United States v. Antonio Rivera, 799 F.3d 180

Background

Defendants Rivera, Villaman, and Whaley ran two Long Island bars that functioned as illegal brothels, recruiting undocumented women with promises of good pay and transport and then coercing them (threats of violence/deportation, forced intoxication, sexual assault).
Government moved in limine to exclude evidence or cross-examination about the victims’ other sexual behavior or prior employment in sexualized businesses under Fed. R. Evid. 412; the district court granted the motion.
At trial defense elicited other testimony (e.g., victims leaving and later returning to work, prior visits to the bars, recruiting friends) and argued consent/pecuniary motive in closing. Defendants convicted of sex trafficking, forced labor, and alien-harboring/transportation offenses.
On appeal defendants challenged (1) exclusion under Rule 412 as violating confrontation/complete-defense rights; (2) the sex-trafficking jury instruction for omitting an objective “reasonable person in the victim’s circumstances” component of coercion; and (3) the reasonableness and procedural correctness of sentences.
The Second Circuit affirmed convictions, held the Rule 412 exclusion did not violate confrontation or deny a complete defense, found the jury instruction erroneous but harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, vacated sentences as procedurally unreasonable, and remanded for full resentencing.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument (Gov't)	Defendant's Argument	Held
Exclusion under Fed. R. Evid. 412 of victims’ prior sexualized employment	412 protects victims and the excluded evidence was irrelevant to coercion/consent and should be excluded	Prior work in sexualized businesses or prior prostitution is highly probative of whether victims were defrauded or consented; exclusion violated the right to confront witnesses and present a complete defense	Rule 412 exclusion did not violate the Sixth Amendment; prior prostitution/sexualized-work evidence was irrelevant to whether victims were later coerced and any defense was sufficiently presented by other testimony
Jury instruction on coercion (sex-trafficking)	Instruction allowed jury to consider victim vulnerabilities but did not need explicit objective standard	Instruction omitted requirement that a reasonable person in similar circumstances would feel coerced; this lowered the government’s burden	Court erred by omitting objective “reasonable person of like background/circumstances” component but error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt given strong evidence of threats, force, and intoxication
Applicability of Rule 412 to forced labor counts	412 applies because forced labor included sexual acts and sexual assault, so it is a criminal proceeding involving alleged sexual misconduct	Defendants argued 412 should not bar probing into prior sexualized employment for forced-labor defense	Court held 412 applied to forced-labor counts and exclusion was proper for same reasons as sex-trafficking counts
Sentencing enhancements/procedural correctness	Government defended enhancements (serious injury, aggravated sexual abuse) as supported by record	Defendants argued some enhancements were improperly applied and several sentences exceeded statutory maxima or mandatory-minimums were misapplied	Court vacated sentences, found multiple procedural errors (including improper across-the-board enhancements and sentences exceeding statutory maxima), and remanded for full resentencing

Key Cases Cited

Manley v. AmBase Corp., 337 F.3d 237 (2d Cir. 2003) (standard of review for evidentiary rulings)
United States v. Tropeano, 252 F.3d 653 (2d Cir. 2001) (de novo review for constitutional issues in evidentiary rulings)
Olden v. Kentucky, 488 U.S. 227 (1988) (Confrontation Clause and limits on exclusion of cross-examination where credibility is central)
Holmes v. South Carolina, 547 U.S. 319 (2006) (right to present a complete defense)
Davis v. Alaska, 415 U.S. 308 (1974) (right to impeach witnesses by cross-examination)
United States v. Zayac, 765 F.3d 112 (2d Cir. 2014) (harmlessness where alternative testimony or admissions supplied the defense theory)
United States v. Cephus, 684 F.3d 703 (7th Cir. 2012) (prior prostitution evidence irrelevant to coercion element)
United States v. Roy, 781 F.3d 416 (8th Cir. 2015) (excluding prior prostitution evidence as irrelevant to sex-trafficking coercion/consent)
Sullivan v. Louisiana, 508 U.S. 275 (1993) (harmlessness beyond a reasonable doubt for omitted elements in jury charge)
United States v. Dorvee, 616 F.3d 174 (2d Cir. 2010) (requirement to correctly calculate Guidelines range at sentencing)
United States v. Bonilla, 618 F.3d 102 (2d Cir. 2010) (court must state reasons for sentence imposed)
United States v. Corsey, 723 F.3d 366 (2d Cir. 2013) (vacatur of sentence moots substantive-reasonableness inquiry when procedural error found)
United States v. Ahders, 622 F.3d 115 (2d Cir. 2010) (need for explanation when applying specific enhancements)