United States of America v. Karla Ruiz

The Honorable Leon Jordan, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of *
Tennessee, sitting by designation.
NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
File Name: 10a0433n.06
No. 08-3473
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, )
)
Plaintiff-Appellee, )
)
v. )
)
KARLA RUIZ, )
)
Defendant-Appellant. )
ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED
STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF
OHIO
Before: KENNEDY and COLE Circuit Judges, and JORDAN, District Judge*
JORDAN, District Judge. Following a lengthy jury trial, appellant Karla Ruiz
was found guilty of traveling in interstate commerce with the intent to promote or
facilitate an unlawful activity (18 U.S.C. § 1952(a)(3)). The jury, however, found her
not guilty of the alleged unlawful activity, that is, a conspiracy to distribute controlled
substances. In this appeal, Ms. Ruiz argues that the district court erred in denying
her motion for judgment of acquittal or for a new trial because the jury’s verdict was
so inconsistent that her conviction cannot stand and, in any event, the evidence was

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insufficient to support the conviction. W e find no merit to either of the appellant’s
arguments, and we AFFIRM her conviction.
I. BACKGROUND
At trial, the government’s evidence showed that numerous persons, some in
California and some in Ohio and Illinois, were importing large amounts of marijuana
and cocaine from California to Ohio and other states. Various witnesses testified
that the conspirators used several females who transported the drugs and cash
proceeds in two vehicles – a green Honda Odyssey van or a grey Dodge Intrepid.
The government’s theory was that Ruiz was one of the females who arranged the
trips and, on occasion, drove one of the vehicles. One of the other drivers was
Eunice Silva. Prior to trial, Silva pleaded guilty and testified about her courier
activities with Ruiz.
Silva described how she was recruited by her brother who was in jail in
California with Ruiz’s husband. Although Silva was not specifically told that the trips
would involve drugs and cash, she knew that was the purpose. Karla Ruiz called
Silva and arranged for her to drive on a “test” trip to W aukegan, Illinois, with Bonnie
Rendon. Silva was not paid for that trip. Ruiz then called and arranged for Silva to
transport eight kilograms of cocaine to Springfield, Ohio, in November 2001 with
Ruiz’s sister-in-law, Monica Garcia, in whose name the van was registered. Ruiz
paid Silva $2000 upon her return.

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Ruiz arranged another trip with Silva to Springfield in December 2001, but by
this time agents were aware of the activities of the conspiracy and the group was
under investigation. The Odyssey van was driven to a restaurant parking lot in
Springfield, Ohio, where it was left with the keys inside. Two other conspirators who
had flown into Ohio to conduct the drug transaction picked up the van and drove it
to a garage, and seven kilograms of cocaine were removed from a secret
compartment in the dashboard. Agents were able to interrupt the drug transaction
and seize most of the cocaine and some drug proceeds. The van was returned to
the parking lot and Ruiz and Silva began their trip back to California. This time,
however, at the request of a DEA agent the van was stopped for a traffic violation.
Ruiz was driving and Silva and Ruiz’s three-year-old child were passengers in the
van.
The Ohio State Trooper who stopped the van had a drug dog with him which
he used to check the exterior of the van. The dog alerted and the van was searched
for drugs and cash. Only a small amount of cocaine and methamphetamine were
found in a compact in Silva’s bag, and she was arrested for possession. The van
was seized and searched more carefully. Two hidden compartments were found,
one in the dashboard and one in the rear panel, but both were empty. Ruiz and her
child were released. Silva testified that she drove to Ohio and other states after the
December trip and that each trip was arranged by Ruiz.

