United States v. Juan MacIas

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

A. Charged Conduct

On September 5, 2011, Defendant-Appellant Juan Macias (“Macias”) was arrested for illegal re-entry near the Tecate, California, Port of Entry. At approximately 4 o’clock in the morning, a seismic sensor indicated movement. Border Patrol Agent Russell Slingerland and two other agents responded to the location of the sensor. Upon investigation, they discovered Macias crouched behind boulders and brush in a steep canyon. Macias initially told the agents that he had no legal documents to be in the United States and that he entered by “jumping the [border] fence.” Macias also told the agents he was from Mexico. However, after Macias was brought into custody, he agreed to speak to an agent without an attorney and claimed under oath that he was born in Riverside, California. He said his mother had told him that he had been born in Riverside, but because he was born at home she never “registered” his birth. He claimed that he had a California birth certificate and was a United States citizen. However, he did not have the birth certificate with him.

UNITED STATES V. MACIAS

B. First Trial

On September 27, 2011,…

Opinion by Judge BENAVIDES; Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge WARDLAW.

OPINION

This is a direct criminal appeal from convictions for being a removed alien found in the United States in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326 and for making a false claim of United States citizenship in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 911 . Finding no reversible error, we affirm the district court’s judgment.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

A. Charged Conduct

On September 5, 2011, Defendant-Appellant Juan Macias (“Macias”) was arrested for illegal re-entry near the Tecate, California, Port of Entry. At approximately 4 o’clock in the morning, a seismic sensor indicated movement. Border Patrol Agent Russell Slingerland and two other agents responded to the location of the sensor. Upon investigation, they discovered Macias crouched behind boulders and brush in a steep canyon. Macias initially told the agents that he had no legal documents to be in the United States and that he entered by “jumping the [border] fence.” Macias also told the agents he was from Mexico. However, after Macias was brought into custody, he agreed to speak to an agent without an attorney and claimed under oath that he was…

concurring in part and dissenting in part:

I agree with the majority that the district court violated Macias’s Confrontation Clause rights by admitting the Amended Delayed Birth Registration, which contained the Border Patrol agents’ testimonial statements that Macias was born in Mexico. The majority also correctly holds that the district court’s admission of the document where the government failed to call the two attesting Border Patrol agents to testify at Macias’s trial was error. However, the majority incorrectly reviews this error under the plain error standard, concluding that although the error was “plain,” it did not affect Macias’s substantial rights. The majority disregards the well-established principle that we “review de novo whether the admission of a document violated a defendant’s Confrontation Clause rights.” United States v. Bustamante, 687 F.3d 190, 1193 (9th Cir.2012). Under that standard, “[t]he government bears the burden-of proving that a Confrontation Clause error is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. at 1195. The government cannot meet that burden here.

A.

Macias’s opening brief argues that the standard of review of the Confrontation Clause error…