United States v. Martin

1
24-3013
United States v. Martin
United States Court of Appeals
For the Second Circuit
August Term 2025
Argued: February 13, 2026
Decided: August 21, 2026
No. 24-3013
U NITED S TATES OF AMERICA,
Appellee,
v.
ADELLE ANDERSON,
Defendant,
C ORY MARTIN,
Defendant-Appellant.

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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of New York
No. 20-cr-549, Ann M. Donnelly, Judge.
Before: C ALABRESI , L IVINGSTON, and NATHAN, Circuit Judges.
Defendant-Appellant Cory Martin appeals from a
judgment of the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of New York (Donnelly, J.), convicting him, after a jury
trial, of murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire,
fraud, and identity theft. On appeal, Martin argues that (1) the
evidence was insufficient to support his murder-for-hire
convictions, (2) the district court’s jury instructions
inadequately explained the consideration element of murder-
for-hire, (3) the district court erred in delivering an aiding-and-
abetting instruction with respect to the murder-for-hire count,
and (4) his other convictions should be vacated due to spillover
prejudice. We hold that Martin’s murder-for-hire conviction
was supported by sufficient evidence; the jury instructions
accurately stated the elements of murder-for-hire; the district
court did not plainly err by failing to give an additional
clarifying instruction; the district court’s aiding-and-abetting
instruction was justified based on the evidence; and there was
no error due to spillover prejudice. We therefore AFFIRM the
judgment of conviction on all counts.
Judge Calabresi dissents in a separate opinion.

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EMILY D EAN (Amy Busa,
Andres Palacio, and Tanya
Hajjar, on the brief), Assistant
United States Attorneys, for
Joseph Nocella, Jr., United
States Attorney for the Eastern
District of New York, Brooklyn,
NY, for Appellee.
JANE ANNE MURRAY, Murray
Law LLC, New York, NY, for
Defendant-Appellant.
N ATHAN, Circuit Judge:
In April 2018, Defendant-Appellant Cory Martin strangled
Brandy Odom, dismembered her body with power tools he
purchased from Home Depot, and scattered her remains throughout
a public park in Brooklyn. Martin did this because his then-girlfriend,
Adelle Anderson, had taken out life insurance policies on Odom and
promised to give Martin the proceeds once Odom was dead. After
the murder was complete, Anderson attempted multiple times to
collect on the fraudulent policies, though her efforts were unavailing.
Police eventually discovered Odom’s remains, convinced Anderson
to cooperate, and prosecuted Martin for, among other crimes,

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murder-for-hire in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1958. Following a jury trial
in which Anderson was the Government’s star witness, Martin was
convicted on all counts.
At trial, Martin argued that Anderson masterminded and
executed Odom’s murder, and that she had fabricated whole cloth
Martin’s role in the scheme. The jury rejected that theory, concluding
that, as required by § 1958, Martin murdered Odom in exchange for
Anderson’s promise of insurance proceeds.
On appeal, Martin advances a different theory. He argues that
murder-for-hire requires an employee-employer relationship and
that he and Anderson did not have one. Instead, Martin claims that
Anderson acted entirely at his direction, in part because she suffered
horrific abuse at his hands. Anderson was therefore either acting
under duress, or at most was Martin’s co-conspirator. But she did not
“hire” Martin to do anything, and Martin therefore cannot have
committed “murder-for-hire.”
We reject this argument. The murder-for-hire statute does not
require a formal employment relationship; it requires that a murder
constituted consideration for a promise to pay something of
pecuniary value. The meaning of consideration in this context is the
same as at common law, referring to the age-old concept of reciprocal
inducement. That is, the killer’s promise to kill must induce the
payor’s promise to pay, and the payor’s promise to pay must induce
the killer’s promise to kill. We hold that the Government presented
sufficient evidence in this case for a reasonable jury to conclude, as it
did, that Anderson and Martin’s arrangement met this definition of
consideration.

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We also hold that the district court’s jury instructions
accurately stated the elements of murder-for-hire; the district court
did not plainly err by failing to give an additional clarifying
instruction; the district court’s aiding-and-abetting instruction was
justified based on the evidence; and there was no error due to
spillover prejudice. We therefore AFFIRM the judgment of conviction
on all counts.
BACKGROUND1
Cory Martin and Adelle Anderson met in high school in the
early 2000s and commenced a decade-long “on and off” relationship
during which Martin continuously sexually and physically abused
Anderson. App’x at 117–18. Between 2015 and 2017, Anderson took
out life insurance policies on various individuals with the express
intention that she would give the policy proceeds to Martin if Martin
killed the insured individuals. One of those insured individuals was
Brandy Odom.
Before Martin and Anderson targeted Odom, however, they
1 The following facts are drawn from the evidence presented at Martin’s
trial. On review for sufficiency of the evidence, “we are to view the
evidence, whether direct or circumstantial, in the light most favorable to the
government,” and “defer to the jury by resolving all inferences from the
evidence and issues of credibility in favor of the verdict.” United States v.
Hardwick, 523 F.3d 94, 100 (2d Cir. 2008) (citation modified). “Any lack of
corroboration goes to the weight of the evidence, not to its sufficiency, and
a challenge to the weight of the evidence is a matter for argument to the
jury, not a ground for reversal on appeal.” United States v. Gordon, 987 F.2d
902, 906 (2d Cir. 1993).

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first set their sights on a man named Alex Villard. Anderson and
Villard had dated in the mid-2010s and had a child together. But
Anderson later left Villard in order to pursue a relationship with
Martin. Eventually, Anderson and Martin both came to “want
[Villard] to die.” App’x at 127. Martin devised the first insurance
scheme in service of that goal. The plan was straightforward:
Anderson would take out insurance policies in Villard’s name; Martin
would kill Villard; and Anderson would give the insurance proceeds
to Martin. The “point” of the scheme was that “[Martin] was not
going to get rid of [Villard] who was [Anderson’s] problem
and . . . not get paid for it or benefit some way from it.” Id. at 127.
Although Anderson took out an insurance policy in Villard’s name in
2016, Martin never went through with Villard’s murder because
Anderson “kept getting cold feet[.]” Id. at 129–30.
Around the same time, Martin also instructed Anderson to
apply for insurance policies on both of Anderson’s children, which
she did in 2016 and 2017. But while Anderson actively wanted Martin
to kill Villard, at least initially, she did not want Martin to kill her
children. Accordingly, in order to pressure Anderson to take out the
policies on her children, Martin threatened Anderson and, on at least
one occasion, subjected her to violent physical abuse. Anderson
ultimately acquiesced and applied for the policies. But she continued
to resist Martin’s murderous designs on her children. In order to
protect her younger son, Anderson sent him to live with Anderson’s
friends in Atlanta for roughly a month and a half, after which Villard
secured full custody. Anderson’s older son stopped living with her
full time as well, primarily staying with Anderson’s mother and sister

