United States v. Gildo Ricci

── United States v. Gildo Ricci ── Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit Date: May 28, 2026 Category: General USCA4 Appeal: 25-4261 Doc: 34 Filed: 05/28/2026 Pg: 1 of 8 UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 25-4261 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. GILDO RICCI, Defendant - Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, at Alexandria. Claude M. Hilton, Senior District Judge. (1:24-cr-00149-CMH-1) Submitted: April 21, 2026 Decided: May 28, 2026 Before GREGORY, WYNN, and BERNER, Circuit Judges. Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion. ON BRIEF: Geremy C. Kamens, Federal Public Defender, Patrick L. Bryant, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Shannon S. Quill, Assistant Federal Public Defender, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER, Alexandria, Virginia, for Appellant. Todd W. Blanche, Deputy Attorney General, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C.; Lindsey Halligan, United States Attorney, Special Attorney, Lauren N. Beebe, Assistant United States Attorney, Christopher M. Carter, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Alexandria, Virginia, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. USCA4 Appeal: 25-4261 Doc: 34 Filed: 05/28/2026 Pg: 2 of 8 PER CURIAM: Gildo Ricci appeals his jury conviction and the 18-month sentence imposed for possession with intent to distribute cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(C). Ricci asserts that the district court abused its discretion when it granted the Government’s motion to strike a particular juror (“the Juror”) for cause without first obtaining a sufficient factual basis to determine whether the Juror could remain impartial. The Government responds that, because defense counsel failed to timely object to the Juror’s dismissal, Ricci failed to preserve the issue for appeal and, thus, plain error review applies. The Government next asserts that, regardless of which standard of review this court applies to Ricci’s assignment of error, the court should defer to how the district court chose to conduct voir dire. Finding no error, we affirm. “Voir dire plays an essential role in guaranteeing a criminal defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury, in that it enables the court to select an impartial jury and assists counsel in exercising peremptory challenges.” United States v. Jeffery, 631 F.3d 669, 673 (4th Cir. 2011) (internal quotation marks omitted). “‘Despite its importance, however, the adequacy of voir dire is not easily subject to appellate review,” and this court “accord[s] great deference to the district court’s decisions about the conduct of voir dire.” Id. (citation modified). This “is so because a trial judge’s appraisal is ordinarily influenced by a host of factors impossible to capture fully in the record, such as a prospective juror’s inflection, sincerity, demeanor, candor, body language, and apprehension of duty.” United States v. Tsarnaev, 595 U.S. 302, 312-13 (2022) (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, the “trial 2 USCA4 Appeal: 25-4261 Doc: 34 Filed: 05/28/2026 Pg: 3 of 8 court’s broad discretion in this area includes deciding what questions to ask prospective jurors.” Id. at 313; see id. at 313-14 (finding that distri