The appeals court did not seem very impressed.

The oral argument is here: https://www.ca4.uscourts.gov/OAarchive/mp3/23-4451-20250912....

The first question they asked is "why didn't you ask for a bill of particulars?".

Overall, they seemed very confused as to the argument made here - why is the indictment actually insufficient, and what words did you want them to use instead.

I don't think this will be a successful appeal at all - they seem to all agree this is not stuff that goes in an indictment, and to the degree that there was ambiguity, the correct answer was to request a bill of particulars.

At around 10 minutes, one of the judges asks counsel for the best case he has that says he's right, and he can't come up with one at all.

Which is probably the point at which he lost this appeal. :)

To be fair, i don't blame the lawyer, and i expect why the judges are being not too hard on him, is because he's doing his best to argue a losing case because of choices made at the district court level.

Thanks for the additional info! That does seem like a bit of a sticky situation for the defense.