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instead.
At some point, Anderson and Martin’s sights shifted to Odom.
Anderson had first befriended Odom while Anderson was living with
Villard. Anderson and Odom bonded over their shared occupation—
sex work—and Odom moved in with Anderson and Villard for a
time. When Anderson later left Villard and moved in with Martin, so
did Odom. At first, Anderson and Odom worked together with
Martin acting as their pimp. Later, at Martin’s direction, Anderson
stopped performing sex work herself and shifted instead to managing
Odom’s sex work.
In early 2017, Martin suggested to Anderson that Odom should
become the target of a new insurance-murder scheme. Anderson
agreed and took out the first of two insurance policies in Odom’s
name in March of that year. Anderson filled out the application and
listed herself as the beneficiary, falsely claiming to be Odom’s sister.
Nine months later, Anderson took out another insurance policy in
Odom’s name. She again filled out the application herself, listed
herself as the beneficiary, and pretended to be Odom’s sister.
Anderson’s plan was to transfer all of the insurance proceeds to
Martin upon Odom’s death.
At trial, Anderson testified that she “did not like” Martin’s plan
to kill Odom in exchange for insurance proceeds. Id. at 141. But
Anderson also testified to various facts from which the jury could
have inferred that she still wanted the murder to occur. For example,
Anderson viewed some version of the insurance-murder scheme as
inevitable by 2017 and understood killing Odom to be “an easier
option” than the other potential targets. Id. Anderson also may have

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wanted Martin to commit the murder so that the couple could jointly
benefit from the insurance proceeds, including by improving their
precarious housing situation. Finally, Anderson was informed by one
of her sons that he had witnessed Odom performing oral sex on
Martin, though Anderson testified that she “did not believe” her son’s
story. App’x at 205. Anderson therefore may have wanted Martin to
kill Odom out jealousy or a desire for revenge. Anderson also at least
once encouraged Martin to “try n do something with that bitch”
before the insurance policies in Odom’s name expired. Gov. App’x at
414.
Martin strangled Odom to death in April 2018. Following the
murder, Martin picked Anderson up from Anderson’s mother’s
house, along with Anderson’s infant daughter. The couple went to
dinner at Red Lobster. They then purchased cleaning supplies at
Walmart and returned to Martin’s house, where Martin proceeded to
dismember Odom’s corpse with tools that he had purchased from
Home Depot. Martin and Anderson then made two trips together to
Canarsie Park, Brooklyn, to dispose of the remains.
After initially refusing to cooperate, Anderson reversed course
and pled guilty to, among other counts, murder-for-hire in violation
of 18 U.S.C. § 1958. She testified at Martin’s trial pursuant to a
cooperation agreement, and was ultimately sentenced to five years’
probation without any custodial sentence. At her sentencing hearing,
the district court acknowledged that she was “the victim of sustained
and serious sexual, physical, and psychological abuse,” but also
emphasized that “there were so many off-ramps here” that Anderson
declined to take. Supp. App’x at 25–26. The court specifically

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observed that Anderson participated in the murder scheme “for over
a year,” and that she “did nothing to warn [Odom], even when
[Anderson] was safe at [her] family’s house.” Id. at 24.
Following a two-week jury trial, where Anderson’s testimony
was critical, Martin was convicted of murder-for-hire and murder-
for-hire conspiracy, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1958(a), along with
various counts of fraud and identity theft related to the fraudulent
insurance policies. The court sentenced Martin to concurrent terms
of life imprisonment on the § 1958 convictions, concurrent terms of 20
years’ imprisonment on the two fraud counts, and two years’
imprisonment on the identity theft count. Martin timely appealed.
DISCUSSION
A. Scope of Section 1958
Because the meaning and scope of § 1958 impacts each of the
grounds for appeal, we address the statutory interpretation question
first. “[O]ur inquiry begins with the statutory text, and ends there as
well if the text is unambiguous.” BedRoc Ltd., LLC v. United States, 541
U.S. 176, 183 (2004). That is the case here.
Section 1958 makes it a crime to participate in interstate
commerce “with intent that a murder be committed in violation of the
laws of any State or the United States as consideration for the receipt
of, or as consideration for a promise or agreement to pay, anything of
pecuniary value[.]” 18 U.S.C. § 1958(a). At issue here is the meaning
of “consideration.”
The term “consideration” has a well-settled meaning: “an act or

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forbearance or the promise of it done or given by one party in return
for the act or promise of another.” Consideration, Webster’s Third
New Int’l Dictionary 484 (1981); see also Consideration, Am. Heritage
Dictionary 313 (2d College ed. 1982) (defining consideration as
“[p]ayment given in exchange for a service rendered; recompense”).
Put differently, consideration means “inducement,” or the “cause,
motive, price, or impelling influence which induces” parties to
consummate an agreement. Consideration, Black’s Law Dictionary
(5th ed. 1979). As a leading treatise on contract law explains, “the
fundamental and generally accepted idea of consideration” is that
“consideration is the exchange or price requested and received by the
promisor for its promise.” 3 Williston on Contracts § 7:2 (4th ed.
2026).
We hold that consideration has the same meaning in § 1958. “It
is a settled principle of statutory construction that, absent contrary
indications, Congress intends to adopt the common law definition of
statutory terms.” Resolution Tr. Corp. v. Diamond, 45 F.3d 665, 672 (2d
Cir. 1995) (citation modified). Of course, § 1958 does not “import all
of contract law,” United States v. Gibson, 530 F.3d 606, 610 (7th Cir.
2008), nor does it require proof of a legally enforceable contract,
United States v. Hardwick, 523 F.3d 94, 100 (2d Cir. 2008). But “[w]here
Congress borrows terms of art in which are accumulated the legal
tradition and meaning of centuries of practice, it presumably knows
and adopts the cluster of ideas that were attached to each borrowed
word[.]” Sekhar v. United States, 570 U.S. 729, 733 (2013) (quotation
marks omitted). That principle applies even where such a word is
“obviously transplanted from another legal source.” George v.

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McDonough, 596 U.S. 740, 746 (2022) (quotation marks omitted).
Accordingly, we and every other circuit to discuss the meaning
of “consideration” in § 1958 have understood the term in line with
“the traditional sense of bargained for exchange, so that there must
be a quid-pro-quo (or at least the promise of such) between the parties
to the transaction.” Hardwick, 523 F.3d at 99–100 (quotation marks
omitted); see also Gibson, 530 F.3d at 610 (“[C]onsideration retains its
contract law meaning of a bargained-for exchange of something of
value[.]” (quotation marks omitted)); United States v. Wicklund, 114
F.3d 151, 154 (10th Cir. 1997) (same); United States v. Washington, 318
F.3d 845, 854 (8th Cir. 2003) (same); United States v. Hernandez, 141
F.3d 1042, 1057 (11th Cir. 1998) (same). Section 1958 thus criminalizes
“a very limited category of behavior; only those instances in which
one party agrees to commit a murder in exchange for another party’s
provision (or future promise) of payment.” United States v. Frampton,
382 F.3d 213, 217 (2d Cir. 2004).
Up to this point, the parties are largely in agreement as to the
meaning of consideration in § 1958. Where they part ways, however,
involves the nature of the required “exchange.” Id.; see also Hardwick,
523 F.3d at 100. Martin contends that such an “exchange” must be
more than a mere transfer, requiring instead something akin to an
arm’s length “employment relationship.” Appellant’s Br. at 56–57. In
Martin’s view, § 1958 incorporates a “‘for hire’ element,” and
therefore must “involve[] a hirer/solicitor and a murderer.”
Appellant’s March 11 Letter at 1. To that effect, Martin requested a
jury instruction that “consideration” must be “offered by one (the
solicitor) in exchange for another’s (the murderer’s) agreement to