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Ruiz was indicted with three others and charged with conspiracy to distribute
and to possess with the intent to distribute in excess of five kilograms of cocaine.
She was also charged with a violation of the Travel Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1952(a)(3),
which prohibits traveling in interstate commerce with the intent to promote or
facilitate an unlawful activity. The “unlawful activity” that formed the basis of this
charge was identified in the indictment as “a business enterprise involving an
unlawful conspiracy to possess with the intent to distribute a controlled substance.”
Ruiz and Asmed Escareno went to trial, but the other co-conspirators pleaded
guilty. Ruiz was found guilty of the Travel Act count and Escareno was convicted
of all the charges against him. Ruiz filed a post-trial motion for judgment of
acquittal or a new trial which was denied by the district court. She was sentenced
to 54 months in prison and a three-year term of supervised release.
II. DISCUSSION
A. Standard of Review
On the issue of whether the jury verdict was so inconsistent that Ruiz is
entitled to a new trial, this court reviews the district court’s decision to deny a new
trial for an abuse of discretion. United States v. Lawrence, 555 F.3d 254, 261 (6th
Cir. 2009), cert. denied, 130 S. Ct. 1879 (2010). An abuse of discretion may be
found when the district court relies on “clearly erroneous findings of fact, uses an
erroneous legal standard, or improperly applies the law.” Id. (quoting United States
v. White, 492 F.3d 380, 408 (6th Cir. 2007)). This court reviews de novo Ruiz’s

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claim that she is entitled to a judgment of acquittal because the evidence was not
sufficient. United States v. Grubbs, 506 F.3d 434, 438 (6th Cir. 2007). The
question is “whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the
prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the
crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979).
B. Inconsistent Jury Verdict
Ruiz argues that conspiracy was an element of the Travel Act count and
therefore the jury’s determination that she was guilty of the Travel Act count but not
the conspiracy count creates an impermissible inconsistent verdict. She
characterizes the conspiracy charge and the Travel Act charge as “mutually
exclusive crimes,” arguing that the conspiracy was a necessary element of the
Travel Act charge. Ruiz takes the position that the not-guilty verdict on the
conspiracy count demonstrates that the “jury did not (and apparently could not) find
that a conspiracy existed,” and in the absence of a conspiracy, the Travel Act count
must be dismissed.
Ruiz recognizes that the Supreme Court has repeatedly found that jury
verdicts like the one in this case should not be reviewed. In United States v.
Powell, 469 U.S. 57 (1984), the Court considered a factual situation very much like
the one before this court and found that there was no reason to review the jury’s
verdict. Id. at 69. In Powell, the defendant was charged in a 15-count indictment
with conspiring with her minor son and husband to possess with the intent to

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distribute cocaine, possession with the intent to distribute cocaine, and several
counts of using a telephone to commit and facilitate the drug felonies. The jury
acquitted her on the conspiracy count and the possession count, but found her
guilty of three of the telephone facilitation counts. Id. at 59-60.
Powell argued that proof of the conspiracy or the possession counts was an
element of each of the telephone facilitation counts, so the jury’s verdict was
inconsistent. Id. at 60. The Court reiterated the rule it adopted in Dunn v. United
States, 284 U.S. 390, 393 (1932):
The most that can be said in such cases is that the verdict shows that
either in the acquittal or the conviction the jury did not speak their real
conclusions, but that does not show that they were not convinced of
the defendant’s guilt. We interpret the acquittal as no more than their
assumption of a power which they had no right to exercise, but to
which they were disposed through lenity.
Id. at 63 (quoting Steckler v. United States, 7 F.2d 59, 60 (2d Cir. 1925)). The
Court went on to point out that a defendant’s assumption that the error was in the
conviction is no more than speculation; the opposite could have been true – that the
error was in the acquittal, but the government has no right to challenge the acquittal
on grounds of inconsistency. Id. at 65. “The fact that the inconsistency may be the
result of lenity, coupled with the Government’s inability to invoke review, suggests
that inconsistent verdicts should not be reviewable.” Id. at 66. Instead, a
defendant’s protection against an inconsistent verdict lies in an independent review
of the sufficiency of the evidence. Id. at 67.

