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Saturday, January 14th, 2012

Many Unhappy Returns

United States v. Cadet, No. 10-4220-cr (2d Cir. December 20, 2011) (Miner, Cabranes, Wesley, CJJ)

An Eastern District jury convicted Joseph Cadet of 16 tax offenses based on his preparation of dozens of false tax returns for his “clients” between 2003 and 2006. Although the court affirmed his conviction – he challenged only the admission of Rule 404(b) evidence, a perennial loser in this circuit – it vacated and remanded the sentence due to a host of sentencing errors.

First, the district court imposed a 41-month prison sentence and a three-year term of supervised release on each of the 16 counts of conviction. But the statutory maximum term of imprisonment for each violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(2) was three years’ imprisonment to be followed by one year of supervised release.

The court also made several incorrect restitution rulings. First, the restitution order included losses sustained by New York City …

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“Vigor” Mortis

United States v. Bourke, No. 09-4704-cr (2d Cir. December 14, 2011) (Pooler, Hall, CJJ)

Defendant Bourke was convicted of violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the Travel Act, and § 1001 atfer his involvement in a complex bribery scheme arising from the late 1990’s privatization of Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil company, SOCAR. Although it noted that that Bourke “vigorously attack[ed]” his conviction, the circuit affirmed.

Bourke mounted several unsuccessful challenges to the jury instructions. First, the district court was not required to instruct the jury that it needed to agree unanimously on the specific overt act committed in furtherance of the conspiracy charge. The “jury did not need to agree on a single overt act to sustain a conspiracy conviction,” and the overt act “need not [even] be a crime.” Nor did the district court err in giving a conscious avoidance instruction – there was “ample evidence to support a conviction” …

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Wednesday, January 4th, 2012

PC World

Several Interesting per curiams rounded out 2011:
In United States v. Steppello, No. 10-4527-cr (2d Cir. December 23, 2011) (Jacobs, Cabranes, Wesley, CJJ) (per curiam) the court reversed a Northern District order granting suppression of cocaine seized from the defendant’s person when arrested, and, later, from his home pursuant to a search warrant, and his post-arrest statements. The district court had found that the initial arrest of the defendant was not supported by probable cause, and that everything else was a tainted fruit. But the circuit found “significant errors” in the district court’s assessment of the evidence. First, it “failed to examine the totality of the circumstances, and instead, considered individual facts in isolation.” Second, the court “failed to evaluate the facts in light of the training and experience of the arresting agents.” The district court also erred in discounting the reliability of information provided by an otherwise untested informant
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Sunday, November 20th, 2011

Making a Skilling in Albany

United States v. Bruno, No. 10-1887-cr (2d Cir. November 16, 2011) (Parker, Chin, CJJ, Korman, DJ)

The story of Joe Bruno, former New York State Senate Majority Leader, is fairly well known. Having seemingly turned his position into a veritable cesspool of self-interested profiteering, he was ultimately convicted of two counts “honest services” fraud – the jury hung on a third, and acquitted him of several others. Consistent with the law at the time, however, the fraud was charged only as a failure to disclose various conflicts of interest.

While Bruno’s appeal was pending, the Supreme Court decided United States v. Skilling, 130 S.Ct. 2896 (2010), which held that the honest services statute criminalizes only fraudulent schemes that are effectuated through bribery or kickbacks. In light of Skilling, was inevitable that Bruno’s convictions would have to be tossed. The only real suspense was whether the Circuit would acquit him or …

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Saturday, November 12th, 2011

Bed Gub

United States v. Simmons, No. 10-1526-cr (2d Cir. October 26, 2011) (Winter, Pooler, Parker, CJJ)

New York City police officers accompanied an individual to his apartment in the Bronx to retrieve his belongings. He was moving out because his roommate, defendant Simmons, had pulled a gun on him during an argument a few days earlier.

Inside the apartment, the officers found Simmons in his bedroom; the door was ajar, he was lying in bed and there was a “shiny object” next to him. Simmons got up and the officers pulled him out of the bedroom and into the hall. They asked him about his dispute with the roommate and the gun. Simmons told the officers the gun was in his bedroom and they went in, retrieved it, and arrested him.