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commit a murder.” App’x at 58.
In the Government’s view, the exchange requires only that the
payor’s “payment or promise to pay for the intended murder” was
what “caused [the killer] to carry out [the] murder.” Gov. Br. at 33.
There need be no “employment relationship” or bargaining in the
sense of an ordinary commercial transaction. Id. at 34 (quotation
marks omitted). Nor is it necessary that the payor solicited the
murderer’s participation or initially conceived of the scheme.2
We agree with the Government that nothing in the text of
§ 1958 suggests that “consideration” requires arm’s length bargaining
or a formal employment relationship. After all, “Congress did not
aim § 1958 only at murderous businessmen.” United States v. Phillips,
929 F.3d 1120, 1124 (9th Cir. 2019). While the title of the statute refers
to “Commission of Murder-for-Hire,” 18 U.S.C. § 1958, “[i]t is well
established that the title of a statute cannot limit the plain meaning of
its text,” United States v. Epstein, 620 F.3d 76, 80 (2d Cir. 2010)
(quotation marks omitted). Unlike the title, the statutory text refers
2 The dissent repeatedly contends that the Government views the statute as
requiring only an agreement between the parties rather than an exchange
(or promised exchange) of payment for the murder. See post at 1, 3–4 & n.1.
We understand the Government’s argument differently. In distinguishing
several of our prior cases, the Government emphasizes that Anderson and
Martin not only agreed to their exchange in advance of the murder, but also
that Anderson’s promise “was necessary for Martin’s renumeration for the
murder” and therefore that “Martin did not and could not have committed
this crime alone.” Gov. Br. at 33. The Government’s statement that
“nothing more is required” simply clarifies that § 1958 does not incorporate
a separate “for-hire” or “employment” element. Id. at 34.

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to “consideration,” which plainly encompasses transactions other
than hiring an employee. All that is required is that “the
consideration and the promise bear a reciprocal relation of motive or
inducement: the consideration induces the making of the promise and
the promise induces the furnishing of the consideration.”
Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 71 cmt. b (1981). “[J]ust as the
promisor’s purpose must be to induce an exchange, so the promisee’s
purpose must be to take advantage of the proposed exchange.”
Farnsworth on Contracts 64 (1982). Thus, while “consideration must
not be confounded with motive, . . . it is the essence of a
consideration, that, by the terms of the agreement, it is given and
accepted as the motive or inducement of the promise.” O.W. Holmes,
Jr., The Common Law 293 (1882). “The root of the whole matter is the
relation of reciprocal conventional inducement, each for the other,
between consideration and promise.” Id. at 293–94.
We emphasize that no actual, enforceable agreement is
required. Rather, “it is the defendant’s intent that controls.”
Hardwick, 523 F.3d at 100. “According to the plain language of § 1958,
the act of traveling in, or using a facility of, interstate commerce,
coupled with the intent that a murder take place in consideration of
anything of pecuniary value, is itself a substantive offense[.]”
Frampton, 382 F.3d at 217 n.3. “[T]he statutory phrase consideration
for a promise or agreement to pay does not create a separate
‘agreement element,’ but rather modifies the type of intent which a
defendant must possess, namely, the intent to commit a murder for
hire.” United States v. Dvorkin, 799 F.3d 867, 875–76 (7th Cir. 2015)
(quotation marks omitted) (collecting cases). Thus, if the defendant is

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the payor, it is irrelevant whether “the would-be murderer is an
undercover agent who by definition never intends to commit the
crime.” Hardwick, 523 F.3d at 100. Likewise, if the defendant is the
murderer, the payor’s subjective motives are irrelevant, except insofar
as they illuminate the defendant’s intent. What matters is that the
defendant acted on an understanding of his counterpart’s role that
satisfies the requirements of § 1958.
In sum, if the defendant is the alleged killer, as was the case
here, he violates § 1958 if he (1) intends to commit the murder in order
to induce payment by another person, and (2) intends for the expected
payment to induce his commission of the murder. That is, the
payment (or promise to pay) must not be incidental to the murder—
it must both induce and be induced by the murder (or promise to
murder).
B. Sufficiency of the Evidence
Applying this interpretation of § 1958 to the facts at hand, we
conclude that the evidence was sufficient to support Martin’s murder-
for-hire convictions.
In assessing sufficiency, we ask “whether, after viewing the
evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational
trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime
beyond a reasonable doubt.” In re Terrorist Bombings of U.S. Embassies
in E. Afr., 552 F.3d 93, 112 (2d Cir. 2008). We “resolv[e] all inferences
from the evidence and issues of credibility in favor of the verdict,”
and “may not substitute our own determinations of credibility or
relative weight of the evidence for that of the jury.” Hardwick, 523

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F.3d at 100. “If the court concludes that either of the two results, a
reasonable doubt or no reasonable doubt, is fairly possible, the court
must let the jury decide the matter.” United States v. Autuori, 212 F.3d
105, 114 (2d Cir. 2000) (cleaned up). Thus, “[a]lthough we review a
claim of insufficient evidence de novo, a defendant challenging his
verdict on sufficiency grounds bears a heavy burden.” Hardwick, 523
F.3d at 100 (cleaned up).
The evidence here was sufficient for a reasonable juror to
conclude that Martin murdered Odom as consideration for
Anderson’s promise to pay him insurance proceeds. As we have
already explained, it is Martin’s state of mind that matters, not
Anderson’s. And it does not matter whether Martin or Anderson
initially conceived of the plot. Section 1958 requires only that Martin
viewed his participation as a reciprocal exchange for Anderson’s
promise to pay. That is, Martin understood his promise to commit
the murder as inducement for Anderson’s promise to pay, and
understood Anderson’s promise to pay as inducement for his promise
to commit the murder.
The Government presented evidence that, from the outset,
Martin understood the scheme in exactly this way. Starting with the
plot to kill Alex Villard, Anderson testified that “the point of filling
out life insurance paperwork” was that “[Martin] was not going to get
rid of [Villard] who was my problem and [Martin] not get paid for it
or benefit some way from it.” App’x at 127. The later scheme to kill
Odom was structured in the same way, and the jury could reasonably
have inferred that the promise of insurance proceeds served the same
purpose. The Government also presented evidence—text messages

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between Martin and Anderson—in which Anderson actively used the
prospect of insurance proceeds to incentivize Martin to commit the
murder. While not overwhelming, this evidence satisfies the
Government’s burden on sufficiency review.
Martin has several responses, none of which persuades us.
First, Martin argues that his promise to commit the murder did not
induce Anderson’s promise to pay because Anderson’s promise to
pay was the result of coercion and abuse. Put differently, Martin
argues on appeal that he forced Anderson to participate, and that her
participation therefore cannot have constituted “consideration” for
anything.3 In making this argument, Martin relies heavily on
Anderson’s trial testimony regarding her sexual, emotional, and
physical abuse at Martin’s hands. See, e.g., App’x at 118–20, 123, 131–
33, 141.
As a threshold matter, we reiterate that Anderson’s motives are
not an element of a violation of § 1958. But her motives are relevant
to Martin’s understanding of Anderson’s role in the scheme.
We disagree with Martin that the jury was required to conclude
from this trial record that Anderson participated in the scheme under
3 At trial, the Government also presented evidence that Martin had
attempted to recruit a third-party, Samson Alabi, to commit the murder in
exchange for $25,000. On appeal, however, the Government abandons any
argument that Martin’s discussions with Alabi—in which Martin was the
solicitor rather than the would-be murderer—were an independently
sufficient basis for the jury’s verdict as to § 1958. We therefore deem the
argument abandoned and do not address Alabi’s role in the murder scheme
in this Opinion. See United States v. Prawl, 149 F.4th 176, 187 (2d Cir. 2025).

