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Parties Involved:
Mobile Materials, Inc.
Appellant
Gerald O. Philpot
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

FILED 

U nittd State& Court af Appeals '.?enth Circuit 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

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No. 86-1756 

MOBILE MATERIALS, INC. and 

GERALD 0. PHILPOT, 

Defendants-Appellants. 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA 

(D.C. No. CR-84-147-E) 

Mack Muratet Braly of Mack Muratet Braly & Associates, Tulsa, 

Oklahoma, for Defendants-Appellants. 

Andrea Limmer, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. 

(Douglas H. Ginsburg, Assistant Attorney General: w. Stephen 

Cannon, Deputy Assistant Attorney General; and John J. Powers, 

III, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., with her 

on the brief), for Plaintiff-Appellee. 

Before McKAY, MOORE, and BALDOCK, Circuit Judges. 

PER CURIAM. 

Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 1 
This case arose as one of.,severaL,prosecutions in a campaign 

by the Justice Department to rid the Oklahoma and Kansas highway 

construction industry .,of anticompet.i tive bidding prac-~ices. · In 

view of the issues on appeal, it will be helpful to recite the 

procedural history of the case in some detail. 

On August 22, 1984, a grand jury sitting in the Western 

District of Oklahoma returned a seven-count indictment against 

Mobile Materials, Inc. (the Corporation), Mobile Materials Company 

(the Partnership), and Gerald o. Philpot, the president of both 

firms. Count one of the indictment charged all three defendants 

and unnamed co-conspirators with participation in a conspiracy to 

submit rigged bids to, or withhold bids from, the Oklahoma 

Department of Transportation and the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority 

in violation of section 1 of the Sherman Act, 15 u.s.c. § 1 

(1982). Counts two and three charged Mr. Philpot and the 

Corporation with making false, fictitious, and fraudulent 

statements to the United States Department of Transportation in 

violation of 18 u.s.c. § 1001 (1982); and counts four through 

seven charged all three defendants with mail fraud under 18 u.s.c. 

§ 1341 (1982) in connection with the progress payments claimed 

from the state of Oklahoma. 

Prior to trial, the defendants moved to dismiss the 

indictment on the ground that both the Corporation and the 

Partner·ship had been dissolved more than two years before the 

indictment was returned. The district court granted the motion as 

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to the Corporation and thecPartnership, finding its ruling 

compelled by our decision in United States v. Safeway Stores, 140 

F.2d 834 (lOth Cir. 1944). The court declined to dismiss the 

criminal charges lodged against Mr. Philpot, however, reasoning 

that its order as to the Corporation and Partnership had no 

bearing on the allegations against him and no effect on the 

government's burden of proof. Rec. vol. I, doc. 37 at 4-5. 

Subsequently, the government filed an interlocutory appeal 

under 18 u.s.c. § 3731 (1982 & Supp. IV 1986) to contest the 

district court's dismissal of the indictment and moved for a 

continuance in the prosecution of Mr. Philpot under section 

316l(h)(8) of the Speedy Trial Act, 1~ u.s.c. §§ 3161-3174 (1982 & 

Supp. II 1984). The district court granted the government's 

motion, concluding that "the ends of justice served by granting 

such a continuance outweigh the best interests of the public and 

the Defendant in a speedy trial." Rec. val. I, doc. 49 at 1. The 

government's appeal was presented to us in the case of United 

States v. Mobile Materials, Inc., 776 F.2d 1476 (lOth Cir. 1985). 

In Mobile Materials, we reversed the district court's ruling 

that under Oklahoma law a criminal prosecution cannot be 

maintained against a corporation that was dissolved before the 

return of the indictment. On December 9, 1985, we issued a 

mandate to the district court to conduct further proceedings in 

the prosecution of,the three defendants consistent with that 

holding. As a first step in reactivating the prosecution, the 

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district court held a status conference -on January 9, 1986, in 

which it granted requests by both parties for permission to file 

motions and--amended -documents. Rec. vol. I, doc. 59. 

Following an eight-day jury trial begun on March 3, 1986, the 

Partnership was acquitted of all charges. However, Mr. Philpot 

and the Corporation were convicted of the Sherman Act violation 

and one count of making false and fraudulent statements to the 

United States Department of Transportation. The district court 

sentenced Mr. Philpot to serve two concurrent three-year terms of 

imprisonment and to pay fines totaling $110,000. The court also 

imposed fines totaling $510,000 against the Corporation. 

On appeal, Mr. Philpot and the Corporation (the appellants) 

raise four issues: (1) whether the case should have been 

submitted to the jury on a theory of a grand conspiracy to rig 

bids, (2) whether the Speedy Trial Act was violated by the 

protracted length of the prosecution, (3) whether the trial 

judge's attitude and demeanor convinced the jury that the judge 

thought the appellants were guilty, and (4) whether the sentences 

were grossly disproportionate to others given for the same crimes 

and imposed without regard for the circumstances of the 

defendants. 

