United States v. Myra Minks

406 F. App'x 116

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: December 9, 2010
• Docket: 09-10454
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

MEMORANDUM ***

Myra Minks appeals the district court’s revocation of her supervised release. She argues that the district court’s admission of hearsay testimony at her revocation hearing violated her due process rights and was prejudicial. 1 We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review de novo whether the district court violated Minks’s due process rights. United States v. Perez, 526 F.3d 543, 547 (9th Cir.2008). Violations of such constitutional guarantees are subject to harmless error review. Id.

The Sixth Amendment right of confrontation does not apply in supervised release revocation hearings, United States v. Hall, 419 F.3d 980, 985 (9th Cir.2005); and, generally speaking, hearsay may be admissible, see United States v. Comito, 177 F.3d 1166, 1170 (1999). However, under some circumstances, the admission of unreliable hearsay at a revocation hearing can rise to the level of a due process violation. See Hall, 419 F.3d at 986.

Lirakis’s statements to the police officer were hearsay but were amply corroborated by the testimony of other witnesses and by physical evidence found by Minks’s person. However, even if the statements should not have been received, the indisputably admissible evidence overwhelmingly established Minks’s violation of supervised release beyond any doubt, much less by a preponderance of the evidence.

AFFIRMED.

*** This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.

1 . Although the parties do not address mootness, we note that Minks's release from custody on October 30, 2010 did not render this appeal moot because she remains on supervised release until January 26, 2012. See United States v. Radmall, 340 F.3d 798, 800 n. 3 (9th Cir.2003); United States v. Verdin, 243 F.3d 1174, 1178 (9th Cir.2001) (appeal not moot because "success for [defendant] could alter the supervised release portion of his sentence”) (quotation marks and citation omitted).