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duress. “The assessment of witness credibility lies solely within the
province of the jury, and the jury is free to believe part and disbelieve
part of any witness’s testimony.” United States v. Ware, 577 F.3d 442,
447 (2d Cir. 2009). The jury was therefore free to reject Anderson’s
allegations of abuse, as Martin’s trial counsel strenuously argued it
should do on cross-examination and in closing. Moreover, even if the
jury did credit Anderson’s general account of abuse, Anderson never
testified that Martin forced her to participate in the specific scheme to
kill Odom. That contrasts with her testimony that Martin forced
Anderson to take out a life insurance policy on one of her own
children by “t[ying] [her] up in the basement for three days” and
abusing her “until [she] agreed to do it.” App’x at 141.
Assuming that Anderson was abused, the jury still need not
have concluded that she participated under duress. As the
Government argued at trial, Anderson was “terrified” of Martin but
was also someone who “would stand by [Martin] through
unthinkable things.” Id. at 263. That is, she was both a victim of abuse
and a “full-throated participant” in the murder scheme. Id. Similarly,
as the trial court noted at Anderson’s sentencing, Anderson retained
a degree of agency throughout the scheme. Starting with Villard,
Anderson exercised control over Martin’s choice of victim, forcing
Martin to back down multiple times by “getting cold feet.” App’x at
130. And Anderson participated in the plot to murder Odom for over
a year, despite “so many off-ramps” and opportunities for Anderson
to withdraw, report Martin, or warn Odom. Supp. App’x at 25.4
4 The dissent draws the opposite lesson from Anderson’s sentencing,

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Moreover, the Government presented the jury with multiple
explanations for Anderson’s participation other than coercion.
Namely, the Government introduced—and the defense
emphasized—evidence suggesting that Anderson had independent
motives for wanting Martin to kill Odom. From those motives, the
jury could have inferred that Martin saw Anderson’s promise to pay
as inducement to commit a murder that Anderson wanted to occur.
One such motive was pecuniary gain. At the time, Anderson
and Martin were struggling financially, their house was under
foreclosure, and their utilities had been cut off. Anderson thus might
have hoped that she would reap quality-of-life benefits if she could
induce Martin to commit the murder and use some of the insurance
proceeds to find the couple a more stable living situation. The fact
that Anderson would have shared in the benefits of the scheme does
not negate the possibility that she intended to compensate Martin for
his role as the killer.
Another motive supported by the record involves Anderson’s
sense that Martin believed she owed him recompense for perceived
wrongs in the past. For example, Anderson testified that she planned
arguing that no “judge would sentence Anderson to probation if the judge
thought the facts were anything like what the majority describes them to
be.” Post at 5–6. But it was precisely the prospect of such sentencing
leniency that gave Anderson a motive to downplay her own agency and
culpability in her testimony at Martin’s trial. It would have been reasonable
for the jury, accurately perceiving Anderson’s motives, to discredit her
testimony about abuse. In any event, the jury in Martin’s case was not
obligated to view Anderson’s role in the scheme the same way as the judge
did at Anderson’s own sentencing.

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to give Odom’s life-insurance proceeds to Martin so that “[Martin]
could stop saying that [Anderson] owed him for everything that
[Martin] claims [Anderson] did to him over [Anderson’s] lifetime.”
App’x at 144. Thus, the record supports a conclusion that Anderson
wanted Martin to kill Odom so that Anderson could obtain the money
she felt she needed to expunge her perceived debts. In this view,
Anderson’s offer to pay Martin the insurance proceeds would have
served two, simultaneous roles: inducement to commit the murder
and repayment of Anderson’s debts.
A third motive supported by the record is simple jealousy. On
cross-examination, defense counsel probed Anderson on her
relationship with Odom, eliciting testimony that one of Anderson’s
sons witnessed Odom having sex with Martin and then told
Anderson about it. In closing, defense counsel argued that “[Martin]
started having sex with [Odom],” that Odom and Anderson “fought”
over Martin, that Anderson “grew to dislike” Odom, and that “by the
time of [Odom’s] murder, [Anderson] hated her.” Gov. App’x at 146.
Counsel then emphasized: “[T]hat’s motive.” Id. The jury could have
reasonably credited the theory that Anderson hated Odom, which fit
neatly with Anderson’s text message to Martin encouraging him to
“do something with that bitch this week.” Id.at 414.
Based on these apparent motives, the jury could have inferred
that Martin did not understand Anderson to be acting as his minion
or to be completely under his control. Instead, the jury could have
concluded that Martin viewed her as an active “accomplice,” App’x
at 263, who induced his participation just as much as he induced hers.
Martin next argues that viewing Anderson as having induced

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his participation contradicts the Government’s representations at trial
that Anderson was a victim of abuse. But that mischaracterizes the
Government’s position. While the Government did argue that Martin
“was at the heart of this insurance murder plot” and that the plot “all
started with” Martin, App’x at 245, it did so largely to counter
Martin’s own theory that “every step of this life insurance scheme and
the murder of Brandi Odom started with [Anderson] and ended with
[Anderson],” Gov App’x at 145. The Government never suggested
that Anderson acted under duress. Nor could it have, as it was
simultaneously prosecuting Anderson for her own violation of § 1958.
To the contrary, the Government repeatedly emphasized Anderson’s
culpability, arguing that despite her abuse, Anderson “yessed
[Martin], and in doing that she knew . . . this incentivized [Martin] to
go through with it because of the possibility of a payout.” App’x at
265. The Government was also clear that “[i]t doesn’t matter at all
who masterminded this[,] . . . if [Martin] thought of it first, [or] if []
Anderson thought of it first.” Id. at 266. In any event, the parties’
characterizations of the case are not evidence, and what matters
instead is whether the evidence presented to the jury could have
persuaded a reasonable juror of Martin’s guilt. Here, it did.
In addition to arguing that Anderson acted out of coercion,
Martin also contends that because the Government described
Anderson’s promise to transfer the insurance proceeds as a gift rather
than a payment, the evidence is insufficient to support the jury’s
verdict of consideration. Martin points to the Government’s
argument that “Adelle Anderson told you that she agreed to give all
the policy proceeds to the defendant for him to control just like she

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21
had with the money she made in sex work and just like the money
Brandy made in sex work.” Appellant’s Reply Br. at 4 (quoting App’x
at 256)). But the fact that the Government used the word “give”
instead of “pay[]” to describe Anderson’s promise does not mean that
the promise was entirely gratuitous or unconditional. Id. at 3.
Instead, the evidence supported the jury’s rational conclusion that
Anderson made the promise in order to induce Martin to kill Odom.
That is what § 1958 requires.
Finally, Martin argues that the interpretation of § 1958
described above would mean that any murder conspiracy involving
money will also be murder-for-hire. Not so. Indeed, had the jury here
concluded that Martin directed the entire scheme and was not
induced to act by Anderson’s promise, he would have committed
only a conspiracy to murder and not murder-for-hire. The fact that
the jury interpreted the evidence differently in this case does not
mean that the two crimes will always be coextensive. Nor can we
second guess the jury’s verdict on appeal simply because we would
have weighed the evidence differently. See Autuori, 212 F.3d at 114.
In sum, the jury reasonably concluded based on the totality of
the evidence that Martin’s promise to murder induced Anderson’s
promise to pay and that Anderson’s promise to pay induced Martin’s
promise to murder. That is, the jury found that “there was a mutual
agreement, understanding, or promise that something of value would
be exchanged for committing the murder.” App’x at 281; see also
Frampton, 382 F.3d at 218. Martin’s sufficiency challenge therefore
fails.