Sufficiency of the Indictment 

Under the general heading of the first-issue presented, the 

appellants raise several arguments. We only consider the 

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contention that,the indictment is insufficient. 1 • 2 Appellants 

suggested below that count one failed to provide sufficient 

, -information. to enable them ·to -prepare a "defense,· contrary to the 

sixth amendment to the United States Constitution. They also 

argue that count one may be based on facts not presented to the 

grand jury, contrary to the fifth amendment. 

The sufficiency of an indictment is judged by 1) whether the 

indictment contains the elements of the offense and apprises the 

defendant of the charges he must meet and 2) whether the defendant 

would be protected against double jeopardy by a judgment on the 

indictment. Hamling v. United States, 418 u.s. 87, 117 (1974). 

Appellants' real complaint about count one of the indictment is 

that its breadth allowed the introduction of co-conspirator 

1 Under the general heading of the first issue presented, 

appellants also argue that 1) coconspirator hearsay and evidence 

concerning "unrelated" jobs should not have been admitted, 2) 

there was a variance between the single conspiracy charged and the 

conspiracy proved at trial because the rigged bids were actually 

multiple conspiracies and 3) the government should not have 

informed the jury that its witnesses had rigged bids and were 

immunized. We do not reach these issues because of appellants' 

failure to designate the trial transcript for our review. See 

Appellants' Designation of Record on Appeal filed September~, 

1986 (failing to designate complete trial and sentencing 

transcript). The few pages of trial transcript that were 

designated, rec. vols. II, III, IV and v, simply do not address 

the evidence concerning these points. As expected, the parties 

differ sharply concerning characterization of that evidence. 

2 The appellants offer only a cursory argument on this issue in 

their Brief in Chief. They refer us, however, to their Brief in 

Support of the Motion to Dismiss Count One for Vagueness, a 

document submitted to the district court and now included as part 

of the record before us. It is in the supporting brief that the 

appellants·ground their objection to the language of count one in 

the guarantees of the fifth and sixth amendments. Rec. vol. I, 

doc. 44 at 4-6. 

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testimony and-allowed the jury to consider evidence of a single 

conspiracy to rig bids, of which the appellants were a part. 

Appellants' Brief-In-Chief-at 12-14 (citing United States v. 

Heath, 580 F.2d 1011, 1026 (lOth Cir. 1978) (McKay, J., 

dissenting), cert. denied, 439 u.s. 675 (1979)). Indeed, 

appellants have challenged the admissibility of co-conspirator 

statements and the sufficiency of the evidence to support a single 

conspiracy, but have not provided us with those portions of the 

transcript needed for our review. See, ~, United States v. 

Washita Constr. Co., 789 F.2d 809, 821-22 (lOth Cir. 1986) (court 

reviewed trial testimony and judge's findings in rejecting 

defendants' claims that co-conspirator hearsay admitted 

improperly). We decline to consider these issues in the absence 

of a record containing those portions of the transcript on which 

the parties rely. 3 United States v. Tedder, 787 F.2d 540, 542 n.2 

(lOth Cir. 1986); United States v. Strand, 617 F.2d 571, 577 (lOth 

Cir.), cert. denied, 449 u.s. 841 (1980); Rachbach v. Cogswell,· 

547 F.2d 502, 504 (lOth Cir. 1977). 

3 Fed. R. App. P. 10(b)(2) provides: 

(2) If the appellant intends to urge on appeal that a 

finding or conclusion is unsupported by the evidence or 

is contrary to the evidence, the appellant shall include 

in the record a transcript of all evidence relevant to 

such finding or conclusion. 

At the time the record was designated in this case, a general 

order established the procedure for designating a record in the 

Tenth Circuit. See In Re: Adoption of Procedures for Simplifying 

Designation and Transmission of Records on Appeal from the 

District Court (lOt~ Cir. July 17, 1985) (unpublished order). 

Although the order sought to reduce the designation of unnecessary 

materials, it retained the time-honored rule that "[a]ppeals will 

be heard on the record." Id. S IV(f). 

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Turning to the sufficiency of the indictment, the entire 

document-may be considered. Uni-ted States v .- Metropolitan Enter., 

Inc., 728 F.2d 444, 452-53 (lOth Cir. 1984). For purposes of 

testing the sufficiency of the indictment, the essential elements 

of a conspiracy under §§ 1 & 2 of the Sherman Act are "time, 

place, manner, means and effect." United States v. Greater Kansas 

City Retail Coal Merchants' Ass'n, 85 F. Supp. 503, 508 (W.o. Mo. 

1949). In this case, the paragraphs preceding count one and count 

one itself establish these elements. 

15 u.s.c. § 1 provides that contracts, combinations and 

conspiracies in restraint of trade are illegal. Tracking the 

statutory language, paragraph 14 of the indictment charged that 

"the defendants and co-conspirators engaged in a combination and 

conspiracy in unreasonable restraint of trade and commerce" from 

July 1978, through February 1982. Rec. vol. I, doc. 1 at 7. 

