United States v. Castillo-Najer , 541 F. App'x 895 ( 2013 )

FILED
United States Court of Appeals
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS Tenth Circuit
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT November 18, 2013
Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v. No. 12-3340
(D.C. No. 2:11-CR-20023-KHV-1)
VICTOR CASTILLO-NAJER, (D. Kan.)
Defendant - Appellant.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT*
Before GORSUCH, ANDERSON, and HOLMES, Circuit Judges.
Victor Castillo-Najer appeals his conviction for aiding in the distribution of
more than 100 kilograms of marijuana. He says the district court should’ve granted
his motion for a new trial because there wasn’t enough evidence to establish his guilt.
This court has explained that a “district court should grant such a motion only in
exceptional cases in which the evidence preponderates heavily against the verdict.”
*
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously to grant the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs without oral
argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore
ordered submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment is not binding
precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral
estoppel. It may be cited, however, for its persuasive value consistent with
Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th Cir. R. 32.1.
United States v. Cesareo-Ayala, 576 F.3d 1120, 1126 (10th Cir. 2009) (internal
quotation marks omitted). We review the district court’s denial of a motion for new
trial for an abuse of discretion. Id. Here we see none.
At the heart of this case lies a credibility contest. At trial the government
presented evidence linking Mr. Castillo-Najer to the drug deal; Mr. Castillo-Najer
offered an innocent explanation of the facts. In the end, the jury chose to credit the
government’s account. As the district court observed, the jury’s choice was a
reasonable if not unassailable one, and it certainly can’t be said to labor upstream
against the predominant tide of evidence presented at trial.
The government’s case went like this. A confidential informant was tasked by
Mexican drug smugglers to transport a large shipment of marijuana to Kansas City.
The informant tipped off authorities to the shipment and proceeded to work with
them to apprehend the intended recipient. The informant told officers that the drugs
were to be delivered to “Kiko” in Kansas City. Two undercover detectives, John
Hernandez and Octavio Pasillas, then took possession of the marijuana and told the
informant to give Kiko their phone number. The informant later notified the
detectives that their phone number had been provided to Kiko, and gave the
detectives Kiko’s phone number (228-215-6217). Soon, the detectives received two
calls from 918-530-6172, but they did not answer those calls. Instead,
Detective Pasillas called the 228-215-6217 number to arrange a meeting to deliver
the drugs. He testified that the person on the phone identified himself as Kiko.
-2-
The next day the detectives drove their truck loaded with the drugs to a
parking lot by a Lowe’s store. When they arrived, Detective Pasillas called Kiko to
let him know where they were parked. During the conversation, Kiko asked
Detective Pasillas to meet him somewhere else, but Detective Pasillas refused.
Several minutes later, a blue Toyota Tundra approached the detectives’ truck and
Detective Pasillas spoke with the driver. Detective Pasillas testified that the driver
(again) asked to move the transfer to a different location, but the detective told the
driver “this is the way it’s going to have to go, we have to stay here. My orders were
to deliver it to you. If you’re Kiko, then I’m going to deliver it to you right here,
right now.” R., Vol. 2 at 304. Detective Pasillas testified that the driver said he was
Kiko but drove away.
Soon enough, though, he and Detective Pasillas exchanged a few more phone
calls about how the transfer should be made. Ultimately, Kiko advised Detective
Pasillas that he would be sending someone else in a grey vehicle to pick up the drugs.
And, in fact, within a few minutes a grey minivan arrived and parked next to the
detectives’ truck. Two men loaded the minivan with garbage bags from the
detectives’ truck. The bags smelled of marijuana and, at one point, one of the bags
opened revealing bricks of marijuana wrapped in cellophane. After the bags were
loaded into the minivan, the undercover detectives gave a signal to other detectives in
the area — detectives who proceeded to arrest the two men by the minivan and
Mr. Castillo-Najer who was found in the blue Toyota Tundra truck in a different
-3-
parking lot nearby. At trial, Detective Pasillas identified Mr. Castillo-Najer as the
driver of the truck who had said he was Kiko.
In the truck, the detectives found four cell phones and a hand gun.
Mr. Castillo-Najer told the detectives that two of the phones were his: numbers
913-752-7552 and 918-530-6172 (the number from which the detectives had received
two unanswered calls the day before the transfer). Mr. Castillo-Najer said that the
other two phones belonged to his cousin “Primo”; they had numbers 319-462-1046
and 228-215-6217 (the number the informant had provided to the detectives as
Kiko’s phone number and had been used to coordinate the transfer of the drugs). The
government introduced phone records at trial showing calls from 228-215-6217 to the
confidential informant’s phone and the undercover detectives’ phone on the day
before and the day of the transfer; and calls from 913-752-7552 and 319-462-1046 to
the phone of one of the men who arrived in the minivan to help transfer the drugs,
calls made in the minutes leading up to the transfer.
For his part, Mr. Castillo-Najer offered a very different version of events at
trial. He testified that Kiko was someone from whom he bought cheap construction
supplies to use in his home renovation business. He asserted that three of the
four phones belonged to Kiko or Primo and that the only phone belonging to him
bore the number 913-752-7552. He said the other phones were given to him by Kiko
to help arrange a pick-up of construction materials. He said that he spoke to the
detectives on the phones given to him by Kiko but thought the transaction being
-4-
arranged was for construction materials, not drugs. On cross-examination, however,
Mr. Castillo-Najer was unable to provide information about Kiko’s real name,
employment information, or whereabouts.
When denying Mr. Castillo-Najer’s request for a new trial, the district court
observed that on this record “the jury could reasonably have chosen not to believe
that the phantom Kiko was responsible for orchestrating the shipment, and rather to
conclude that defendant and Kiko were the same individual.” R., Vol. 1 at 310-11.
We see no basis to disagree with this assessment. Without any, we cannot fault the
district court for denying the motion for a new trial. The judgment is affirmed.
Entered for the Court
Neil M. Gorsuch
Circuit Judge
-5-