United States v. Dearld Gene Davis, A/K/A "Doc" Davis, and Phillip Martin McFarland

780 F.2d 838, 19 Fed. R. Serv. 1224, 1985 U.S. App. LEXIS 25745
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
DecidedDecember 19, 1985
Docket84-2099, 84-2100
StatusPublished
Cited by29 cases

This text of 780 F.2d 838 (United States v. Dearld Gene Davis, A/K/A "Doc" Davis, and Phillip Martin McFarland) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Dearld Gene Davis, A/K/A "Doc" Davis, and Phillip Martin McFarland, 780 F.2d 838, 19 Fed. R. Serv. 1224, 1985 U.S. App. LEXIS 25745 (10th Cir. 1985).

Opinion

JOHN P. MOORE, Circuit Judge.

Defendants-appellants, Dearld Gene “Doc” Davis and Phillip Martin McFarland, were indicted on charges of: (1) conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1) and 846; and (2) traveling interstate with the intent to promote, manage, establish, and carry out a conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine in violation of the Travel Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1952(a)(3). After a joint jury trial, the defendants were convicted on both counts. Davis was sentenced to concurrent terms of three years on each of the two counts, and McFarland received concurrent terms of two and one-half years for each count. Defendants seek reversal of their convictions, raising these issues in their consolidated appeal: (1) the evidence was insufficient to establish a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1952(a)(3); (2) the defendants’ Fifth Amendment rights were violated by a government agent’s comments during grand jury testimony; (3) tape recordings of telephone conversations were admitted as evidence against the defendants in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2515 and 2517(5); and (4) a tape recording introduced by the government should have been excluded due to the presence of unexplained inaudible portions. In addition, Davis argues the district court erred in admitting a note pad belonging to McFarland as evidence against Davis, contending it was improperly authenticated and prejudicial. McFarland argues the district court erred in admitting evidence of Davis’s prior crimes in defendants’ joint trial due to its prejudicial impact on McFarland’s case. For the reasons set forth below, we affirm the convictions.

“Doc” Davis was for several years a self-employed musician and songwriter in Oklahoma. At the time of the events underlying his conviction in this case, he resided in Hartshorne, Oklahoma. Davis became acquainted with defendant McFarland in 1979. From time to time, Davis and his band played at a Hartshorne bar owned by McFarland, whom Davis described as a close friend.

In March 1982, Davis came to the attention of investigators with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) through a wiretap of a telephone belonging to Richard Riley, a key witness in the case against the defendants. The electronic surveillance was authorized by the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma as part of an extensive investigation of public corruption and narcotics violations. Neither the defendants nor the crimes with which they were charged were listed as targets in that authorization. Initially, government investigators knew Davis only as “Doc.” His last name remained unknown until after Richard Riley agreed in April 1982 to cooperate with the government in the investigation of a variety of crimes. 1 As part of his arrangement with the government, Riley agreed to continue his relationship with “Doc” and others and to record telephone conversations relating to their activities. Thereafter, investiga *841 tors learned that Doc’s last name was Davis.

At trial, Riley testified that he first met Davis in 1981. At that time, Riley was the president of Midstates Distributing Products in Oklahoma City, a company involved in the distribution of “turkey” drugs. 2 Riley testified that he and Jerry Woods, a friend and business associate, arranged to purchase two pounds of methamphetamine, a dangerous controlled substance, from Davis for $12,000 per pound. Riley claimed that he and Woods never paid for the second pound and that the outstanding debt was the subject of several discussions between Davis and Riley.

Following Riley’s agreement to cooperate with the government in April 1982, he recorded several conversations with Davis in which arrangements were made for Davis to obtain chemicals, laboratory equipment, and glassware to manufacture methamphetamine. The government introduced twenty tapes of their conversations into evidence. As part of the arrangements, FBI agents obtained five gallons of phenyl-propanolamine from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which were delivered to Davis in June 1982 by an FBI agent posing as Riley’s girl friend. At that time, Davis believed that phenylpropa-nolamine, which is sold legally as a decongestant, was a necessary precursor to the manufacture of methamphetamine.

In September 1982, DEA agent John Coonce was brought into the case and introduced by Riley to Davis as a chemical supplier from Metroplex Chemical in Dallas, Texas. By that time, Davis was aware that methylamine, rather than phenylpro-panolamine, was the proper precursor for methamphetamine. On September 10, 1982, in Oklahoma City, Coonce exchanged the phenylpropanolamine in Davis’s possession for methylamine. Thereafter, on October 11, 1982, November 19, 1982, and December 9, 1983, Davis and McFarland made trips from Oklahoma to Metroplex in Dallas to obtain glassware, equipment, and chemicals necessary for the manufacture of methamphetamine. Through a prior agreement with the owners of Metroplex, the government videotaped these visits. The videotapes, which were introduced into evidence, indicated the defendants discussed the manufacturing process for methamphetamine with Coonce and others during their visits.

After several months without contact from defendants following their November 1982 trip to Dallas, Coonce telephoned Davis in the summer of 1983. Davis met alone with Coonce in Tulsa in September 1983. Shortly after defendants’ third trip to Dallas, Coonce met with Davis and McFarland in a hotel room in Tulsa on December 17, 1983. A tape recording of their conversation, which was introduced into evidence, indicated that most of the meeting involved a discussion about the manufacturing process for methamphetamine. Upon leaving the hotel, Davis and McFarland were arrested.

The government presented the foregoing evidence in support of its theory that defendants conspired, from the time of Davis’s initial contacts with Richard Riley in 1982, to establish a laboratory to produce methamphetamine. While it is uncontro-verted that no methamphetamine was ever produced, the government argues that the tape recordings of various telephone calls, the videotapes of defendants’ three visits to Metroplex Chemical, and testimony regarding meetings between government agents and McFarland and Davis support the inference that defendants were attempting to accumulate the materials necessary to produce methamphetamine.

Davis has continually maintained that he never intended to manufacture methamphetamine or to perform any illegal act. He contends he initiated and pursued his relationship with Richard Riley in 1982 as part of an attempt to investigate the December 1981 shooting death of his music *842 publisher and friend, Jim Ross. 3

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Bluebook (online)
780 F.2d 838, 19 Fed. R. Serv. 1224, 1985 U.S. App. LEXIS 25745, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-dearld-gene-davis-aka-doc-davis-and-phillip-martin-ca10-1985.