United States v. Andrea Lewis, 796 F.3d 543

Andrea Lewis, choir director (and later pastor), was convicted after a jury trial of three counts under 18 U.S.C. § 2423(a) for transporting three underage choir members across state lines with intent that they engage in illegal sexual activity.
The named victims each first had sexual contact with Lewis at about age 14; two relationships continued into adulthood; Lewis denied having sex with them when they were minors or transporting them for that purpose.
The government sought to admit testimony from two additional uncharged minor victims under Federal Rule of Evidence 413 to show other sexual assaults, including forcible acts and molestation beginning as early as age eight.
The district court, after a pretrial hearing outside the jury’s presence, admitted the Rule 413 evidence over Lewis’s Rule 403 objection; the court instructed the jury that uncharged acts were not charged in the indictment.
On appeal Lewis argued the uncharged forcible assaults were more serious and thus unfairly prejudicial compared to the charged statutory offenses; the Fifth Circuit found the particular argument was not preserved and reviewed for plain error.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Admissibility of uncharged sexual-assault evidence under Rule 413 subject to Rule 403 balancing	Government: Rule 413 permits admission of other sexual-assault evidence to show propensity, intent, modus operandi, and to impeach defendant’s testimony.	Lewis: Admission is unfairly prejudicial under Rule 403 because uncharged conduct involved forcible assaults and could confuse/jury and outweigh probative value.	Court: Evidence highly probative of proclivity, intent, modus operandi, and impeachment; jury instruction mitigated prejudice; no clear abuse of discretion in Rule 403 ruling.
Preservation / Standard of Review	Government: Lewis did not preserve the specific Rule 403 argument about relative seriousness; thus plain error review applies.	Lewis: Contended his Rule 403 objection below preserved the issue.	Court: Lewis’s particular contention wasn’t raised below; plain error review applies and court found no clear or obvious error, so affirm.

United States v. Dillon, 532 F.3d 379 (5th Cir. 2008) (Rule 403 review; deference to district court)
United States v. Escalante-Reyes, 689 F.3d 415 (5th Cir. 2012) (plain-error standard explained)
Weeks v. Angelone, 528 U.S. 225 (2000) (jurors presumed to follow limiting instructions)
United States v. Hitt, 473 F.3d 146 (5th Cir. 2006) (intent element for § 2423(a) and relevance of modus operandi evidence)
United States v. Moore, [citation="425 F. App'x 347"] (5th Cir. 2011) (per curiam) (child-molestation evidence admissible to show sexual interest in children)
United States v. Polasek, 162 F.3d 878 (5th Cir. 1998) (objection must specify grounds to preserve error)
Mathis v. Exxon Corp., 302 F.3d 448 (5th Cir. 2002) (pretrial objection can preserve appellate review under Rule 103)
Camacho v. Tex. Workforce Comm'n, 445 F.3d 407 (5th Cir. 2006) (earliest panel opinion controls when resolving circuit conflict)