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22
C. Jury Instructions
Martin separately argues that we must reverse because the
district court’s jury charge was deficient. “Jury instructions are
erroneous if they mislead the jury or do not adequately inform the
jury of the law, and error is prejudicial where the appellant can show
that the error, in light of the charge as a whole, improperly influenced
the jury’s verdict.” Moore v. Rubin, 160 F.4th 271, 296 (2d Cir. 2025)
(cleaned up). We “examine the jury charge in its entirety, rather than
scrutinize it strand-by-strand,” and have emphasized “that a trial
court has discretion in the style and wording of jury instructions, so
long as the instructions do not mislead the jury as to the proper legal
standard.” Id. (cleaned up).
Martin raises two objections on appeal. First, he argues that the
jury charge failed to “clarify that ‘consideration’ as used in the
murder-for-hire statute mean[s] a quid pro quo exchange and not
simply an expectation or a desire for money.” Appellant’s Br. at 54.
Second, he argues that the charge improperly included an aiding-and-
abetting instruction. Id. at 61. We disagree.
1. Definition of Consideration
Prior to the charge conference, Martin proposed language
explaining that “the consideration requirement is interpreted in the
traditional sense of bargained for exchange, so that there must be a
quid-pro-quo (or at least the promise of such) between the parties to

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23
the transaction.” App’x at 58 (citation modified).5 At the charge
conference, Martin’s counsel objected to “the lack of language
concerning the consideration requirement” in the court’s provisional
jury instructions, and requested the inclusion of “language indicating
that there must be a quid pro quo or a bargained-for exchange.” Id.
5 Martin’s proposed jury charge on the consideration element read:
The third element that the government must prove is that the
murder was intended to be committed as consideration for
the receipt of anything of value. This requires that the
government prove that there was a mutual agreement,
understanding or promise that something of value would be
exchanged for committing the murder. “Anything of value”
means, for example, money, negotiable instruments, real
estate, jewelry, forgiveness of debt, or anything else that the
primary significance of which is economic advantage. It is not
necessary for the government to prove that anything of value
was in fact exchanged or delivered.
The consideration requirement is interpreted in the
traditional sense of bargained for exchange, so that there must
be a “quid-pro-quo (or at least the promise of such) between
the parties to the transaction. The federal murder-for-hire
statute requires the government to prove that the accused
intended for a murder to be committed as consideration for
something of pecuniary value. Moreover, the mere fact that
the consideration offered by one (the solicitor) in exchange for
another’s (the murderer’s) agreement to commit a murder
could inure to the economic benefit of the latter is insufficient.
There must be evidence to establish that at the time the
agreement was formed, the consideration was something the
primary significance of which lay in its economic advantage.
App’x at 58–59.

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24
at 241. The court acknowledged Martin’s arguments but declined to
adopt his proposed language.6 Because Martin’s objection to the
omission of his proposed language was adequately preserved, we
review that objection de novo.
Refusing that language was not erroneous, both because the
district court’s given charge was accurate and because Martin’s
requested language was not additive. The given charge described
“consideration” as requiring that “before the murder there was a
6 The district court’s jury charge on the consideration element read:
The third element that the government must prove beyond a
reasonable doubt is that the defendant intended that the
murder be committed as consideration for the receipt of
anything of pecuniary value. This element requires that
before the murder there was a mutual agreement,
understanding, or promise that something of value would be
exchanged for committing the murder. “Anything of value”
means money, negotiable instruments or anything else the
primary significance of which is economic advantage.
The Government does not have to prove that money or a
similar item was actually exchanged or delivered. The
Government does not need to show that the defendant
actually received anything of pecuniary value for his
participation in the events. Only that he participated with the
understanding based on a mutual agreement that he would
receive in exchange something of pecuniary value. If,
however, you find that there was no mutual agreement before
the murder that something of value would be exchanged,
then payments of money after the murder standing alone
would not satisfy this element.
App’x at 281.

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25
mutual agreement, understanding, or promise that something of
value would be exchanged for committing the murder.” Id. at 281. It
also required the Government to show that Martin “participated with
the understanding based on a mutual agreement that he would
receive in exchange something of pecuniary value.” Id. We think this
language adequately informed the jury through understandable and
not overly legalistic language that “there must have been a mutual
agreement that Martin would commit the murder in exchange for
payment.” Appellant’s Reply Br. at 12 (quotation marks omitted).
Martin objects that the jury “could simply view the word
‘exchange’ as synonymous with ‘give’ or ‘hand over’ . . . without
appreciating the additional ‘quid-pro-quo’ element[.]” Id. at 12-13.
The dissent echoes this argument, characterizing the court’s language
as “ambiguous and obscure” and suggesting that the word
“exchange” did not clearly require the jury to find inducement. Post
at 7–8 (quoting United States v. Rossomando, 144 F.3d 197, 202 (2d Cir.
1998)). We disagree.
In assessing how a reasonable jury would understand words
used in jury instructions, dictionary definitions are instructive,
although not dispositive. See United States v. Ng Lap Seng, 934 F.3d
110, 145 (2d Cir. 2019) (relying on dictionaries to establish the
“common meaning” of a jury instruction). The definition of
“exchange” is “to part with, give, or transfer in consideration of
something received as an equivalent,” “to part with for a substitute,”
or “to give and receive reciprocally.” Exchange, Webster’s Third New
Int’l Dictionary 792 (2002) (emphasis added). That is particularly true
when coupled with the word “for,” as it was here. See id. (giving as

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26
an example “the boy exchanged his mother’s cow for a handful of
beans”). Indeed, commonly used synonyms of “exchange (for)”
include “trade (for),” “barter (for),” and “bargain (with)”—the exact
concepts that Martin contends were insufficiently communicated to
the jury. Exchange (for), Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus,
https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/exchangefor (last
visited Aug. 19, 2026).
We can also look to our precedents and jury instructions from
prior cases. Fittingly, we have used “exchange for” in place of
“consideration” in the context of the murder-for-hire statute. See
Frampton, 382 F.3d at 218. And the district court’s jury charge matches
almost verbatim a leading treatise on federal criminal jury
instructions. See 3 Leonard B. Sand et al., Modern Federal Jury
Instructions – Criminal, Instr. 60-17 (2025).
These data points support that “exchange for” sufficiently
communicated to the jury the nature of the required consideration.
See, e.g., Saint-Jean v. Emigrant Mortg. Co., 129 F.4th 124, 154 n.14 (2d
Cir. 2025). We do not think that any “skillful parsing” was required
to avoid confusion here. Post at 7 (quoting Rossomando, 144 F.3d at
202).
Moreover, Martin’s requested language—“a quid pro quo or a
bargained for exchange”— was no more informative than the version
given. Quid pro quo is a legalistic, Latin phrase that translates to
“something for something.” Quid Pro Quo, Black’s Law
Dictionary (12th ed. 2024). That is the essence of an exchange. Like
quid pro quo, “bargained-for” is a legal term of art that would be no

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27
more familiar to lay jurors than “consideration.”7 If anything,
including technical language like “bargained-for”—or the less
technical “bargain”—might have misled the jury by suggesting a
requirement for haggling or that the agreement to murder Odom
must have been an arm’s length transaction. The district court
recognized this difficulty, noting that including the phrase
“bargained-for exchange” might mislead the jury into thinking that
§ 1958 reaches only a “traditional hitman case.” App’x at 241. And,
when the court raised this problem at the charge conference, Martin’s
counsel failed to propose a workable alternative.8
Even if Martin’s requested instructions had been “legally
correct” and “help[ful],” there would still be no reversible error
because “the court’s charge also was correct” and “a reasonable juror
8 The dissent interprets the charge conference differently, claiming that the
district court recognized “that the facts of the case ill fit the murder-for-hire
statute[.]” Post at 10 (quotation marks omitted). We disagree with the
initial premise—as explained above, the evidence was sufficient for a
conviction and nothing about the Government’s case was an “ill fit” with
the statute. Furthermore, the court’s colloquy with Martin’s counsel only
underscores the confusing nature of Martin’s proposed language. After
listening to Martin’s proposal, the court seemed to believe that it was either
aimed at § 1958’s “pecuniary value” element, or that it had something to do
with the role of the “insurance company” in the murder scheme. App’x at
241. The court did not recognize, and Martin’s counsel did not clarify, that
the proposed language was meant to convey that Anderson could not have
been coerced. Had the court agreed to include Martin’s proposed language
in its ultimate instructions, we think it likely that the jury would have been
confused as well.