Paragraph 9 of the indictment explains the sealed competitive 

bidding process used by the Oklahoma Department of Transportation 

and Oklahoma Turnpike Authority. Id. at 4-5. Highway 

construction contracts are awarded to the lowest responsible 

bidder following the opening of sealed bids. Id. Paragraph 15 of 

the indictment charges that a substantial term of the conspiracy 

"was to submit collusive, noncompetitive, and rigged bids to, or 

withhold bids from, the Oklahoma Department of Transportation and 

":'-the Oklahoma Turnpike ·Authority for the award of highway 

construction projects in Oklahoma." Id. at 7. Paragraph 16 

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outlines the.practices in furtherance of the conspiracy allegedly 

engaged in by the appellants and other conspirators including 1) 

-discussing the-submission of.prospective bids on projects, 2) 

agreeing on the successful low bidder on projects, 3) submitting 

intentionally high, noncompetitive bids or withholding bids on 

construction projects and 4) submitting bid proposals with false 

statements and entries. Id. at 8. Paragraph 17 spells out the 

anticompetitive effects of the conspiracy, primarily the lessening 

of price competition. 

The indictment charges the appellants with a bid-rigging 

conspiracy in the award of highway projects during a 43-month 

period, from July 1978 through February 1982. Thus, the time 

element is satisfied. The conspiracy is alleged to have existed 

in the Western District of Oklahoma. Rec. vol. I, doc. 1 at 9. 

Thus, the place element is satisfied. The indictment specifies 

the manner and means of the conspiracy. There was advance 

agreement as to which co-conspirator would be the low bidder on 

highway construction projects. With this object in mind, some 

noncompetitive bids were submitted, and some bids were withheld. 

The indictment also specified the effect of this practice, a 

lessening of price competition in the highway construction 

industry. This indictment has "more factual detail" than the 

brief indictment in United States v. Cecil, 608 F.2d 1294 (9th 

Cir. 1979)(per curiam), relied on by appellants. See United 

States v. Miller, 771 F.2d 1219, 1227 (9th Cir. 1985) (rejecting 

application of Cecil to a Sherman Act indictment). 

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Three weeks after the indictment, the government came forward 

and filed a bill of particulars listing eleven highway 

construction projects, twelve companies, and sixteen persons which 

the government claimed were part of the conspiracy. Thereafter, 

the government amended its bill of particulars by listing six 

highway construction projects involving the appellants directly 

and three others involving other co-conspirators. The indictment 

supplemented by the bill of particulars certainly put the 

defendants on notice of the charges against them. United States 

v. Bi-Co Pavers, Inc., 741 F.2d 730, 734-35 (5th Cir. 1984) 

(highway bid rigging indictment specifying one project 

sufficient). Of course, it would have been preferable for the 

information in the bill of particulars to have been contained in 

the indictment as it apparently was in the sister case of United 

States v. Washita Constr. Co., 789 F.2d 809 (lOth Cir. 1986). But 

this circuit has never held that a failure of an indictment to 

list specific transactions or name all co-conspirators renders an 

antitrust indictment invalid. 

To the contrary, in United States v. Armour & Co., 137 F.2d 

269, 271 (lOth Cir. 1943), the court held an indictment sufficient 

which charged a conspiracy to fix prices of hogs in the Oklahoma 

City market even though the dates of particular transactions or 

the names of the actors were not contained in the indictment. The 

indictment charged the offense and merely detailed the elements or 

the means by which the conspiracy to restrain trade operated. Id. 

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at 271, 272 (Phillips, J., concurring). Likewise, in Frankfort 

Distilleries v. United States, 144 F.2d 824, 832 (lOth Cir. 

1944)(en bane), rev'd on other grounds, 324 u.s. 293 (1945), the 

court considered two Sherman Act indictments with multiple 

defendants. The cases concerned an alleged conspiracy to fix 

retail liquor prices and another to monopolize the retail grocery 

trade. In upholding the general nature of the indictments, the 

court commented that the indictments did not list: 1) the specific 

products involved, 2) the producers, wholesalers, and retailers 

affected, nor 3) the persons involved in the conspiracies. But 

that did not affect the sufficiency of the indictments: 

[T]hese indictments each charge in general terms a 

conspiracy to restrain interstate trade and commerce, or 

monopolize such trade and commerce, as the case may be, 

substantially in the language of the Act. And if the 

allegations in respect to the manner and means of 

effecting the object of the combination and conspiracy 

are not set forth in sufficient detail, the remedy is to 

apply for a bill of particulars. 

Id. at 832. The Tenth Circuit relied on Glasser v. United States, 

315 U.S. 60 (1942), in which the Court restated that a conspiracy 

indictment must state a common intent, but that "[t]he 

particularity of time, place, circumstances, causes, etc., in 

stating the manner and means of effecting the object of the 

conspiracy ••• is not essential to an indictment." Id. at 66. 

