USA v. Gendron

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
WESTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
v.
PAYTON GENDRON,
Defendant.
22-CR-109-LJV
DECISION & ORDER
Before this Court is Payton Gendron’s motion to dismiss the government’s Notice
of Intent to Seek the Death Penalty based on the alleged abuse of the grand jury
process. See Docket Item 235. The government opposed the motion, Docket Item 245,
and Gendron replied, Docket Item 257. The Court has carefully reviewed the parties’
briefing and the grand jury testimony at issue. For the reasons explained below,
Gendron’s motion is denied.
The Court assumes the parties’ familiarity with the relevant facts.1 Gendron
argues that the government used the grand jury process to compel irrelevant evidence.
Docket Item 235 at 6-11. More specifically, he argues that the government’s grand jury
questions covered “a wide range of topics having no relationship to the charges under
consideration by the grand jury or the special findings it was asked to make.” Id. at 1.
He cites many areas of questioning that he says were improper, including “[w]hether he
1In any event, because Gendron’s motion pertains to grand jury testimony that is
subject to a protective order, see Docket Item 27 at ¶ 4, this Court will refer to the
challenged testimony only to the extent necessary to explain its decision. Gendron also
filed more than 300 pages of grand jury transcripts and two grand jury exhibits as
sealed exhibits to his briefing. See Docket Items 235-1, 257-1, and 257-2. The briefing
for this motion shall remain under seal because it extensively refers to and includes
excerpts of confidential grand jury testimony. See Docket Items 235, 245, and 257.
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had learning, physical, emotional, or mental disabilities,” and “[w]hether . . . he seemed
to be racist.” Id. at 2. Gendron contends that such questioning “was designed to
explore and preemptively rebut some common categories of mitigation.” Id. at 6. The
proper remedy, he says, is to “dismiss the Notice of Intent to Seek the Death
Penalty . . . [or a]t a minimum, . . . preclude the government from using the
impermissibly obtained information for any purpose at trial.” Id. at 11.
The government responds that it probed only “legitimate areas of inquiry,” and
that “[t]o the extent the witnesses’ testimony also related to mitigation evidence . . .
[Gendron] has not shown any prejudice and has not demonstrated that he is entitled to
any relief from this Court.” Docket Item 245 at 1-2.
The grand jury is “an investigatory body charged with the responsibility of
determining whether or not a crime has been committed.” United States v. R. Enters.,
Inc., 498 U.S. 292, 297 (1991). It is tasked with “inquir[ing] into all information that
might possibly bear on its investigation until it has identified an offense or has satisfied
itself that none has occurred.” Id. And “[a]s a necessary consequence of its
investigatory function, the grand jury paints with a broad brush.” Id. “[T]he law
presumes, absent a strong showing to the contrary, that a grand jury acts within the
legitimate scope of its authority.” Id. at 300.
Some of the challenged testimony, such as questioning about whether witnesses
had observed Gendron exhibiting racial animus, see, e.g., Docket Item 235-1 at 178,
was plainly relevant to the hate crime charges in this case. And even if the questioning
exceeded the scope of the government’s authority, Gendron’s proposed remedy of
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dismissing the Notice of Intent to Seek the Death Penalty is inapt. Gendron cited no
precedent for this remedy, see generally Docket Item 235, nor has this Court found any.
Gendron cites United States v. Friend, 2000 WL 36751464 (E.D. Va. Apr. 5,
2000), which reinforces this Court’s decision to deny his request to dismiss the Notice of
Intent. The court in Friend found “no authority that discusses whether abuse of the
grand jury process on any occasion warrants dismissal of a notice of intent to seek a
sentence of death during a capital proceeding.” Id. at *7. The court concluded that to
merit dismissal of the Notice of Intent, a defendant would need to make “some showing
that the violations that occurred during the grand jury proceeding substantially
influenced the decision by the United States’ Attorney General to authorize the death
penalty or that there is ‘grave doubt’ that the decision to authorize the death penalty was
substantially influenced by the testimony which was inappropriately elicited.” Id. As in
Friend, “[a]bsolutely no showing of this kind has been made here” and, having reviewed
the testimony at issue, “it is difficult to conceive that such a showing could be made.”
See id.
As for Gendron’s alternative request to preclude the government from using “any
of this information at trial for any purpose,” Docket Item 235 at 3, Gendron again has
cited no precedent for this remedy, see generally Docket Item 235, nor has this Court
found any. See Friend, 2000 WL 36751464, at *6 (“The [c]ourt has found no statutory
or decisional authority for the alternative relief . . . of completely precluding the United
States from using [the challenged grand jury] testimony during any phase of the trial for
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any purpose.”).2 The proper method for challenging the admissibility of such evidence
is by a motion in limine. Gendron’s request therefore is denied without prejudice.
CONCLUSION
For the reasons stated above, Gendron’s motion to dismiss the government’s
Notice of Intent to Seek the Death Penalty based on the alleged abuse of the grand jury
process is DENIED. Gendron may challenge the admissibility of the grand jury
testimony by a motion in limine.
SO ORDERED.
Dated: 	April 22, 2025
Buffalo, New York
/s/ Lawrence J. Vilardo
LAWRENCE J. VILARDO
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
2 The government concedes that it “w[ill] not seek to affirmatively introduce the
grand jury transcripts for [the relevant] witnesses at trial, absent an exception to the
hearsay rule,” but it “reserves its right to use the grand jury transcripts for impeachment
purposes.” Docket Item 245 at 16. The government in Friend agreed “not to
affirmatively use [the challenged] testimony,” and the district court held that the
government could not “affirmatively us[e] any of [the challenged] testimony” but could
use it “for impeachment should the occasion arise.” 2000 WL 36751464, at *8. Friend
therefore does not support Gendron’s request for the broad remedy of forbidding the
government from using the contested “information for any purpose at trial.” See Docket
Item 235 at 11.
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