In United States v. Sanchez, --- F.4th ---, No. 23-2533 (9th Cir. 2026), a divided panel reversed the district court’s denial of Andres Sanchez’s motion for a new trial, and remanded in a case in which a jury convicted Sanchez on six counts of preparing and presenting false and fraudulent tax returns.
Defendant-Appellant Andres Sanchez appeals from his conviction on six counts of preparing and presenting false and fraudulent tax returns in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(2). Sanchez argues that the presence of a racially biased juror during deliberations violated his Sixth Amendment right to trial by an impartial jury. It is undisputed that a racially biased juror was present during most of the jury deliberations and that this juror made racially biased comments during deliberations—but the district court excused the biased juror and accepted the verdict from an 11-member jury.The district court denied Sanchez’s motion for mistrial before the verdict and his motion for new trial after the verdict. We conclude that the district court applied the incorrect legal standard when determining whether Sanchez was prejudiced by the racially biased juror’s presence. Under the correct standard, there is a strong presumption of prejudice, and applying that standard, the Government has not met its heavy burden to prove harmlessness. Accordingly, we reverse the denial of Sanchez’s motion for a new trial, and we remand for a new trial.The Constitution requires “a jury capable and willing to decide the case solely on the evidence before it.” Smith v. Phillips, 455 U.S. 209, 217 (1982). The Sixth Amendment guarantees criminal defendants the right to a trial “by an impartial jury.” The bias or prejudice of even a single juror” violates that right. “Actual bias is, in essence, . . . the existence of a state of mind that leads to an inference that the person will not act with entire impartiality.”The key facts underlying Sanchez’s Sixth Amendment claim are essentially undisputed. Sanchez contends, and the Government does not meaningfully dispute, that a racially biased juror, Juror 5, was present during virtually all the jury’s deliberations—but excused before the district court accepted the jury’s verdict. Further, the Government does not challenge the district court’s finding that Juror 5 made a statement during jury deliberations to the effect that “people from Mexico come to the United States to screw over or get over on Americans.” Nor does the Government challenge the district court’s finding that Juror 5 could not “be fair and impartial.”In sum, we conclude that the district court erred in applying Sarkisian’s version of the plain error standard when assessing whether Sanchez was prejudiced by the presence of a biased juror. Sarkisian is neither binding nor persuasive authority on this issue because it expressly declined to decide whether the Remmer presumption-of-prejudice standard should apply; its only reason for questioning Remmer’s applicability contravened our precedent; and it provided no reasoned explanation for applying the plain error standard instead.“[A] juror’s good faith belief in his own impartiality is not dispositive.” “The effect of extrinsic prejudicial evidence on a juror’s deliberation may be substantial even though it is not perceived by the juror and ‘a juror’s good faith cannot counter this effect.’”When a juror is racially biased or makes a racially biased statement, but that juror is excused before the trial court accepts a verdict, the Remmer presumption of prejudice applies, and the Government bears the heavy burden of rebutting that presumption and proving that the racially biased juror’s presence was harmless to the defendant. Additionally, when a biased juror has participated in deliberations, such participation is additional evidence of prejudice that the Government must overcome. In this case, a racially biased juror participated in all but the last thirteen minutes of the jury’s deliberations, which spanned many hours across two days. Because the Government has not met its burden to show Juror 5’s presence and racially biased statements were harmless, Sanchez is entitled to a new trial. Accordingly, we REVERSE the district court’s denial of Sanchez’s motion for a new trial, and we REMAND for a new trial.