For that type of specificity, a bill of particulars may be sought. 

Id. The Supreme Court has emphasized repeatedly that the test of 

the sufficiency of an indictment is not whether it could be more 

definite and certain, for that is the function of a bill of 

particulars. United States v. Debrow, 346 U.S. 374, 378 (1953); 

Rosen v. United States, 161 u.s. 29, 34 (1896); Cochran and Sayre 

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\ 

.v .• United States, 157 u.s. 286,.290 (1895) ("Few 

indictments • • . are so skilfully drawn as to be beyond the 

hypercriticism of--astute ·counsel--few which might not be made more 

definite by additional allegations."). 

The indictment in this case contains the elements necessary 

to allege an antitrust violation. In Metropolitan Enter., Inc., 

728 F.2d at 452-53, we considered a similar indictment charging 

bid rigging on highway projects in Oklahoma and found that the 

indictment contained the necessary elements. It is the presence 

of the necessary elements which determines the sufficiency of the 

indictment. The essence of a S 1 Sherman Act violation is a 

combination and conspiracy in restraint of trade. Eastern States 

Lumber Ass'n v. United States, 234 U.S. 600, 609 (1914). The 

combination and conspiracy is prohibited without regard to the 

success or failure of the concerted activity. United States v. 

Socony-Vacuum Oil Co., 310 u.s. 150, 225 n.59 (1940). Overt acts 

need not be alleged. Nash v. United States, 229 u.s. 373, 378 

(1913); Miller, 771 F.2d at 1226. The bill of particulars served 

to "offset a lack of factual specificity." 4 Given the substantive 

law in this area, the mere furnishing of a bill of particulars in 

no way means the indictment was insufficient. 

4 If an indictment or information does not state all of 

the essential elements, it cannot be cured by a bill of 

particulars that alleges facts establishing the missing 

element. The bill may offset a lack of factual 

specificity, but i~ will not save an indictment so vague 

that it fails completely to charge an offense. 

w. LaFave & J. Israel, Criminal ProcedureS 19.2(f) (1984). 

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The appellants liken this case to Russell v. United States, 

369 u.s-. 749 (1962): however, -the-ef-fense -involved in this case is 

far different. In this case, we are dealing with a per se 

antitrust violation against a backdrop of established law for 

evaluating the sufficiency of antitrust violations. Russell 

involved 2 u.s.c. S 192, which concerns the refusal by a 

congressional witness "to answer any question pertinent to the 

question under inquiry." The indictments in Russell did not 

identify the "question under inquiry," the subject under 

congressional inquiry. Russell, 369 u.s. at 752. This impeded 

the defense because a witness may refuse to answer questions which 

are not pertinent to the subject matter under inquiry. Id. at 

755. After an exhaustive discussion of the substantive criminal 

law involved, the Court stated: 

As has been pointed out, the very core of criminality 

under 2 u.s.c. S 192 is pertinency to the subject matter 

under inquiry of the questions which the defendant 

refused to answer. What the subject matter actually 

was, therefore, is central to every prosecution under 

the statute. Where guilt depends so crucially upon such 

a specific identification of fact, our cases have 

uniformly held that an indictment must do more than 

simply repeat the language of the criminal statute. 

Id. at 764. The failure to specify the subject matter would force 

a defendant "to go to trial with the chief issue undefined." Id. 

at 766. 

The indictment in this case is light years away from the 

ind±ctment in Russell. -As noted,-the core of criminality under 

S 1 of the Sherman Act is conspiracy in restraint of trade. The 

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.. indic-tment alleges a per se violation of the Sherman Act, namely a 

bid-rigging conspiracy concerning public highway construction. 

· -·_.-The government contended- that the conspiracy was self-perpetuat-ing 

and could be plugged into at any time by the participants. See 

United States v. Beachner Constr. Co., 729 F.2d 1278, 1283 (lOth 

Cir. 1984) (the ability to rig bids due to "a tacit understanding 

based upon a long course of conduct" constitutes a single 

conspiracy in violation of§ 1). The indictment does more than 

merely repeat the words of the statute; it describes this 

particular conspiracy. Unlike Russell, the chief issue in the 

first count of the indictment was clearly defined. 

The fact that various highway projects were not listed in the 

indictment does not render it invalid. "[I]t is well settled that 

conspiracies under the Sherman Act are not dependent on any overt 

act other than the act of conspiring." Socony-Vacuum Oil Co., 310 

U.S. at 225 n.59. Thus, overt acts of the conspiracy in restraint 

of trade need not be specified in the indictment. Appellants 

assert that the time period covered in the indictment involved the 

awarding of over 700 projects by the Oklahoma Department of 

Transportation. Rec. vol. I, doc. 44 at 3. Even accepting this 

information, the identification of which projects were alleged to 

be a direct part of the conspiracy involving defendants was the 

function of a bill of particulars. In United States v. Fishbach 

and Moore, Inc., 576 F. Supp. 1384, 1388 (W.O. Pa. 1983), the 

de-fendant e-lectrical contractors sought a bill of particulars 

specifying which of 150 electrical projects over a seven-year 

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per-iod were aJ .. l.egedl.y subject to- a bid-rigging scheme. The 

government contended that individual projects were not relevant 

·-and that all bids during the pe~iod-were the subject of the 

indictment. Id. After considering the nature of a Sherman Act 

conspiracy and the requirements of a sufficient indictment as 

stated in Russell, the district court required a bill of 

particulars to allow the defendants to better prepare for trial. 

