Before KELLY, Circuit Judge, McWILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge, and VRATIL, District Judge.2

The only issue on appeal is whether the district court committed reversible error in its handling of a note sent the court by the jury during the course of its deliberations. We conclude the district court did not so err, and therefore affirm.

Quan Trieu, the defendant in the trial court and the appellant in this Court, was convicted on each count of a five-count indictment charging him with uttering and possessing counterfeit American Express traveler's checks with an intent to deceive another person, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 513(a). Each count was based on a different traveler's check, all of which were uttered and possessed on the same date, August 26, 1993, in Utah, one in Cedar City, Utah, and the other four in St. George, Utah.

The government's evidence established, prima facie, and strongly so, that the checks in question were not genuine, but false and fictitious. The defendant testified on his own behalf and stated that he simply did not know they were spurious, and thought they were genuine. He did admit that in passing, or attempting to pass, the checks he had used a false name, Larry Wong, and had endorsed each check with the name Larry Wong. Defendant used a false Montana driver's license in the name of "Larry Wong" when he negotiated the checks.

Apparently without objection, the district court in Instruction No. 13 instructed the jury that the essential elements of the crimes charged in the indictment were as follows:

The criminal statute upon which the indictment is based is 18 U.S.C. 513(a). That statute reads in part as follows:

Whoever makes, utters or possesses a counterfeited security of ... an organization, with intent to deceive another person, organization, or government .... shall be guilty of a crime.

The term "counterfeited" means a document that purports to be genuine but is not, because it has been falsely made or manufactured in its entirety.

The term "security" means, among other things, a traveler's check.

The term "organization" means a legal entity, other than a government, established or organized for any purpose, and includes a corporation, company, association, firm, partnership, joint stock company, foundation, institution, society, union, or any other association or persons which operates in or the activities of which affect interstate or foreign commerce. (emphasis added).

During the course of their deliberations, the jury sent five notes to the district court. The defendant argues that the district court's handling of the fifth and final note dictates a reversal of the guilty verdict.

The penultimate note from the jury to the court read as follows:

"Your Honor, in Instruction No. 13 where it says 'or manufactured in its entirety' does entirety include his signature?"

With all of counsel agreeing thereto, the district court answered that note as follows:

To the jury, the definition of counterfeited in Instruction No. 13 is taken verbatim from the United States Code. It means what it says. Please do your best to apply the general meaning of the words in the definition to the facts of this case as you find them. Under the circumstances of this case, it would appear to be appropriate to consider the signature as a part of the entire document.

The final note sent the court by the jury read as follows:

If a non-counterfeited traveler's check is signed with a fraudulent signature, is the document now counterfeit according to the definition you just gave us?

Before answering the final note, the district court conferred with counsel. Defense counsel stated that he believed the jury should be instructed that the answer to this final note was simply, "No." And, as an alternative, counsel stated that if the court desired to expand on that, the court should instruct the jury that a fraudulent signature on a non-counterfeited traveler's check "would not constitute a crime in this case."

The district court declined to follow defense counsel's suggestion, and answered the final note as follows:

To the jury, under the rules of the court, I am not able to give you a direct answer to the question you asked about a 'non-counterfeited traveler's check.' Please do your best to review the evidence and apply the law as it has been explained to you. (emphasis added).

Defense counsel objected to that answer, requesting that the court should inform the jury that the question was a hypothetical question. The district court refused defense counsel's suggestion, noting that defense counsel would then, in effect, be conceding that the checks were counterfeit, a fact that had not been stipulated to at trial. The district court further noted that there was no precedent for it to give the jury an "advisory opinion" or to answer a "hypothetical question."

Shortly after the district court's answer to the jury's final note, the jury returned verdicts convicting the defendant on all five counts. Defendant now appeals his conviction and the sentences imposed thereon, and his only ground for reversal, and remand for a new trial, is that the district court committed reversible error in its answer to the final note of the jury. We do not agree.

The submission of additional instructions after a jury has retired and commenced its deliberations is ordinarily a matter for the sound discretion of the trial judge where the instructions already given the jury are unequivocal. United States v. Walker, 557 F.2d 741, 746 (10th Cir.1977). However, where the closing instructions are conflicting and the jury makes its difficulties "explicit," a trial judge should clear up such difficulties with "concrete accuracy." Id.; see also United States v. Zimmerman, 943 F.2d 1204, 1213 (10th Cir.1991); United States v. Arias-Santos, 39 F.3d 1070, 1076 (10th Cir.1994).

In the instant case, by Instruction No. 13 the jury was instructed that the word "counterfeited" means that the document in question that purports to be genuine is not genuine because it has been falsely made "in its entirety." In our view, that is an unequivocal instruction that is a complete answer to the jury's final inquiry as to whether a "non-counterfeited traveler's check" is rendered counterfeit "when signed by a fraudulent signature." Instruction No. 13 said, in so many words, that it had to be counterfeit "in its entirety."

Defendant's reliance on United States v. Maura, 778 F.Supp. 835 (D. Md.1991) is misplaced. That case involved a motion for acquittal, after a jury had been discharged for failure to agree upon a verdict, based on the insufficiency of the evidence to show that the defendant knew he was possessing or uttering a counterfeit check. We are not here concerned with a sufficiency of the evidence argument.

Judgment affirmed.