United States v. Breeden , 30 F. App'x 159 ( 2002 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 00-4812
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
versus
JEFFREY RANDALL BREEDEN,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western Dis-
trict of Virginia, at Lynchburg. Norman K. Moon, District Judge.
(CR-00-70020)
Submitted: February 21, 2002 Decided: March 4, 2002
Before WILKINS, MOTZ, and TRAXLER, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Robert E. Woodford, Colorado Springs, Colorado, for Appellant.
Eileen J. O’Connor, Assistant Attorney General, Robert E. Lindsay,
Alan Hechtkopf, S. Robert Lyons, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF
JUSTICE, Washington, D.C., for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
See Local Rule 36(c).
PER CURIAM:
Jeffrey R. Breeden was convicted by a jury of two counts of
attempted income tax evasion, 26 U.S.C. § 7201 (1994), and two
counts of willful failure to file tax returns, 26 U.S.C. § 7203(1994), for which he was sentenced to thirty-six months impris-
onment. Breeden appeals, claiming that the district court erred in
refusing to give two proffered jury instructions. We review the
district court’s refusal to give a requested jury instruction for
abuse of discretion. United States v. Russell, 971 F.2d 1098, 1107
(4th Cir. 1992); United States v. Lozano, 839 F.2d 1020, 1024 (4th
Cir. 1988). A district court has discretion to choose among pro-
posed instructions and to determine the content of its charge to
the jury, Russell, 971 F.2d at 1107, as long as, when “viewed as a
whole in the context of the trial, the charge was not misleading
and contained an adequate statement of the law to guide the jury’s
determination,” United States v. Park, 421 U.S. 658, 675 (1975).
Viewing the jury instructions in the context of the entire
trial, we conclude that they were proper in all respects. We
therefore find no abuse of discretion. Accordingly, we affirm. We
dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions
are adequately presented in the materials before the court and
argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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