United States v. Paz-Alvarez

LIPEZ, Circuit Judge.

Appellants Angel Paz-Alvarez (“Paz”) and Luis Marrero-Marrero (“Marrero”) were convicted for their roles in a drug trafficking conspiracy. Together, they built sophisticated secret compartments (“clavos”) in boats designed to smuggle hundreds of kilograms of cocaine into the United States. They argue that their convictions should be vacated because of errors in the jury instructions. In addition, Paz challenges the sufficiency of the evidence and the two-level sentence enhancement he received for using a “special skill,” while Marrero argues that the conspiracy statutes…