Id. at 1389. Likewise, in United States v. Campbell Hardware, 470 

F. Supp. 430, 433-34 (D. Mass. 1979), the district court 

recognized that great factual specificity is not required in 

Sherman Act indictments and declined to dismiss the indictment. A 

bill of particulars was the proper avenue for greater factual 

detail. Id. 

In this case, the government voluntarily came forward with a 

bill of particulars and an amended bill of particulars specifying 

particular projects, companies and persons thought to be directly 

involved. It cannot be said that the appellants were unable to 

prepare a defense given the indictment; indeed, appellants do not 

so contend on appeal. 

Nor does Russell support an argument that the indictment 

contravenes the fifth amendment by not assuring that appellants 

were convicted only upon facts found by the grand jury. Again, 

this argument misapprehends the nature of indictment in Russell. 

In RusS'ell, the Court-was insistent that an indictment under 18 

u.s.c. § 192 "state the question under •.• inquiry as found by 

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~he grand jury." Russell, 369 U.S. at 771. The Court stated: 

A grand jury ••• must necessarily determine what the 

question under inquiry was. To allow the prosecutor, or -- the court, to make a subsequent guess as to what was in 

the minds of the grand jury at the time they returned 

the indictment would deprive the defendant of a basic 

protection which the guaranty of the intervention of a 

grand jury was designed to secure. For a defendant 

could then be convicted on the basis of facts not found 

by, and perhaps not even presented to, the grand jury 

which indicted him. 

Id. at 770. This oft-quoted language read in context admits of no 

more than the requirement that an indictment must contain the 

essential elements of the offense as determined by the grand jury. 

In Russell, the indictments did not contain an essential element 

of the offense because they did not state the subject under 

congressional inquiry. The grand jury was required to make a 

determination of the subject under inquiry. Id. Thus, a grand 

jury must find all essential elements of the offense and recite 

these elements in the indictment. 

All of the essential elements of a Sherman Act violation were 

contained in this indictment. The indictment did more than track 

the statutory language;5 it described a conspiracy in restraint of 

trade. Although we cannot say whether each project relied upon by 

the government was presented to the grand jury, there simply is no 

requirement that every factual detail of a charge be presented to 

a grand jury. The government is not so limited in its proof. 

5 An indictment which merely tracks the statutory language may 

well be sufficient provided the statute contains all the essential 

elements of the crime. Hamling, 418 u.s. at 117; United States v. 

Zavala, 839 F.2d 523, 526 (9th Cir.)(per curiam), cert. denied, 

109 S. Ct. 86 (1988). 

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Here, the grand jury found elements of a bid-rigging conspiracy 

involving the appellants. The indictment notified the appellants 

· .of .. the charge •. Greater .factual specificity was. acceptably 

provided by the bill of particulars. 

Violation of the Speedy Trial Act 

The Speedy Trial Act, 18 U.S.C. §§ 3161-3174 (1982 & Supp. II 

1984} (the Act}, requires that a defendant charged by indictment 

must be brought to trial within seventy days of the date the 

indictment is filed or the date the defendant first appears before 

a judicial officer of the court, whichever occurs later. Id. 

S 316l(c)(l). However, section 316l(h) provides for the exclusion 

of certain periods of delay in the calculation of the seventy-day 

term. Four types of delay, each treated by a distinct subsection 

of section 316l(h}, are at issue in this appeal. In addition, 

various other provisions of the Act are implicated by the course 

of proceedings prior to trial. 

The appellants argue that the trial court erred in granting a 

continuance in the prosecution of Mr. Philpot under section 

316l(h)(8)(A). 6 They do not dispute that some period of delay was 

6 Section 316l(h){8)(A) excludes 

[a]ny period of delay resulting from a continuance 

granted by any judge on his own motion or at the request 

of the defendant or his counsel or at the request of the 

attorney for the Government, if the judge granted such 

continuance on the basis of his findings that the ends 

of justica served by taking such action outweigh the 

best interest of the public and the defendant in a 

speedy trial. No such period of delay resulting from a 

(continued on following page) 

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proper while the.government.appealed the dismissal of all charges 

against the Corporation. However, the appellants maintain that 

only the application of section 316l(h)(l)(E)7 coupled with 

section 316l(h)(7)8 could stay the entire prosecution, and that 

not even the force of these provisions was sufficient to halt the 

proceedings for the period of delay actually incurred. The sum of 

the appellants' claim is that all charges in the indictment must 

be dismissed9 because the government failed to bring them to trial 

within the time allowed by section 316l(c)(l). By the appellants' 

calculations, the last possible date on which either the 

Corporation or Mr. Philpot could have been brought to trial was 

(continued from previous page) 

continuance granted by the court in accordance with this 

paragraph shall be excludable under this subsection 

unless the court sets forth, in the record of the case, 

either orally or in writing, its reasons for finding 

that the ends of justice served by the granting of such 

continuance outweigh the best interests of the public 

and the defendant in a speedy trial. 

