U.S. v. Sklena

In prosecution on wire and commodity fraud charges stemming from scheme in which defendant and another trader purchased and sold customers' futures' contracts non-competitively so as to produce monetary gains for defendant once defendant sold said contracts at prevailing market price, Dist. Ct. erred in denying defendant's request to admit deposition transcript of other trader involved in disputed transactions where said trade had died prior to trial. Defendant was entitled to new trial since said transcript was admissible under Rule 804(b)(1) where: (1) CFTC, which ran subject deposition, was essentially same party as Justice Dept., which represented U.S. in instant case; and (2) CFTC had opportunity and similar motive in deposition to develop trader's testimony regarding actions taken by defendant and trader regarding customers' futures contracts. Moreover, error was prejudicial since testimony in transcript corroborated defendant's account of timing of trades that formed essential portion of defendant's defense.