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Nevertheless, Ruiz has seized upon a footnote in the Powell opinion that
excepts a situation where a guilty verdict on one count necessarily excludes a
finding of guilt on another. Id. at 69, n. 8; see also United States v. McCall, 85 F.3d
1193, 1197-98 (6th Cir. 1996) (using the term “mutually exclusive” but finding that
the verdicts were not reviewable). This court finds, however, that this is not a case
where the exception would apply. In crafting the exception, the Court contemplated
a situation in which a defendant receives two guilty verdicts that are logically
inconsistent, for example if a jury convicted a defendant of both larceny and
embezzlement based on the same underlying conduct. See United States v.
Daigle, 149 F. Supp. 409, 414 (D.D.C. 1957), cited in Powell, 469 U.S. at 69 n.8.
Even putting aside the obvious distinction that Ruiz has received one guilty and one
not-guilty verdict, just as in Powell, we conclude that the two charged crimes are
interdependent rather than mutually exclusive. Contrary to Ruiz’s contention, a not-
guilty verdict on the conspiracy count is not determinative of whether Ruiz intended
to promote or facilitate an unlawful activity while traveling in interstate commerce.
As the Court noted in Powell, the verdict could reflect jury lenity, or even a mistaken
acquittal. Powell, 469 U.S. at 64-65.
We find that this issue is controlled by the Supreme Court’s decision in
Powell and decline to review the jury’s verdict. There is no reason to vacate a
conviction “merely because the verdicts cannot rationally be reconciled.” Powell,
469 U.S. at 69.

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C. Sufficiency of the Evidence
As directed by the Supreme Court, Ruiz’s avenue of relief, if any, is through
a sufficiency of the evidence evaluation. The indictment charged that Ruiz traveled
from California to Springfield, Ohio, to facilitate the distribution of controlled
substances. In order to prove this charge, the government had the burden to show
that the defendant traveled in interstate or foreign commerce with the intent to
promote or facilitate an unlawful activity and that she performed or attempted to
perform an act that promoted or facilitated the unlawful activity. United States v.
Driver, 535 F.3d 424, 430 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 129 S. Ct. 662 (2008).
In support of her contention that the government has failed to satisfy its
burden, Ruiz asserts that “the jury did not (and apparently could not) find that a
conspiracy existed,” so one of the elements of the Travel Act – the unlawful activity
– did not exist. To the extent that this is simply her argument that the jury verdict
is impermissibly inconsistent restyled as an insufficient evidence claim, the
Supreme Court has foreclosed it in Powell:
[R]espondent’s argument that an acquittal on a predicate offense
necessitates a finding of insufficient evidence on a compound felony
count simply misunderstands the nature of the inconsistent verdict
problem. Whether presented as an insufficient evidence argument, or
as an argument that the acquittal on the predicate offense should
collaterally estop the Government on the compound offense, the
argument necessarily assumes that the acquittal on the predicate
offense was proper – the one the jury “really meant.” This, of course,
is not necessarily correct; all we know is that the verdicts are
inconsistent.

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469 U.S. at 68.
When treated as an argument that there was insufficient evidence for a
reasonable trier of fact to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that she traveled
across state lines to promote or facilitate the “unlawful activity” of a drug-trafficking
conspiracy, Ruiz’s argument likewise fails. Our review of this claim should be
“independent of the jury’s determination that evidence” on the conspiracy count
“was insufficient.” Id. at 67. Much of the testimony during the lengthy trial
concerned the existence of the conspiracy, that is, who was involved and how the
cocaine was delivered. Part of that proof came from Silva who detailed her
involvement as a courier for the conspiracy. She described how Ruiz called her to
set up the trips to Ohio and that Ruiz was with her in December 2001 when the van
was stopped. Silva testified that she knew that they were transporting drugs and
cash, although she had not been specifically told that information. Thus, based on
Silva’s testimony, there was evidence that Ruiz traveled from California to Ohio in
a van that had secret compartments to hold drugs and cash. Further, Silva’s
testimony about her courier activities was corroborated by other evidence, including
the stop of the van.
Although Ruiz contends that Silva’s testimony was so incredible that it could
not support her conviction, it was for the jury to decide whether to credit Silva’s
testimony. The jury was told to consider the co-defendants’ testimony with “more
caution,” but they could base their verdict on the unsupported testimony of these

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witnesses if they believed it beyond a reasonable doubt. Obviously, the jury
believed enough of Silva’s testimony to find that Ruiz was a courier for the
conspiracy. Considering all the evidence in the light most favorable to the
government, we find that there was sufficient evidence to support the defendant’s
conviction.
III. CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of conviction is AFFIRMED.

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