7 Section 316l(h)(l)(E) requires the court to exclude "any period of delay resulting from other proceedings concerning the 

defendant, including but not limited to ••• delay resulting from 

any interlocutory appeal." 

8 Section 316l(h)(7) requires the court to exclude "[a] 

reasonable period of delay when the defendant is joined for trial 

with a codefendant as to whom the time for trial has not run and 

no motion for severance has been granted." 

9 Section 3162 (a)(2) provides: "If a defendant is not . to trial within the .time limit required. by section 316l(c) 

extended by section 316l(h), the ••• indictment shall be 

dismissed on motion of the defendant." 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 17 
February 17, ·1986, two weeks- before the jury in t-he case was 

actually empanelled.10 

The appellants are correct in their assertion that sections 

316l(h){l)(E) and {h)(7), not section 316l(h)(8)(A), governed the 

exclusion of certain periods of delay incurred in the prosecution 

of this case.l1 Section 316l(h)(l)(E) tolled the speedy trial 

clock of the Corporation while the government's interlocutory 

appeal was before this court. Similarly, section 316l(h)(7) 

excluded several "reasonable" periods of delay that punctuated the 

prosecution of Mr. Philpot. Our conclusion on this point follows 

directly from our holding in United States v. Theron, 782 F.2d 

1510 (lOth Cir. 1986), a decision announced fifteen months after 

the district court granted the continuance in this case. 

The appellant in Theron was one of twelve co-defendants 

indicted for conspiracy and mail fraud. When released on bail, 

ten of Mr. Theron's co-defendants moved for an "ends of justice" 

continuance under section 316l(h)(8) of the Speedy Trial Act due 

to the complexity of the case. Mr. Theron, who remained in 

custody, opposed the motion and filed his own motion under the Act 

10 "The date that trial commences for the purposes of the Speedy 

Trial Act is the date that a jury is selected." United States v. 

Scalf, 760 F.2d 1057, 1059 (lOth Cir. 1985) (citing Un~ted States 

v. Martinez, 749 F.2d 601, 604 (lOth Cir. 1984)). 

11 Therefore we do not address the appellants' alternate 

argument that even if the trial court-were correct in applying 

section 316l(h)(8), the seventy-day period in the prosecution of 

Mr. Philpot lapsed six weeks before trial actually began. 

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to demand an immediate trial or .dismissal of his. indic.tment. The 

district court granted the co-defendants' motion for continuance 

· but denied· Mr. Theron' s- mot-ion .. for trial or dismissal. Mr. Theron 

then sought a writ of mandamus from this court ordering the trial 

judge to begin trial or dismiss his indictment. 12 

In reviewing Mr. Theron's claims, our examination of the text 

and the legislative history of the Speedy Trial Act led us to 

conclude that the district court had abused its discretion in 

granting a continuance under section 316l(h)(8). 

It appears that the trial court relied upon three factors to justify the continuance: (1) the codefendants' 

need for preparation time; (2) the complexity of the 

case; and (3) the desirability of trying all defendants 

at once. In the context of this case these are either 

improper or insufficient factors to justify an ends-ofjustice continuance under S 316l(h)(8). 

Theron, 782 F.2d at 1512-13. With one addition, 13 these are precisely the factors cited by the district court in this case for 

granting the government a continuance under section 316l(h)(8). 

See rec. vol. I, doc. 49. 

In Theron, we noted that "[s]ubsection (h)(7) treats 

exclusion of time because codefendants are in the case, not 

subsection (h)(8)." Id. at 1513. Thus we concluded that "holding 

12 Subsequently, Mr. Theron filed a motion for severance and 

release pending trial; that motion was also denied. An appeal of 

that ruling was consolidated with Mr. Theron's request for the 

writ of mandamus. 

13 The fourth factor was a conflict in scheduled trial dates the 

government would incur if the continuance were not granted. 

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··· ... that a complex ,multiple defendant case_ is enough to toll the Act 

under subsection (h)(8) would emasculate the specific separate 

provision in subsection (h) ( 7) • • • • " -Id. · Broadening this 

statement only slightly for the purposes of this case, we conclude 

that the misapplication of section 316l(h)(8) will undermine not 

only section (h)(7), but also section 316l(h)(l)(E). 

Choosing the correct statutory provisions to regulate the 

periods of delay in this prosecution only begins the task before 

us. We still must examine the effects of these provisions to 

determine whether the appellants' conclusion, that all charges 

against them must be dismissed, is warranted. A temporary split 

in the appellants' joint trial proceedings occurred when the 

government filed an interlocutory appeal from the dismissal of 

charges against the Corporation and simultaneously moved for a 

continuance in the prosecution of Mr. Philpot during the pendency 

of the appeal. As a result, the legal consequences of the delay 

in the prosecution of the Corporation may appear unrelated to 

those arising from the delay in the pretrial proceedings against 

Mr. Philpot. But, in fact, the operation of the Act upon the 

prosecution of the Corporation determines the effect of delay on 

the government's case against Mr. Philpot. 

The internal workings of the Act as applied to this case are 

complex. For the sake of clarity in the exposition of our 

analysis, we will address the application of the Act to the 

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"Corporation,separately from its application.to Mr. Philpot. We 

begin with the Corporation. 

The appellants were arraigned on August 22, 1984, the same 

day the grand jury returned its indictment. The seventy-day 

period began to run for the Corporation the following day, 

August 23, 1984. United States v. Richmond, 735 F.2d 208 (6th 

Cir. 1984); United States v. Campbell, 706 F.2d 1138, 1139 (11th 

Cir. 1983). From that date until October 9, 1984, the day the 

district court dismissed all charges against the Corporation, 14 

forty-seven days elapsed. However, due to the filing of pretrial 

motions in the case, all but seven days of this period are 

excludable under section 316l(h)(l)(F). 15 From October 10 to 

November 5, 1984, the period following the dismissal but preceding 

the government's appeal under 18 u.s.c. § 3731, twenty-six 

nonexcludable days elapsed. Thus, a total of thirty-three days 

14 The government states that the district court's order 

dismissing all charges against the Corporation (and Partnership) 

was entered on November 19, 1984, the same day the court granted 

the government's motion for a continuance in the prosecution of 

Mr. Philpot. See Brief of Appellee at 13. This is incorrect; the 

order was entered October 9, 1984. See rec. vol. I, doc. 37. The 

error renders the government's calculations of excludable time 

inaccurate. See Brief of Appellee at 13, 19. 

15 This section states: 

(1) Any delay resulting from other proceedings 

concerning the defendant, including but not limited to--

. . (F) ·delay resulting from any· pre-trial motion,· 

from the filing of the motion through the conclusion of 

the hearing on, or the prompt disposition of, such 

motion • • • • 

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passed before jurisdiction over.the Corporation was withdrawn from 

the district court. The appeal was under the jurisdiction of this 

.. court from November. 6, 1984, when the government filed its notice. 

of appeal, until December 9, 1985, when we issued our mandate to 

the district court. This entire 398-day period is excludable 

under section 316l(h)(l)(E). 

Upon our remand of the case to the district court, the 

government acquired an additional seventy days in which to bring 

the Corporation to trial. 16 This period began December 10, 1985, 

the day after our mandate issued. By January 8, 1986, thirty days 

of the period had passed without any advance in the prosecution of 

the appellants. None of this time is excludable under the Act. 

On January 9, 1986, the district court held a pretrial status 

16 Section 316l(d)(2) provides in part: 

If the defendant is to be tried upon an indictment 

or information dismissed by the trial court and 

reinstated following an appeal, the trial shall commence 

within seventy days from the date the action occasioning 

the trial becomes final, except that the court retrying 

the case may extend the period for trial not to exceed 

one hundred and eighty days from the date the action 

occasioning the trial becomes final if the 

unavailability of witnesses or other factors resulting 

from the passage of time shall make trial within seventy 

days impractical. 

In United States v. Scalf, 760 F.2d 1057, 1059 (lOth Cir. 

1985), we defined "the date the action occasioning the retrial 

becomes final" in section 316l(e) as the date the mandate issues 

from the court of appeals to the trial court. The reason for this 

is straightforward. Prior to that date, the court of appeals 

retains control of the judgment; the appellants may request a 

rehearing or the court may decide to rehear the case en bane. 

Once the mandate issues, ·however, th~trial court regains 

jurisdiction over the case. The same definition applies to the 

phrase where it appears in section 316l(d)(2). 

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conference at,tended by Mr. Philpot· and' counsel representing both 

Mr. Philpot and the Corporation. At the conference, the 

government· asked to· submit an amended bill of.; particulars while 

the appellants requested time in which to submit additional 

pretrial motions. The court allowed the appellants fifteen days 

(until January 24, 1986) to file their motions and granted the 

government an additional ten days (until February 3, 1986) in 

which to respond. Joint Docketing Statement at 2-3. The status 

conference was "a proceeding concerning the defendant"; January 9 

is therefore excludable under section 316l(h)(l). The question 

remains, however, whether all or even part of the twenty-five day 

period from January 10 until February 3, 1986, is excludable under 

that same section or any other provision of the Speedy Trial Act. 

