Barnaby Ashford Bloomer v. United States

Appellant Bloomer was convicted, in a jury trial, of having unlawfully received 225 pounds of contraband marihuana. 21 U.S.C. § 176a. He appeals, invoking our jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 , 1294.

Bloomer makes four contentions: (1) The search which revealed the marihuana was unlawful; (2) The failure of the Government to disclose the identity of its informant denied the appellant of his right to confrontation; (3) The jury commissioner failed to meet his affirmative duty to insure that the jury panel represented a cross-section of the community; and (4) The Government’s proof was insufficient to support conviction. The contentions are ill-founded; hence, we affirm.

The facts can be briefly summarized. On January 6, 1967, Customs Agent Gates received a telephone call from an informant who warned that a 1958 blue Oldsmobile automobile, license number YWR-583, would cross the Mexican border at San Ysidro, California that afternoon. While Agent Gates did not learn who would be driving the automobile, he was informed that the car would likely contain marihuana and that it would probably be left parked somewhere in the San Ysidro area.

At about six o’clock that evening, Agent…