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28
would have understood [it] correctly.” United States v. Mulder, 273
F.3d 91, 105–06 (2d Cir. 2001). If “no erroneous instruction was given”
and the defendant’s “claim of prejudice is based on the failure to give
any explanation beyond the reading of the statutory language itself,”
such “[a]n omission, or an incomplete instruction, is less likely to be
prejudicial than a misstatement of the law.” Henderson v. Kibbe, 431
U.S. 145, 155 (1977) (discussing prejudice in the habeas context). In
sum, whether or not it was “preferable for the court to incorporate
[Martin’s] requested instruction as a more specific statement of his
defense, the court’s instructions adequately apprised the jury of the
defense and do not warrant reversal of [Martin’s] conviction.” United
States v. Vasquez, 82 F.3d 574, 578 (2d Cir. 1996).
The dissent states that “the charge needed to be free of any
suggestion that the jury could convict based on a coerced ‘exchange’
rather than actual inducement.” Post at 8. While perhaps the district
court might have prophylactically instructed the jury not to convict if
it found that Anderson acted under duress, that objection was not
raised below and Martin disavows it now. See Appellant’s Letter at 1
(“The defense . . . never sought—and none was necessary—a charge
about Anderson’s mitigating or exonerating motivations. Indeed, on
appeal, Appellant never disputed Anderson’s engaged
participation.”). Furthermore, giving such a prophylactic instruction
might itself have been error because it would have “cast doubt upon
the defense proffered.” United States v. Ramirez, 482 F.2d 807, 815 (2d
Cir. 1973). Martin’s theory at trial was that Anderson, far from being
under duress, was in fact the mastermind of the scheme. See, e.g., Trial
Tr. at 38 (“The truth is this entire life insurance murder scheme starts

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29
and ends with Ms. Anderson.”); App’x at 184 (“Do you remember
telling the detectives that you were the one in control of the finances
because you’re better with money[?]”); Gov App’x at 140 (“This is an
independent woman who makes her own decisions and those
decisions are about making money and getting other benefits.”). The
district court thus likely would have erred by sua sponte instructing
the jury as to duress.
Nevertheless, to the extent Martin or the dissent suggests that
some as yet unidentified instruction would have better tailored the
charge to “the particular facts of this case,” post at 13, we review the
district court’s failure to deliver it for plain error. See United States v.
Hunt, 82 F.4th 129, 139 (2d Cir. 2023) (reviewing an objection for plain
error where it was “materially different from the objection” raised at
trial). “We typically will not find such error where the operative legal
question is unsettled, including where there is no binding precedent
from the Supreme Court or this Court.” United States v. Whab, 355
F.3d 155, 158 (2d Cir. 2004). We cannot conclude that failure to
include specific language “affected [Martin’s] substantial rights” or
“cast doubt on the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial
proceedings” when we do not even know what such language would
be. United States v. Guldi, 141 F.4th 435, 446 (2d Cir. 2025). The dissent
claims to find plain error here, but in fact merely restates its central
objection to our de novo analysis of the given jury charge.
Stepping back, the dissent’s position is that the district court
should have, on its own, discerned a theory of the case completely at
odds with the one that the defense advocated at trial, based solely on
the defense’s request for instructions including the words “quid pro

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30
quo,” “bargained-for exchange,” “murderer,” and “solicitor.” Then,
according to the dissent, the district court should have fashioned an
entirely new clarifying instruction on its own. It should have done so
despite Martin’s counsel’s failure to explain such an argument when
asked at the charge conference. And it also should have done so even
though it might have undermined Martin’s ability to fairly present his
actual theory of the case to the jury. That is certainly more than the
law and common sense require of our trial court judges. We cannot
see plain error in the district court’s failure to follow that unrequested
path.
Thus, we conclude that the district court’s given instructions
were not erroneous because they accurately stated the requirement
that a murder-for-hire be committed “in exchange for” something of
pecuniary value, and the district court did not plainly err in declining
to give an additional, unidentified instruction further clarifying
Martin’s required role in the murder scheme.
2. Aiding and Abetting
Martin also contends that the district court erred by instructing
the jury that it could convict Martin on an aiding-and-abetting theory
of § 1958 liability. Martin argues that there was no evidence that he
was an accomplice to the murder, rather than the principal, and that
he could not have aided or abetted anyone because he and Anderson
were the only two participants in the crime.
Martin is correct that “[a] trial court may give an aiding and
abetting charge [only] . . . when the evidence warrants such a
charge.” United States v. Damsky, 740 F.2d 134, 140 (2d Cir. 1984). But

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31
the aiding-and-abetting instruction was warranted here, since
Anderson independently violated § 1958 by promising to pay Martin
the insurance proceeds. By conceiving of the plot, brainstorming
potential victims, and collaborating with Anderson in her efforts to
take out and collect on the insurance policies in Odom’s name, Martin
aided and abetted Anderson’s commission of her own § 1958
violation. That evidence was sufficient for the jury to convict on an
aiding-and-abetting theory, and therefore was also sufficient to justify
the court’s instruction. And, while Martin is correct that “one cannot
aid or abet himself,” Havens v. James, 76 F.4th 103, 120 (2d Cir. 2023),
he identifies no reason why one cannot violate § 1958 both as the killer
and also as an aider-or-abettor of the payor. The district court
therefore did not err by delivering an aiding-and-abetting instruction
regarding Martin’s culpability under § 1958.
D. Spillover Prejudice
Martin last argues that any error with respect to his § 1958
conviction created impermissible spillover prejudice with respect to
his fraud and identity-theft convictions. Because we conclude that
there was no reversible error either with respect to the sufficiency of
the evidence or the jury instructions, Martin’s spillover prejudice
challenge must fail as well.
Moreover, the Government presented overwhelming evidence
of Martin’s guilt on the fraud and identity-theft counts, and the vast
majority of the evidence of the murder would have been admissible
even absent a § 1958 count in order to prove motive for those counts.
See United States v. Hamilton, 334 F.3d 170, 182 (2d Cir. 2003)

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32
(considering the nature of the inadmissible evidence and the strength
of the Government’s case on the remaining counts). Thus, even
assuming error with respect to the § 1958 counts, any spillover
prejudice would still not require reversal.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, we hold that the evidence was sufficient to
sustain Martin’s murder-for-hire convictions, that there was no
reversible error in the district court’s jury instructions, and that there
was likewise no error due to spillover prejudice. The judgment of the
United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York is
therefore AFFIRMED.

