] Speaker 02:
That's correct.

[00:10:00] Speaker 02:
One of the agents testified about the neck tattoos he had seen earlier in the chase and identified the same tattoos on Ruiz.

[00:10:06] Speaker 02:
Ultimately, it came from when they arrested him at the end of the chase, though.

[00:10:10] Speaker 00:
So if the countervailing story is this car just happened to be pulled off at the shoulder there, another white car dropped off the aliens, and then this white car pulled off the shoulder, the fact that they could identify him from the later stop

[00:10:23] Speaker 00:
wouldn't really respond to that Conner story?

[00:10:28] Speaker 02:
Theoretically, I see Your Honor's point, and that's possible.

[00:10:35] Speaker 02:
That wasn't a particular defense or argument made at trial.

[00:10:39] Speaker 02:
But again, the fact of Ruiz's prior conviction helps to show that it was him in the car at the beginning and the end, and he knew what he was doing with the aliens in the car at that point.

[00:10:53] Speaker 02:
Just briefly on 403, as to unfair prejudice, the district court really did everything it could to minimize any unfair prejudice.

[00:11:01] Speaker 02:
There were cautionary instructions throughout the trial, during opening statements, when the evidence was admitted, and in final instructions.

[00:11:10] Speaker 02:
And of course, the government in closing also referred to those instructions.

[00:11:14] Speaker 02:
And what were sanitized conviction documents were not allowed to go back into the jury room.

[00:11:20] Speaker 02:
So the evidence was properly admitted, and there was no abuse of discretion under 403.

[00:11:25] Speaker 02:
And then briefly, to address harmlessness, there was a lot of independent evidence of Ruiz's guilt.

[00:11:30] Speaker 02:
That included the testimony of multiple border patrol agents who identified Ruiz, talked about the circumstances of

[00:11:38] Speaker 02:
location of his car, the circumstances of the pursuit.

[00:11:41] Speaker 02:
There was Gomez who, I don't know if it's fair to say he was a star witness, but he was a guide, who talked about going to bring that group into the United States, to that area of the road, looking for a white car.

[00:11:55] Speaker 02:
and what the driver Ruiz told them during the pursuit, which was to get down, get out after 20 or 30 minutes.

[00:12:03] Speaker 02:
And all that evidence was corroborated by his own text messages, which showed, in fact, the group was looking for a white car, a white Honda, and in that area based on GPS coordinates.

[00:12:12] Speaker 02:
That's more than enough to convict Ruiz.

[00:12:15] Speaker 00:
And so before the car pulled off it disappeared for a couple minutes, and then they reacquired it's pulled off on the side of the road right Before that time had they seen a license plate or anything like that that would allow them to know that it this is indeed the same car that we had been tailing before

[00:12:31] Speaker 02:
There was, and there was agent testimony, and going to your honor's question a couple moments ago, that's correct.

[00:12:38] Speaker 02:
There was observation of a license plate at the outset, and agents actually ran the plates, checked the registration, determined the crossing history and release of liability, and it was the same car that they apprehended a while later.

[00:12:56] Speaker 02:
Unless the court has any other questions, I'd submit.

[00:12:59] Speaker 02:
Yeah, good.

[00:13:00] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:13:01] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:13:06] Speaker 01:
We'll hear rebuttal.

[00:13:27] Speaker 01:
We don't think this is properly 404B, which is normally if something falls into 404B, it's de novo.

[00:13:32] Speaker 01:
And then finally, there was no 403 balancing test.

[00:13:34] Speaker 01:
And I do – I know Judge Curiel.

[00:13:36] Speaker 01:
I've appeared before him many times.

[00:13:37] Speaker 01:
He's a careful judge, a good judge.

[00:13:39] Speaker 01:
In this case, though, I don't think he actually did a 403 analysis.

[00:13:42] Speaker 01:
What he did do was remove some of the factual accoutrement of this offense in terms of some of the fact that there were minors.

[00:13:49] Speaker 01:
It was a port of entry.

[00:13:51] Speaker 01:
harmful in the sense that it makes the offense seem more similar, but he didn't actually conduct, the court did not conduct a real 403 balancing test in terms of does this really meet the standard of admissibility.

[00:14:03] Speaker 01:
And I think that's particularly true because the court's initial ruling on this at the Eliminator hearing was that this is important for knowledge.

[00:14:10] Speaker 01:
The government really didn't pick up, they've to their credit been consistent.

[00:14:13] Speaker 01:
Below, they argued this is for a mistake or lack of accident, and they've argued that same argument in their briefs.

[00:14:21] Speaker 01:
But none of those terms were ever mentioned in the defense case.

[00:14:24] Speaker 01:
You could do a word search through those transcripts.

[00:14:26] Speaker 01:
That just wasn't an issue.

[00:14:27] Speaker 01:
It's just not an issue in this case.

[00:14:29] Speaker 01:
And I agree with the court's comments that by saying, I think government counsel said, this evidence is relevant because it shows he knew what he was doing.

[00:14:36] Speaker 01:
That's just an amplification of the propensity inference.

[00:14:40] Speaker 01:
this court, and I think it was Romero, had said, look, we understand as a matter of nuance that there's a fine line sometimes between evidence that fits under 404B and just straight up propensity.

[00:14:51] Speaker 01:
It's this court's job to draw that line.

[00:14:54] Speaker 01:
And I would advocate for, in this case, this is that line where the evidence doesn't really prove his knowledge of something that's really not at issue in this case.

[00:15:02] Speaker 00:
Counsel, I thought I'd understood you in your opening remarks to suggest that maybe there was another car that the aliens had gotten out of

[00:15:10] Speaker 00:
But maybe I misunderstood, but it sounds like the license plate was seen before it was pulled over to the side of the road and then the same license plate, your client was discovered to be the driver of that car when it was stopped.

[00:15:23] Speaker 00:
And there were footprints leading away from the side of the road.

[00:15:26] Speaker 00:
So I'm struggling to come up with what the counter story is here.

[00:15:30] Speaker 01:
In my understanding of the counter story, Your Honor, to put it in sort of colloquial terms, is that there was a second car.

[00:15:36] Speaker 01:
And the car that the undocumented people were in was not the same car subject to the plate reader.

[00:15:42] Speaker 01:
That's my understanding of this.

[00:15:43] Speaker 01:
And that is why the evidence of Mr. Ruiz's knowledge doesn't really matter in this case in terms of whether it's a mistake or an accident, because it's his defense that

[00:15:53] Speaker 01:
He's not the same car as if these people rode it.

[00:15:58] Speaker 00:
Where's the other car?

[00:15:59] Speaker 01:
Oh, we don't know.

[00:16:01] Speaker 01:
That's the whole point.

[00:16:01] Speaker 01:
That car is gone.

[00:16:03] Speaker 01:
That car's in the wind.

[00:16:07] Speaker 01:
And with that, I'd submit unless the court has further questions.

[00:16:08] Speaker 01:
OK, thank you.

[00:16:09] Speaker 01:
Thank you very much, Your Honor.

[00:16:10] Speaker 01:
Thank you for your counsel for your arguments in the case.

[00:16:11] Speaker 01:
The case is now submitted.