United States v. Garza

Francisco Garza (defendant) was convicted of conspiring to sell various drugs. At trial, the government (plaintiff) alleged that Garza had confessed to his involvement in the conspiracy to police officer Barry Ragsdale. Garza moved to introduce evidence under Federal Rule of Evidence 608(a) about Ragsdale’s character for truthfulness through the opinion testimony of Michael Grimes, a former federal investigator. Grimes would have opined that Ragsdale was deceptive, based on a two-month investigation Grimes conducted in 1998 after an assistant United States attorney claimed that Ragsdale had lied about a defendant’s cooperation. Grimes interviewed several attorneys and police officers regarding Ragsdale. Grimes also believed that Ragsdale was not truthful in the few conversations Grimes had with Ragsdale, based on Ragsdale’s physical tells. Ultimately, Grimes concluded that he lacked sufficient evidence to prosecute Ragsdale. The district court allowed both parties to question Grimes without the jury present to give Garza an opportunity to lay a proper foundation for Grimes’s opinion. After comparing Grimes’s proffered testimony to similar proffered testimony in United States v. Dotson, 799 F.2d 189 (5th Cir. 1986), the district court excluded Grimes’s opinion testimony about Ragsdale’s truthfulness. Garza appealed from his conviction, arguing in relevant part that the district court had abused its discretion by refusing to admit Grimes’s testimony.