## Facts

- James A. Bray was a long-time U.S. Postal Service employee and window clerk in Bay City, Michigan; his close friend and coworker, Robert Owczarzak, was also a postal employee.
- Window clerks recorded daily transactions on USPS accounting forms (including “1412 forms”) and were subject to periodic audits comparing cash and stamp stock to required paperwork.
- Owczarzak began taking cash from stamp sales and, to conceal shortages before audits, asked Bray to lend stamp stock so that Owczarzak’s cash-plus-stamp accountability would match audit expectations.
- Bray also began embezzling cash from postal sales, and the two men traded stamp stock back and forth around audit times to conceal shortages.
- The government prosecuted Bray for embezzling approximately $20,000 from the Postal Service and relied in part on charts summarizing large volumes of postal accounting records; the underlying records were not admitted at trial.
- A jury convicted Bray in federal district court.

## Issues

1. Whether summary charts were properly admitted as substantive evidence under Federal Rule of Evidence 1006 even though the underlying voluminous records were not admitted into evidence.
2. Whether the charts should instead have been treated as non-evidentiary pedagogical aids under Federal Rule of Evidence 611(a).
3. Whether the trial court was required to give a limiting instruction stating that the charts were not evidence.

## Decision

- The Sixth Circuit affirmed the conviction.
- The court held the trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting the charts under Rule 1006 without admitting the underlying documents into evidence.
- The court held the charts were Rule 1006 summaries (substantive evidence), not Rule 611(a) pedagogical aids.
- The court held no limiting instruction was required telling the jury the charts were not evidence, because properly admitted Rule 1006 summaries are themselves evidence.

## Legal Principles

- Under Federal Rule of Evidence 1006, summaries of voluminous writings may be admitted as substantive evidence when the underlying materials are admissible, voluminous, and made available to the opposing party for examination and copying; the underlying documents need not be admitted.
- Federal Rule of Evidence 611(a) permits pedagogical charts to assist the jury in understanding evidence already admitted; such aids ordinarily are not evidence and commonly require a cautionary instruction.
- Whether a chart is a Rule 1006 summary or a Rule 611(a) pedagogical aid turns on its function: substituting for voluminous records (Rule 1006) versus merely organizing or illustrating admitted evidence (Rule 611(a)).
- A limiting instruction that a chart is “not evidence” is inappropriate when the chart has been admitted under Rule 1006 as substantive evidence.
- Admission of summaries and related instructional decisions are reviewed for abuse of discretion.

## Conclusion

The Sixth Circuit held that summary charts condensing voluminous postal accounting records were properly admitted as substantive evidence under Rule 1006 without admitting the underlying records, and that the jury need not be instructed that such admitted summaries are merely demonstrative aids.


United States v. Bray, 139 F.3d 1104 (6th Cir. 1998)