U.S. appellate court reverses dismissal of federal gun charge

A Pittsburgh federal judge was wrong to dismiss an illegal-gun indictment against a Hill District man after two juries couldn’t reach a verdict, an appellate court has ruled in a case of first impression.

The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday reversed the March 2017 decision by U.S. District Judge Cathy Bissoon, clearing the way for a possible third trial for Raymont Wright.

Wright, a convicted felon in his mid-40s, had been under indictment since December 2014 on a charge of carrying an illegal gun following a chase and crash near the former Civic Arena in July of that year.

Police said he had a gun after the crash, but he suggested they planted it.

He went to trial twice within 10 months and both times juries couldn’t come up with a verdict.

After the second mistrial, the U.S. Attorney’s office wanted to try again but the judge said no, invoking her powers of “inherent authority” as a federal judge.

She dismissed the indictment with prejudice, meaning it can’t be filed again, and said she found that Wright’s “interest in finality outweighs the government’s interest in continuing its prosecution.”

She also noted in her opinion, however, that the 3rd Circuit was sure to look at her decision carefully.

It’s the first time the issue of a judge’s authority to dismiss charges after multiple mistrials has come up in the 3rd Circuit.

Two of three circuit judges, Theodore McKee and Patty Shwartz, said Judge Bissoon abused her inherent authority because there is no evidence of government misconduct.

A third judge, Richard Nygaard, disagreed and said the dismissal was “well within the boundaries” of Judge Bissoon’s powers as a judge.

Wright led police on a chase that started on Memory Lane and Bedford Avenue in the Hill District. Police said he drove through a stop sign and took off after spotting an unmarked police car. A pursuit ensued in which he crashed through a fence into a parking lot where the Civic Arena had previously been.

Police said he got out of the car with a gun in his hand and tried to rack the slide, but then threw the weapon to the ground. Authorities were unable to recover DNA or fingerprints to match the gun to Wright, so the case boiled down to police testimony that it was his gun.

Because he’s a felon, he can’t have one.

The majority judges said Judge Bissoon would have been within her powers to toss the case if there was some evidence of prosecutorial misconduct or other government malfeasance. But there was none; the judge even noted the professionalism of the U.S. attorney’s office in how it handled the case both times.

In short, Judge Bissoon made her decision because she felt it was unfair to Wright and the judges said that was wrong.

“Invoking [her] own notions about the unfairness of requiring a defendant to face a retrial where the government did not obtain a majority of the jurors’ votes is an improper exercise of a court’s supervisory power,” wrote Judge Shwartz.

Judge Nygaard said in his dissent, however, that the government had two chances to convict Wright and that the judge was within her powers to prevent a third. His opinion framed the decision in the context of a check on the power of one branch of government over another.

“Just as the filing of an indictment is an exercise of executive power, the dismissal of one is an exercise of judicial power,” he wrote.

He said he saw no abuse of discretion in Judge Bissoon’s “careful and thorough balancing of relevant factors” in making her decision.

Wright was represented by a federal public defender. The public defender’s office in Pittsburgh does not comment on cases.