U.S. v. Jones

Dist. Ct. did not err in granting defendant’s motion for judgment of acquittal after jury found defendant guilty of drug distribution charges arising out of claim that defendant actually manufactured crack cocaine. No witness testified that defendant either possessed or cooked cocaine that formed basis of charged offense, and govt. was unable to establish through its extensive surveillance of residence either how long defendant was inside residence where police claimed crack had been manufactured, or whether defendant was inside residence for sufficient amount of time to manufacture crack. Moreover, remaining circumstantial evidence was insufficient to support instant guilty verdict where contents of telephone recordings contained evidentiary gaps that precluded identification of defendant as individual responsible for making crack, and where any necessary inference to defendant being individual responsible for making crack was based on speculation.