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C ALABRESI , Circuit Judge, dissenting:
Cory Martin is clearly guilty of committing murder and fraud. He could
have been justly sentenced for those crimes in state court.
He is, however, almost certainly not guilty of committing federal murder
for hire. And I think that a jury, properly charged on the elements of murder for
hire, likely would have acquitted him of that offense. The majority nevertheless
affirms his murder-for-hire convictions. In doing so, I believe they do serious harm
to federal-state relations.
I respectfully, but strongly, dissent.
I
I begin with the substance of the murder-for-hire statute, on which the
majority and I largely agree. It has been the position of the government in this case
that so long as “Anderson agreed to pay Martin . . . after Martin . . . murdered
Odom,” nothing “more” was required to establish the consideration element of
murder for hire. Gov. Br. 34. That is not right. The federal murder-for-hire statute,
18 U.S.C. § 1958(a), does not cover every murder conspiracy that contemplates an
exchange of money between co-conspirators. Rather, it requires traditional
consideration, that is, that “the consideration induces the making of the promise

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2
and the promise induces the furnishing of the consideration.” Ante at 13 (quoting
Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 71 cmt. b (1981)).
My colleagues ably explain why this follows from the plain, unambiguous
language of the statute. See Ante at 9–14. I would add, though, that other reasons—
in particular, federalism reasons—also compel this conclusion. Applying federal
murder for hire to include offenses with no real consideration “dramatically
intrude[s] upon traditional state criminal jurisdiction.” Bond v. United States, 572
U.S. 844, 857 (2014) (citation modified). The Supreme Court has long admonished
federal courts not to interpret Congress as expanding federal authority over
traditionally state-policed conduct unless Congress makes clear its intent to do so.
See, e.g., id. at 857–60; United States v. Bass, 404 U.S. 336, 349 & n.16 (1971) (collecting
authorities). This concern has nothing to do with what crimes Congress can give
over to federal jurisdiction. It rather has to do with whether Congress means to
federalize conduct “readily denounced as criminal by the States.” Bass, 404 U.S. at
349. And “we must assume that the implications and limitations of our federal
system constitute a major premise of all congressional legislation, though not
repeatedly recited therein.” United States v. Five Gambling Devices, 346 U.S. 441, 450
(1953).

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3
Murder, of course, is traditionally prosecuted by the states. If Congress
sought to authorize federal courts to displace our state counterparts and
adjudicate all profit-motivated murders, it might well have the power to do so (at
least where interstate commerce is involved). But there is no reason to think it has
done so here, under the heading of murder “for hire.” Indeed, there is every reason
to think that it has not. The majority and I agree that the unambiguous language
of the statute limits the offense to cases involving conventional inducement. See
Ante at 9–14. And the title of the statute, “Use of interstate commerce facilities in
the commission of murder-for-hire,” 18 U.S.C. § 1958, though, as the majority
notes, not in itself determinative, underscores this. The “for-hire” language makes
clear that the statute is addressed to murders that are done for hire, rather than any
murder that involves the exchange of money.
The context in which the statute was enacted also shows that Congress
sought to address murder for hire because of its relation to organized crime, and
it did not seek to address all murders for profit. See S. Rep. No. 98-225, at 304–05
(1984). Congress intended that the offense would implicate a “person who ordered
the murder” on the one hand and a “hit man” on the other. Id. at 306.
Finally, it is worth emphasizing that in the forty-year history of federal
murder-for-hire prosecutions preceding this case, no court has ever adopted the

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4
reading of the statute advanced by the government.1 And the majority, while
managing to affirm the conviction, in no way accepts the government’s theory.
II
We can agree, then, that a murder conspiracy that contemplates the
exchange of money is not federal murder for hire if the money-giver did not induce
the murderer. That nuance might not need to be expressly imparted to a jury in
“the traditional hitman case,” App’x 241, where the relationship between a
contract killer and the person who paid that killer is manifest.
But as the trial court recognized, “This isn’t that case.” Id.
The key government witness and supposed inducer, Adelle Anderson,
testified that the would-be murderer for hire, Cory Martin, was also her abuser.
As the government put it at trial,
Brandy Odom and the defendant’s girlfriend, Adelle Anderson,
worked for the defendant. He was their pimp. They lived and worked
out of his house in Queens. . . . [E]very dollar that they earned from
sex work went to line the defendant’s pockets. He demanded that
1 The government identifies but a single case in which it successfully prosecuted murder-
for-hire with no apparent bargained-for consideration—and the arguments made here
were not addressed in that case. See United States v. Winter, 33 F.3d 720, 721–22 (5th Cir.
1994). In all the other cases the government cites as having “established murder-for-hire
on similar facts,” Gov. Br. 34, someone sought to induce the murderer to kill as
consideration for pecuniary gain.

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5
they call him “Daddy.” He controlled every aspect of their lives,
down to what they ate, and even when or if they could even shower.
App’x 111; see, e.g., App’x 115–23 (testimony by Anderson on Martin’s abuse of
and control over her, her children, and Odom); App’x 132–33 (“Cory had total
control of my life. I couldn’t do anything.”).
If Anderson’s testimony is to be believed, then Martin controlled not only
her life and Odom’s life but also the conspiracy between him and Anderson to
murder Odom. Anderson testified that, in Martin’s own words, “this was his
killing.” App’x 128. She testified that Martin—not she—decided on his own
initiative that Odom was the ideal target for a murder-for-insurance-money
scheme. App’x 137. And she testified that she, as the would-be life insurance
beneficiary, was to channel the money directly to Martin as she did all her income.
App’x 128. In sum, the government’s star witness testified that Martin proposed
and orchestrated the scheme, whereas she merely acquiesced to Martin’s
directives, including agreeing that she would give the anticipated insurance
money directly to Martin as soon as she obtained it.
For her role in the conspiracy, Anderson was sentenced to probation
without objection from the government. And that is worth underscoring. It is
doubtful that any judge would sentence Anderson to probation if the judge

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6
thought the facts were anything like what the majority describes them to be. And
it is inconceivable that on the majority’s account of the facts, the government
would acquiesce to such a sentence, however useful Anderson’s testimony might
have been.
Against this backdrop, it is hard to believe that Martin was, in fact, induced
by Anderson to kill Odom. And indeed, if no reasonable jury could find beyond a
reasonable doubt that he was, then he was entitled to a judgment of acquittal on
the murder-for-hire charges as a matter of law. Instead, though, Martin’s trial
counsel unwisely suggested that Anderson was somehow pulling the strings of
her trafficker in order to eliminate a romantic rival and/or derive personal benefit
from the insurance money. And the majority relies on that theory, along with other
speculated ways in which Anderson could have conceivably benefitted from
Odom’s demise, to say that a jury could have found that Anderson induced Martin
to kill Odom. See Ante at 14–21.
I agree, though skeptically, that the evidence, if read in the light very much
most favorable to the government, could suffice to establish that fact. So, like the
majority, I shall treat the evidence as sufficient. The question then becomes
whether the jury was adequately instructed so that it understood that to convict
Martin of murder for hire, it needed actually to make such a factual finding.

