Nguyen, Khanh Phuong v. U.S., et al. / Phan, Tuyet Mai Thi v. U.S. (06/09/2003)

Questions presented

Was the 9th Circuit's judgment vitiated by the participation of a non-Article III judge?

BY JOSH DEVINE, MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

"Hooch," the Guam Customs Offices resident drug dog, smelled something fishy: 440 grams of crystal methamphetamine, with a street value of more than $30,000.

To track down those responsible for the illegal shipment, officers produced a "controlled delivery," confiscating the drugs and replacing them with rock salt. Agents also placed an invisible "clue spray" inside the package to track whoever opened the package, which was addressed to a "Linda Phan" at Box 91 in Tamuning, Guam.

Just days later, Tuget Mai Thi Phan claimed the package, telling postal clerks she was "Lin Das" sister.

After leaving the post office, Phan traveled to Khanh Phuong Nguyen's apartment. Before arriving at her nieces apartment, police said someone inside that car stopped at the emergency room parking lot at Guam Memorial Hospital and threw an object into a trash can, later discovered to be the express mail carton.

Police continued to follow the car to Nguyens apartment where police later witnessed Phan and Nguyen in the living room with the contents of the opened package. Agents entered the apartment and arrested the two women.

When they searched Nguyen's apartment, police found drugs, package material and more than $6,000. They also found the clue spray on Nguyen's hands. Phan told police she was cooking in the kitchen when the package was opened.

In continuing their investigation, officers followed the return address on the package looking for a Michael Tran at a California address. Tran didnt live there, but a man named Thanh Phuong Nguyen, Nguyen's brother and Phans nephew, did.

Two weeks later, on Dec. 15, 1999, a federal grand jury in Guam returned charges against the two women, including conspiracy to import methamphetamine, aiding and abetting its import and possession with intent to deliver more than 50 grams of the drug.

In March 2000, Nguyen and Phan were found guilty on all counts. Each was sentenced to more than 50 years in prison and five years supervised release.

Nguyen and Phan appealed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on two claims. First, they argued that the district court erred in admitting evidence that showed their family relationships. Second, the two women argued that the evidence was insufficient to prove their guilt.

As is common in hearing cases involving people outside the United States, Chief Judge Mary Schroeder and Senior Circuit Judge Alfred Goodwin traveled to hear the case in the Northern Mariana Islands. There, they were joined by U.S. District Judge Alex Munson of the Northern Mariana Islands.

The 9th Circuit panel unanimously affirmed, saying the case did not depend on family association. Writing for the court, Judge Goodwin called the evidence connecting the return address on the envelope to the two women "relevant and admissible."

Furthermore, the documented route the two women took from the post office to the apartment was, for the judges, an additional reason to uphold the lower courts verdict. According to Goodwin, "An innocent Christmas package would not have produced a trip to a refuse container near the hospital to dispose of the wrapper with its tell-tale information that someone known to the relatives in Guam was connected with the mailing of the package bearing that address."

To the court, "the evidence ... fits together like so many pieces of a puzzle."

In their petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, attorneys for Nguyen and Phan do not argue their clients' innocence. Rather, their appeal alleges that their 9th Circuit appeal was tainted because one of the judges hearing that case wasn't, in their opinion, qualified to consider the case.

Judge Munson, unlike Article III Judges Schroeder and Goodwin, is an Article I judge. Even though both are nominated by the President and approved by the Senate,Article I judgesserve limited terms mainly in territorial areas, whereas Article III appointments are life tenured positions.

Now the Supreme Court is being asked to decide whether Article I judges, who generally exercise the same jurisdictional reach as their Article III counterparts shouldhave less judicial authority.

On Nov. 4, 2002, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in the cases, consolidated them, and allowed Nguyen and Phan to come before the Court without paying court costs.

On June 9, a divided Court sided with Nguyen and Phan, holding that the 9th Circuit panel did not have the authority to decide the case.

The Court split 5-4, with Justice John Paul Stevens writing the majority opinion that concluded that Congress did not contemplate the judges of the District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands to be "district judges" within the meaning of 28 U.S. C. sect. 292(a), which authorizes the assignment of "one or more district judges within [a] circuit" to sit on the court of appeals "whenever the business of that court so requires."

The conclusion of the majority meant that the case was remanded to the 9th Circuit for reconsideration. In so doing, the Court rejected the government's argument that Judge Munson's presence on the panel was a mere technicality because the appeals court opinion was unanimous.

The dissenters agreed with the majority that the 9th Circuit should not have had an Article IV judge on its review panel. But the dissent, written by Chief Justice William Rehnquist for himself and Justices Antonin Scalia, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Stephen Breyer, argued that there was no reason to vacate Nguyen's and Phan's convictions because the mistake"simply did not seriously affect the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings."