you have to speak up a little bit and i will judge ok ok judge i will list the court that i can address two separate issues the first is your time you can do whatever you want thanks judge point number one dealing with the severance and point number two dealing with what i believe to be the critical error on behalf of mrs della donna the the use of the term friendship during the jury george vi jackman on the issue of severance the argument is brief i understand that the three counts of political corruption to mail fraud as well  together i understand also that the two counts of taxes could go should go together also again under a concept of a single transaction there were consecutive years right but the problem is that that the fourth count it's not just an it's not just the count five before it looked the count for there's comments about back dooring and things like that but it are you denying that i mean i didn't take you to be denying that the fifth count is related to counts one through three right correct and that the fourth count is related to the fifth count correct ok so if as a i'm just having trouble following the logic helping out if if  that that the way that you framed the question illustrates the difficulty in this sense is that the analysis should have been that once you get the tax counts once you got the political corruption do you make the choice and it's supposedly because four and five are not automatically counted connected with one two with three as a similar transaction three in fourth or five are one two and three are not the two of them the choice then should be should have been talk about what you can and can't do fourteen eight talks about what you may and you know talks about discretion how what's your authority for saying that under eight b once we're talking about the court's discretion  e reasonably related you just can't keep going and i thought of a kid to take a kid with he made a lot of smoke he makes a copy and it works now you make a copy from the copy and when you put that to walk it doesn't work you've got to go back to the first one because there's a little variance you know each time but isn't that the really the argument you're going to for me because i think move it really goes to the prejudice issue with regard to a nine thousand dollars tax fraud dealing with section eight housing is now lumped into a project case of basically political corruption and the theory being well as you argue of count fourteen was to make the jury think these are and people then that would have applied throughout the jury's determination but the jury actually acquitted didn't clearly instruct them about what the separate counts were right there was if there was a charge with regard to that right and the and the jury demonstrated its capacity to keep the charges separate because i mean to keep the count separate because it in fact entire trial fifty three times during your do b madrone i was cross examination she talked about friendship the government even used the word friendship judge ackerman would he rest in peace by the use of that word friendship the only example he used during the entire jury charge basically took it away from me the argument of simple kindness and and acts of kindness and friendship that would turned into print conspiracy and crime were not simple misstatements they were not simple words of of let's say as the court's case the case is a poor choice of words but in fact was the very essence of it should a said nothing with regard to it or as an example on page fourteen of the brief he said you should have framed it out if in fact you found friendship you should you could find that there was not a criminal intent involved thank you is it improper for a jury to look at this husband and wife together and in in regards to a series of gifts benefiting a family i mean if it is your legal position that giving thousands of dollars in gifts to an paying for surgeries by taking her on the expensive gambling trails behind that of that a whole series of things that go are funneled to to her are somehow things that have if and i don't mean to be overly familiar and using the first names but to keep them separate if if david is aware of these things and there's evidence that he was aware of them disputed but there's evidence he was aware of them if he's aware of all these things coming to his wife are you saying that as a matter of law that's an insufficient quid i am saying to the court on seventeen o two of of our appendix the exact quote from this is why we gave it to him directly meaning the birthday cart so he knew it was coming from us that cannot be speculated the jury cannot speculate that's the government's case he never knew about the gifts therefore we gave them a birthday card that's what this court is left with and what the jury has a birthday card there was no whether there was no other evidence including his own statement that if anything takes me down this is going to be your your honor if i may say the government in their brief misquoted that act you see he was talking about the birthday card the exact quote you on if i may i i'll direct that the exact quote is if but i know if anything's going to take me down and this was a limited from the government's brief meaning the end of my political career it would be this and then he went on to say his relationship their relationship with the this woman will be some of drano was on the lead story of the nightly news in the new york area for human trafficking the front page of all the metropolitan newspapers and an adele of donna because of her friendship took five thousand dollars unbeknownst i'm being nice to her husband again to get a lawyer for this woman in jail if anything was going to take me down meaning the end of his political career he won't be mayor any more chris his wife is so such an oddity with this surely i can understand that that is that is an argument that a jury could have accepted about the meaning of that comment but are you saying that it was beyond the pale was irrational for the jury to to view that comment and say no it didn't just mean the end of my political career cause she's in the news it meant this is the end of my political career and maybe worse because there's a bunch of stuff that's going to hit the fan i mean that's that's what i take it that the government wants us to say aren't we bound by fs the interview we have here to view this evidence in the light most favorable to the government absolutely but my the contents of that quote is himself that's what was going on here so he's saying if anything is going to pick me now that meaning the end of his political career he was not going to be mayor any more because we have a record below that said ninety percent of the time may have please the court my name is caroline said lasky and i represent the united  states the government's position is that there was sufficient evidence of a stream of non campaign contribution gets accepted by david doubt on and and and i doubt donna knowing that they were intended to have david didn't speak or understand spanish and louisa only spoke and understood spanish so how did they get together they got together through ana and through the receipt of the gifts david had knowledge of this continuous stream of gifts which i don't we know that there are several instances in the record where david was present he was present he's due to testify that he stopped elena from showing how the breast reduction surgery would work that he went with ana to luisa's house to pick up gambling money that he was present when on a sold another person that luisa continued to give her money to gamble in atlantic city when they went gambling together that he received the gift card and david the friendship was between dooby and ana in any event he didn't report this gift as he should have which is evidence that he was conscious of guilt in receiving this  and it isn't an ordinary kind of token gift that one would give in this relationship but it is also part of this sort of extraordinary stream of gifts for two people who who don't socialize together but for someone who ha many demands of the couple in terms of their political actions that they take who comes to them again and again for help in their official capacity is there an inference that can be drawn that the jury was permitted to draw based on the political actions would talk yes the jury their jury is entitle to weigh that evidence as evidence that he accepted these gifts understanding that they were intended for him to take these actions when louise was in trouble because of the f there was a there was a portion of the record that had to do with whether there was a hang period there was that there was there was there was a discussion of whether there was some kind of hang period some because she was in the midst of receiving a second violation there was an yourself of having to provide information you know but the argument of the guy haven't learned much because if i refuse in a case i keep my mouth shut if i see a typo i might say something about you but if you're wea use you're not supposed to this you know i know you argue that i don't i don't think that the government relied strongly on the argument that if he had this information this was his sworn with the political corruption jars you know as a as a matter of law there's no reason why these counts couldn't be joined why because counts one through three are properly related as the defendant admits and the defendant and myths that count five as as the tax return which failed to report the proceeds of counts one through three are properly related as properly joined and counts four and five are all properly joined related because they relate to the same series of acts or transactions so under the more restrictive rules eight b each of these offenses are properly joined together  but he properly instructed them which is which in the case that the jury was able to and we've been we assume that the jury followed their instructions and distinguish between the evidence on these counts moreover all of the evidence on these counts could have been introduced as four zero four be evidence as to the other counts they're all how would the tax charges and count four have been for all four be evidence as to count one two or three they would have been for a four b evidence as to count five because they would show a pattern knowledge absence of mistake in the winter or i thought the premise of the of your answer was separating four and five and separating one two from one to three at least that's what i fact it's absolutely it's particularly relevant here does that indicate that he was he was trying to insert something about his view into the instruction no honor if it was an indication that the now when i was hoping that they were going to misinterpret the law that the jury was they were going to try and take advantage of an opportunity for the jury to become confused about what would what if they found these defendants acted both in friendship and because they intended to use their official office to benefit the doubt on us and out of out of a sense of personal advancement and the judge was making sure that if the jury had that issue before the in their minds that they would know that the law was that if there is a dual intent and as he correctly stated to them one of which is neutral you didn't he didn't suggest that friendship was a reason why you could out on as acting on friendship he said this is a neutral intent but if they have them both then you are entitled under the law to convict them and it was a it was appropriate to convict the jury i mean for the jury to be instructed in this way the kind of thing count three was much worse than the conduct in count four and in any case the conduct in count four was less significant tax evasion than the conduct in count five or the failure to report was less significant than in count five it was the least significant of all the conduct that was introduced it was permissible to introduce the conduct in count five in fact it was required if you're going to charge how does it advance your remit because can't you as well i mean that's a little that's like saying well maybe we got convicted i can't work because they really dislike the sound count three you still got wrongly convicted of a count from the defense perspective if you were prejudiced whether it was for prejudic three or three purges and four i mean if you're comparing which is worse how does it get you out of the box that the defense wants to put you on which is they should have been together because you were going to have bleed over prejudice one way or the other well the the conduct is quite distinct so the argument is that there isn't bleed over prejudice from one to the other because they're very unique concepts of conduct and the jury was instructed if it's so unique and distinct why was it not an abuse of discretion to put it together the law is that the proceeds of a crime such as bribery when they are not and you're right your honor may be tried together and the in fact if you're trying to if you're charging that tax crime you have to prove the extortion you have to bring it in otherwise you can't make out your tax case so regardless of whether there's an analysis of prejudice that you have to try them together to prove the tax evasion  court instructs the jury not to weigh these things we assume that the jury can follow its instruction they show that they could with respect to counts one counts two and and in that respect likewise with count four the jury can follow the instructions that they're only required to consider the evidence as to that count in the defendant's conduct the is there is there anything that you want to say in response to mr liberals argument that the sentence was aligned with other sentences given to comparably situated defendants i think the defendants were very selective in choosing the defendants that they added to their chart and they were very selective about presenting the facts in that chart that were relevant for the courts to consider and we pointed out in our brief the many differences between these defendants jack and properly exercised his discretion  the people they had they had a chart of forty different defendant who did what who did you committed various acts of that could be considered under the umbrella of political correctness gone all charged with the same thing you know you know some of them were mail fraud or with regard to the sentence disparity what we try to of call out is those individuals who went to trial with political corruptions not the mayor of canton who was arrested on a drug charge political corruption  conigliaro thirty months just recently you know this was by far in excess of seconds going back to the birthday cart i recognize five hundred dollars but recognize police it was from the we put this trial right to do the metron out with the question on sentencing ninety two you're under oath was david taken advantage of there was a pregnant pause in that courtroom you're under oath ma'am was david take it advantage of the one witness against david to say the two on the quit in my heart i feel so that's their main witness their only