Opinion
Case No. CR-06-206-E-BLW.
June 5, 2007
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER
MEMORANDUM DECISION
The Court has before it defendant Evertson's motion to produce seeking an order compelling the Government to produce certain investigative notes by law enforcement agents. At an earlier hearing, the Court ordered that the notes at issue be submitted to the Court for an in camera inspection. The Government submitted those notes to the Court and the motion is now at issue.
Generally an agent's rough notes jotted during surveillance are not producible under the Jencks Act due to the incomplete nature of the notes. United States v. Cedano-Arellano, 332 F.3d 568 (9th Cir. 2003). The notes would only be deemed statements under the Jencks Act if "the materials not only reflect the witness' own words, but . . . [are] also in the nature of a complete recital that eliminates the possibility of portions being selected out of context." United States v. Bobadilla-Lopez, 954 F.2d 519 (9th Cir. 1992).
The notes here are all handwritten by investigative agents. Except for three short sentence fragments, the notes do not quote any witness but merely contain the agents' truncated summaries of what the witnesses were saying. With regard to the three sentence fragments that appear to be quotes from the witnesses, these fragments are quite short and without any context. The three fragments can in no way be considered a "complete recital" and hence cannot constitute statements under the Jencks Act.
For all of these reasons, the Court will deny Evertson's motion.
ORDER
In accordance with the Memorandum Decision set forth above, NOW THEREFORE IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, that the motion to produce (Docket No. 17) is DENIED.