Jorge Oliverio Moran-Can was charged with two counts of assaulting a federal officer after he encountered a Border Patrol Agent near the U.S.-Mexico border and shoved the agent, causing him to fall down a steep hill. A jury found him guilty, and he appealed to the Ninth Circuit. On appeal, Moran-Can raised three primary arguments: that the government violated Batson v. Kentucky by using a peremptory strike on a Latino prospective juror, that the district court abused its discretion by excluding his biomechanics expert's testimony, and that the prosecutor committed misconduct during closing arguments by referencing translation issues in his testimony.
The Ninth Circuit reviewed the case de novo for the Batson claim and for abuse of discretion for the evidentiary rulings. First, regarding the Batson claim, the court explained that at step three of the inquiry, the defendant must prove the strike resulted from purposeful racial discrimination. The prosecutor offered race-neutral reasons, stating the juror was struck because he did not answer questions, was single, and had no children. The court found Moran-Can failed to show these reasons were implausible or fantastic enough to be a pretext, especially since a similarly situated Latino juror was seated on the jury. Second, the court upheld the exclusion of the biomechanics expert under Daubert and Rule 702, noting the expert's report lacked appropriate validation, failed to explain the data or experimentation relied upon, and rested on factual assumptions unsupported by the record. Under Rule 403, the court agreed the risk of unfair prejudice substantially outweighed the testimony's minimal probative value. Third, the court found no plain error regarding prosecutorial misconduct. Although the prosecutor referenced an inconsistency in Moran-Can's testimony that might have stemmed from a translation issue, the court determined the prosecutor did not plainly misrepresent facts or draw an unreasonable inference. Even if improper, the comment did not affect Moran-Can's substantial rights given other evidence of his lack of credibility.
Moran-Can's conviction for assaulting a federal officer stands without modification or remand for a new trial. The decision reinforces the high bar for proving pretext in Batson challenges when race-neutral reasons are offered and confirms that expert testimony lacking methodological validation will be excluded under Daubert. It also clarifies that prosecutors may reference translation inconsistencies in testimony without committing plain error if the comments do not misrepresent facts or affect the outcome.
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