The following published opinions were released by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on April 30, 2008:

• U.S. v. Gulley (King, DeMoss, Southwick, JJ.; per curiam) (substituted for opinion released April 8, 2008). The Fifth Circuit held that there was sufficient evidence for a rational jury to conclude that the defendant aided and abetted in the victim’s murder; that the district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding evidence of the victim’s prior violent conduct the defendant sought to introduce to bolster his self-defense argument; that the district court did not commit clear error in refusing to hold an in camera hearing into the cause of the government’s pre-indictment delay, because the defendant made insufficient showing that he was prejudiced by the delay and that the government intentionally delayed to gain a strategic advantage, and because bad faith and prejudice are two independent thresholds to a pre-indictment delay claim; that the defendant’s claim of ineffective assistance of counsel for failure to adequately prepare the testimony of the crime scene reconstruction expert was not ripe for review upon direct appeal; and that any error that occurred when defendant was not present when the district court responded to a jury note requesting to be allowed to recess their deliberations for the day was harmless error.
• U.S. v. Tushnet (Jolly, Prado, Southwick, JJ.; opinion by Southwick, J.). Holding that the district court did not err in applying the total weight of all substance-containing media (i.e., drug and filler), rather than just the actual weight of the controlled substance within the media, in determining the amount of MDMA subject to the defendant’s possession conviction for purposes of applying the Sentencing Guidelines.