[DOWNLOAD] "United States v. Peppers" by Third Circuit U.S. Court Of Appeals * eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free

eBook details

Title: United States v. Peppers
Author : Third Circuit U.S. Court Of Appeals
Release Date : January 21, 2002
Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
Pages : * pages
Size : 70 KB

Description

PRECEDENTIAL Argued: March 4, 2002 OPINION OF THE COURT On November 28, 2000, a federal jury found Ronnie Peppers guilty of the first degree murder of a drug dealer, Jorge (""Cuban George"") Drake, conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute controlled substances, use of a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime, and being a felon in possession of a firearm. Before us, Peppers raises three allegations of error: that the prosecution failed to adduce sufficient proof of all of the elements of the alleged crimes, that the District Court erred in not allowing Peppers to proceed pro se after he requested to do so, and that the District Court erred in its determination that the victim's identification of his assailant was not admissible as a dying declaration. For the reasons set forth below, we find Peppers' challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence to be without merit. We do, however, agree with Peppers that the District Court erred in its handling of his request to proceed pro se . We will accordingly remand for a new trial. Additionally, we find that the District Court had the discretion to admit or preclude the proffered statement of identification, and, while perhaps it could have expressed the basis for its ruling more clearly, we do not find that it abused its discretion in refusing to admit the out of court statement.