Submitted: December 14, 2018
Appeal
from United States District Court for the Northern District
of Iowa
Before
LOKEN and ERICKSON, Circuit Judges, and MAGNUSON, [1] District
Judge.
ERICKSON, CIRCUIT JUDGE.
After
purchasing and injecting a substance containing heroin and
fentanyl from Cordero Seals, J.V. overdosed and collapsed
while pumping gas at the Hawkeye Convenience store in Cedar
Rapids, Iowa. Seals was charged with distribution of heroin
and fentanyl resulting in serious bodily injury in violation
of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1) and (b)(1)(C), and
possession with intent to distribute heroin and fentanyl in
violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a) and (b)(1)(C).
Seals twice moved for judgment of acquittal-once at the
beginning of trial, and again at the close of his case. Both
times the district court[2] reserved ruling. The jury convicted
Seals on both counts. Seals then renewed his Rule 29 motion
in writing which was again denied by the district court.
Seals was sentenced to 360 and 240 months concurrently on
counts 1 and 2, respectively. Seals appeals asserting that
the evidence presented at trial is insufficient to convict
him.
I.
Background
On
November 3, 2016, Cordero Seals sold $40 worth of a substance
consisting of heroin and fentanyl to J.V. The two men then
drove to the Hawkeye Convenience store where surveillance
footage captured J.V. entering the restroom with a soda can
in his hand. While in the bathroom, J.V. fashioned the can
into a heroin spoon, fixed up a syringe, and injected
himself. J.V. then returned to his truck to fill his tank
with gasoline, where he lost consciousness and collapsed.
Approximately 90 seconds later, Seals entered the store from
an unknown location, apparently looking for J.V. While inside
the store, Seals looked in the direction of the truck and
apparently observed J.V. slumped near his vehicle. Seals
began to frantically pace for a moment before exiting the
building, flagging down another store patron for a ride and
fleeing the scene leaving J.V. unattended.
Shortly
thereafter a store employee discovered J.V. and called 9-1-1.
Officers and paramedics promptly arrived on the scene. The
first responders observed several symptoms of an opiate
overdose: unconsciousness, shallow breathing, poor skin
coloration, and pinpoint pupils. The paramedics administered
Narcan to revive J.V. and, within 20 to 30 seconds, he
regained consciousness. The first responding police officer
found a syringe, lighter, and the spoon with residue on
J.V.'s person. The Iowa Division of Criminal
Investigation Laboratory later identified the residue as a
mixture of heroin and fentanyl.
J.V.
was transported to Mercy Hospital in Cedar Rapids for
observation. While there, his blood was drawn, "about
half a teaspoon" of which was sent to the FBI laboratory
where it was tested by FBI forensic examiner Roman Karas. The
initial screening detected two opiates (morphine and codeine)
and a subsequent screening detected two more opiates
(fentanyl and acetyl-fentanyl). The arguments in this case
center around the acetyl-fentanyl.
Karas
testified that morphine is a metabolite of heroin. He further
opined that when an individual takes heroin, the heroin
molecules are quickly metabolized so that it is not uncommon
to find only morphine in a subsequent blood
test.[3] Karas also testified that fentanyl has a
short half-life-generally detectable only within two to three
hours of ingestion. He also stated that the half-life of
acetyl-fentanyl had not yet been medically established. Karas
further testified that, due to the low volume of blood
sampled and his inability to perform additional testing, he
was unable to determine precisely which drug caused
J.V.'s overdose.
Dr.
Joshua Pruitt also testified as an expert, concluding that
J.V.'s collapse was a result of an opiate overdose. This
testimony was based on his review of the medical charts, law
enforcement reports of J.V.'s comatose state and his
subsequent Narcan revival. Dr. Pruitt also testified that any
opiates in J.V.'s system before he injected himself in
the Hawkeye bathroom were likely not the cause of the
overdose:
Well, the primary issue here is an issue of timing. The
timing of onset from the time that . . . the substance was
used to the onset of his symptoms was very brief. That fits
with the clinical picture of . . . an opiate overdose. If
there had been other opiates, medications in the background
that were . . . there previously, those would not have
suddenly become so active that they would have caused that
sort of a response. There had to be something that changed;
some new drug introduced that caused . . . those symptoms to
come on so rapidly.
Finally,
Dr. Pruitt confirmed Karas's testimony that it was
medically impossible to determine the concentration of the
various opiates in J.V.'s blood sample but, based on a
total of roughly seven minutes from injection to collapse,
the heroin-fentanyl mixture was the most likely cause of the
overdose.
II.Discus ...