The circuit found that the officers’ questions to Simmons about the gun were covered by the “public safety” exception to …

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Summary Summary

Well, it’s taken months, but at last there are three summary orders worth noting. So, in reverse order, here they are:

United States v. Persing, no. 10-638-cr (2d Cir. August 26, 2011), concerned the district court’s admission of a loan-shark’s computer records. Those records revealed the extent of his business, and other evidence showed that the defendant intervened to try to have those same loans repaid. The government argued he was trying to take over the business, while the defendant argued that he was trying to protect the debtors from the loan-shark. In order for the records to be admissible as a co-conspirator’s declarations, the district court needed to find that there was a single conspiracy that included both the loan-shark and the defendant. The district court did not; in fact, most of its findings on the question, although kind of confusing, seemed to support the defendant’s theory. The circuit …

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Sunday, October 30th, 2011

2B, Or Not 2B?

United States v. Bahel, No. 08-3327 (2d Cir. October 26, 2011) (Pooler, Raggi, CJJ, Korman, DJ)

Sanjaya Bahel, a chief procurement officer at the United Nations, was convicted of honest services fraud and bribery offenses in connection with a kickback scheme in which he improperly steered lucrative U.N. procurement contracts to a friend, in exchange for money. This long opinion covers a lot of very fact-specific issues. This post focuses only on the sentencing claim.

Both U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1 and U.S.S.G. § 2C1.1 can apply to fraud convictions. The difference is that § 2C1.1 applies to specifically to “public officials” and carries a higher base offense level. The district court sentenced Bahel under § 2C1.1, over objection; on appeal, and the circuit rejected his claim that the court should have used § 2B1.1.

Under the relevant definition, which is to be “construed broadly,” Bahel was a “public official.” That he …

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Family Matters

United States v. Banki, N o. 10-3381-cr (2d Cir. October 24, 2011) (Cabranes, Pooler, Chin, CJJ)

Defendant Banki is an Iranian-born United States citizen. Starting in 2006, his family transferred about $3.4 million from Iran to the United States, all of which was effectuated through the “hawala” system. Banki’s hawala broker used a “matching” system to facilitate these transfers. When he knew that Banki’s family wanted to send money to the United States, he would find someone in the U.S. who wanted to send approximately the same amount to Iran. The U.S.-based contact would transfer into Banki’s account a sum comparable to the amount Banki’s family wished to send. Banki’s hawala broker would then pay an equivalent sum to the U.S.-based contact’s intended recipient, or broker, in Iran. Ultimately, Banki received some 56 hawala-related deposits.

Banki would typically email a family member to confirm receipt of each payment. Although most …

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Between the Cracks

United States v. Rivera, No. 10-1199 (2d Cir. October 21, 2011) (Katzmann, Chin, CJJ, Gleeson, DJ)

This interesting decision answers an unanswered question in the circuit’s jurisprudence on § 3582(c)(2) motions. The outcome is favorable for Mr. Rivera, but will likely not last. An amended version of U.S.S.G. § 1B1.10 goes into effect on November 1, 2011, that is, at least arguably, intended to render defendants in his situation ineligible for a sentence reduction.

Background

Convicted by a jury, Rivera faced a base offense level of 38 for trafficking in more than 1.5 kilograms of crack cocaine. There were no adjustments, so 38 was also his total offense level. He was in criminal history category IV, so his range would have been 324 to 415 months. But, he was a career offender. The highest offense level in the career offender table is 37, so the district court correctly “borrowed” the …

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Saturday, October 22nd, 2011

Thorn, Again

United States v. Thorn, No. 11-37-cr (2d Cir. October 20, 2011) (Jacobs, Sack, Raggi, CJJ)

This is Joseph Thorn’s third time in the circuit. Thorn ran an upstate asbestos removal company; he performed dangerous, substandard work, and used the money he earned to grow the business. In 2000, a Northern District jury convicted him of money laundering and environmental crimes, and the district court sentenced him to 65 months’ imprisonment. On the government’s appeal, the circuit vacated the sentence – the guidelines were mandatory then – and on remand the district court downwardly departed to 168 months from what it thought was a 235-month guideline minimum. The government appealed and won again. By this time the guidelines were advisory, however, so while the guideline minimum was now up to 292 months, the district court sentenced Thorn to 144 months.

Three years later, Thorn filed a 2255 motion, seeking to vacate …

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