Butler v. United States

FERREN, Associate Judg>;

A jury convicted appellant oi distributing cocaine. See D.C.Code § 33-541(&)(1) (1998). Appellant challenges his conviction primarily on the ground that the trial court’s deliberate modifications of the standard “reasonable doubt” instruction — incluchwg omission of one of the principal definitional sentences— amounted to constitutional error requiring reversal. We conclude that the court’s revisions of the standard reasonable doubt instruction were improper but that the resulting instruction was not constitutionally deficient. We therefore affirm.

I

The government’s…