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7
It clearly was not. The trial court instructed the jury that the “consideration”
element required only that “before the murder there was a mutual agreement,
understanding or promise that something of value would be exchanged for
committing the murder.” App’x 281. The majority holds that this instruction
required the jury to conclude, before convicting, that “Martin’s promise to murder
induced Anderson’s promise to pay and that Anderson’s promise to pay induced
Martin’s promise to murder.” Ante at 21. I disagree. I read that instruction as
permitting the jury to convict regardless of whether Anderson induced Martin to
murder Odom, so long as Anderson and Martin shared an “understanding” that
she would give him the insurance proceeds after the killing.
“Through a skillful parsing of the court’s charge, one might attempt to
downplay the potential confusion arising from” it. United States v. Rossomando, 144
F.3d 197, 202 (2d Cir. 1998). The majority, for its part, suggests that the jury could
only have read the words “exchanged for” as requiring inducement, albeit sub
silentio. See Ante at 25–26.2 That, for me, is “simply too ambiguous and obscure to
2 The majority relies on dictionaries to explain the jury instructions. Judges today have a
habit of going to dictionaries to explain ambiguous statements. I believe this is as
misguided as judges’ onetime habit of citing statements by individual legislators to

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8
inspire confidence.” Rossomando, 144 F.3d at 202. Given the facts of this case, the
charge needed to be free of any suggestion that the jury could convict based on a
coerced “exchange” rather than actual inducement.
The majority also notes that the jury charge was drawn “almost verbatim”
from Modern Federal Jury Instructions, “a leading treatise on federal criminal jury
instructions.” Ante at 26. A model jury instruction may constitute error—including
plain error—where it does not account for the factual predicates of the particular
case. Indeed, we have repeatedly held as much for charges drawn from this very
treatise. See Rossomando, 144 F.3d at 201–03; United States v. Kopstein, 759 F.3d 168,
180–82 (2d Cir. 2014).
The majority concedes that the trial court could have said more and
instructed the jury not to convict if it found that Anderson was coerced or
otherwise non-inducing. See Ante at 28. It nevertheless affirms Martin’s murder-
for-hire convictions by asserting that Martin failed to raise an objection along those
lines.
explain the meaning of laws, and for the same reason: One can almost always find
dictionaries that will interpret the language as one wishes.
But apart from that, juries do not use dictionaries to understand court instructions.
They use the commonsense meaning that ordinary people give to those words.

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9
Yet Martin did, of course, object at trial to the jury charge on the
consideration element for not including more inducement-explicit language like
“traditional . . . bargained-for exchange,” “quid pro quo,” and
“murderer/solicitor.” App’x 58–59. And, tellingly, the trial court did not deny
Martin’s objection, as the majority implies, on the basis that Martin’s proposed
language was “not additive” or “no more informative than the version given.”
Ante at 24, 26. Instead, the court deemed his proposed jury instructions
“[un]relate[d] to the facts of the case.” App’x 241 (emphasis added). Specifically, the
court stated: “I think the language you’re proposing is more in line [with] a
different sort of a contract murder. The language you’re proposing is language in,
you know, sort of the traditional hitman case which this case isn’t. I think that’s
misleading.” Id. The government, in opposing Martin’s proposed instruction, said:
“It’s just confusing and it doesn’t relate to the facts of this case.” Id. And the court
reiterated: “I just don’t think it relates to the facts of the case which is why I didn’t
include it in the first place. . . . [Y]ou’re talking about the solicitor, I mean this isn’t
that case.” Id.
The majority now tries to separate Martin’s actual, requested instruction
from a supposedly recondite, “unidentified” instruction that would have clarified
the need for genuine inducement rather than a coerced exchange. Ante at 29. In

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other words, the majority suggests that the requested instruction failed to “direct
the trial court’s attention” to the problem before us and hence preserve it for
appeal, United States v. Masotto, 73 F.3d 1233, 1237 (2d Cir. 1996) (quotation
omitted)—and therefore, that it even would have been “error” for the trial court
to address the problem, Ante at 28.
That cannot be reconciled with the record. Martin’s requested instruction
directed the trial court’s attention to the government’s burden of establishing
“traditional . . . bargained-for exchange.” In response, the court acknowledged
that “the facts of the case” bore seemingly no relation to traditional bargained-for
exchange, quid pro quo, or the solicitation of a murder. And that should have
made the problem with the actual instructions quite clear. But rather than sustain
Martin’s objection or probe the issue further, the court rejected Martin’s proposed
language out of hand as “misleading.” That is, the court apparently recognized the
problem now raised on appeal—that “the facts of the case” ill fit the murder-for-
hire statute—and pressed on anyway.
Because Martin’s objection sufficiently directed the trial court’s attention to
the challenge he raises on appeal, I believe that challenge was preserved. And
because the erroneous jury charge was not harmless (and indeed, quite probably

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resulted in a wrongful conviction), Martin’s murder-for-hire convictions should
be vacated.
Finally, even if Martin’s challenge to the jury instructions were forfeited—
that is, if the majority were correct that Martin failed to raise this objection below—
I would nonetheless vacate on the plain error standard.
For us to rectify an error that a defendant failed to object to at trial, there
must be (1) error, (2) that is plain, (3) that affects substantial rights, and (4) that
seriously affects the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial
proceedings. United States v. Bleau, 930 F.3d 35, 39 (2d Cir. 2019) (per curiam). Each
of these requirements is present here.
Unlike the majority, I believe there was error. As discussed above, the jury
charge allowed the jury to convict Martin in the absence of actual inducement.
The error is also plain. “Whether an error is plain can depend on well-settled
legal principles as much as well-settled legal precedents. Thus, even absent binding
case law, an error can be plain if it violates an absolutely clear legal norm . . . .
Accordingly, our court has said that an error is plain when it violates the plain
language of [a] statute.” United States v. Montague, 67 F.4th 520, 535 (2d Cir. 2023)
(citation modified), vacated on other grounds, 144 S. Ct. 2654 (2024). The error here
violated the plain language of the relevant statute. As the majority acknowledges,

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the statute is unambiguous: Murder for hire cannot lie unless there is something
close to traditional, contract-law consideration/inducement. The jury charge—
given the particular facts of this case—suggested otherwise. For that reason alone,
I believe the error was plain. And if the plain language alone were not enough, it
is “absolutely clear,” id., that our precedents do not countenance a seemingly
never-before-adopted conception of federal murder for hire that would effect a
displacement of state criminal jurisdiction with no apparent basis in the text or
purpose of the statute. See supra.
The error affected Martin’s substantial rights. If the jury—properly
instructed—could not find that Anderson induced Martin to kill Odom, then it
would have acquitted him. See, e.g., United States v. Solano, 966 F.3d 184, 193–94 (2d
Cir. 2020).
Finally, the error seriously affects at least the fairness and integrity, if not
also the public reputation, of judicial proceedings. Martin was convicted “based
on a far broader conception of [the statute] than the law permits,” and that
“fundamentally undermines the fairness of [Martin’s] conviction[s].” United States
v. Omotayo, 132 F.4th 181, 197 (2d Cir. 2025).

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For these reasons, the jury charge on consideration was, in my view, not
only error but plain error. I would therefore vacate Martin’s murder-for-hire
convictions even if his challenge were forfeited, which I believe it was not.
* * *
The essence of my dissent is very simple. A charge that might well be
adequate in most murder-for-hire cases was plainly inadequate and misleading on
the particular facts of this case. That the charge was inadequate was clearly—if
inelegantly—brought to the district court’s attention. The district court recognized
the problem and yet did nothing. The result was a conviction that would have
been unlikely if there had been a proper charge.
The majority opinion is not unjust to Martin given his vile criminal history,
but it is unjust in its treatment of the law. The majority incorrectly deems forfeited
an issue that the trial judge addressed in open court in response to defense
counsel’s objections. And then, the majority finds that even if the instructions to
the jury might have allowed the jury to convict without finding true consideration,
that was not plain error—despite the plain language of the statute, the title of the
statute, the context in which the statute arose, the historical application of the
statute, and the federalism principles in which the statute is situated. This result
needlessly muddles our standards both of issue preservation and of plain error.

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More broadly, I repeat that the shoehorning of this garden-variety murder
conspiracy into federal court disserves our federalist system. It will support those
who criticize federal courts as thinking that we should exert jurisdiction because
state courts are inadequate, when the opposite is often true. Our Federalism is
based on the notion that states and state courts are best suited to deal with issues
that are traditionally state crimes. For federal courts to act as if we can do better is
a dangerous form of activism.
I respectfully, but strongly, dissent.

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