(Download) "United States V. Bonds" by United States Court Of Appeals For The Sixth Circuit " eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: United States V. Bonds
- Author : United States Court Of Appeals For The Sixth Circuit
- Release Date : January 15, 1993
- Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 97 KB
Description
ALICE M. BATCHELDER, Circuit Judge. On February 27, 1988, David Hartlaub was gunned down in his van as he stopped at a bank near the Sandusky Mall in Perkins Township, Ohio, where he planned to make a night deposit of cash from the music store he helped manage. The killers apparently had no interest in robbery; police found the deposit bag containing some four thousand dollars on the seat of the van. Three individuals--Wayne Yee, Mark Verdi and John Ray Bonds--were indicted in connection with the crime, tried, and convicted on federal firearms offenses, in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 5861(d) and 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), and conspiracy in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371. At trial, the Government's theory for the shooting was that the gunmen, members of the Hell's Angels motorcycle gang, had mistaken Mr. Hartlaub's yellow van for an identical van driven by a local member of a rival motorcycle gang, the Outlaws, whom the gunmen had allegedly planned to "hit" in retaliation for the shooting of a Hell's Angels member by an Outlaw the previous year in Joliet, Illinois. The defendants also claim that this is a case of mistaken identity--theirs--and challenge their convictions, claiming the Government's evidence to be either flawed, circumstantial, or both. Among the issues we must confront in this appeal is an issue of first impression for this court: whether the district court erred in admitting expert testimony concerning deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) evidence in the trial of these defendants. For the reasons set forth below, we affirm the defendants' convictions.