Had the appellants submitted motions on January 9, the running of 

the seventy-day period would have been tolled for a period 

prescribed by section 316l(h)(l)(F). But on that date the 

appellants (and the governmentj merely expressed the intent to 

file additional documents; nothing was submitted to the court. 

Section 316l(h)(l) does not specify the entire set of 

"proceedings concerning the defendant" that will result in 

excludable periods of delay. To the contrary, its introductory 

language states that delay may result from proceedings "including, 

but not limited to," those found in subsections 316l(h)(l)(A) 

through (h)(l)(J). Moreover, the Senate Report on the 1979 

Amendments to- the Act declares that "[t]he list [of proceedings 

concerning the defendant] is not iniended to be exhaustive. It is 

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representative of procedures of which a defendant might 

ligitimately [sic] seek to take advantage for the purpose of 

pursuing his defense." s. Rep. No •. 212, 96th Cong., 1st Sess. 10 

(1979). 

The open-ended construction of section 316l(h){l) and the 

invitation implicit in the legislative history of the Act cannot 

be ignored. We believe that a permissible addition to the list of 

proceedings that automatically toll the speedy trial clock would 

be a grant of time by the district court--in response to a written 

or oral request by the defendant--for the preparation of written 

pretrial motions. 17 Such a grant of time undoubtedly allows the 

accused to better pursue a defense and is therefore consistent 

with the objective of section 316l(h)(l). But it serves another 

salutary purpose as well. The grant allows the district court to 

dispose of the difficult question of whether the defendant's 

interests are better served by an uninterrupted march to trial or 

by a pause in proceedings at the defendant's request for the 

preparation of pretrial motions. Because our addition to section 

316l(h)(l) automatically suspends the seventy-day period, the 

burden of answering that crucial question lies with the defendant, 

the one best acquainted with the defensive strategy opposing the 

17 Whether a grant of time to the government for preparation of 

a written motion ought to be excluded when the government 

initiates the request for delay is a question we do not decide in 

this appeal. However, we recognize that when the district court 

carves out a block of time to accommodate the defendant's request 

··to ~bmit,pretrial motions, that period must necessarily include 

as an excludable increment a reasonable time for the government to 

respond to the defendant's submissions. 

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government's case. The defendantmay either submit to the 

expeditious prosecution contemplated by the Act or elect to 

posttlone---his trial briefly to better formulate a .defense; the 

choice remains entirely his. An additional benefit of removing 

the "burden of choice" from the court in this situation is that it 

precludes a later charge by the defendant that the court entered 

an arbitrary pretrial procedural ruling that prejudiced his 

ability to prepare his defense properly. 

Our determination on this point does not ignore the Senate 

Judiciary Committee's reservations about enlarging the period 

automatically excluded by pretrial motions practice. Addressing 

changes in the computation of excludable delay under the 1979 

amendments to section 316l(h)(8), the Committee noted that even 

though "some witnesses contended that all time consumed by motions 

practice, from preparation through their disposition, should be 

excluded, the Committee finds that approach unreasonable. This is 

primarily because, in routine cases, preparation time should not 

be excluded where the questions of law are not novel and the 

issues of fact simple." s. Rep. No. 96-212, 96th Cong., 1st Sess. 

33-34. 18 The Committee also urged the courts to exercise caution 

in granting an "ends of justice" continuance under section 

316l(h)(8) of the revised statute to accommodate pretrial motions 

18 The Committee "would permit through its amendments to subse~tion (h)(8)(B) reasonable pr..eparation time for pretrial 

motions in cases presenting novel questions of law or complex 

facts." S. Rep. No. 96-212, 96th Cong., 1st Sess. 34. 

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only !'because it will be quite- difficult to determine a point at 

which preparation actually begins." Id. at 34. 

we note that, as enacted following the 1979 amendments, 

section 3l6l(h)(8)(B) tempers the stern tone of the Committee 

Report regarding the circumstances under which an "ends of 

justice" continuance may be granted. Subsection 3l6l(h)(8)(B)(ii) 

permits a continuance, even in the absence of an unusual or 

complex case or novel questions of fact or law, when a failure to 

grant one "would deny counsel for the defendant or the attorney 

for the government the reasonable time necessary for effective 

preparation, taking into account the exercise of due diligence." 

Moreover, under our modest expansion of the list of tolling 

proceedings, there can be no question about when preparation of 

pretrial motions actually begins. Routine drafting of a motion, 

unknown to the court until the document is filed, simply does not 

toll the speedy trial period. Either the trial judge accedes to a 

specific request for preparation or the trial date moves 

inexorably closer. The court need never fear the appearance of 

the defendant on the eve of trial, in an invitation to the 

government to postpone his prosecution, claiming that his 

preparation of pretrial motions began the moment after 

indictment. 19 

19 In expanding the list of proceedings concerning the defendant 

:as· we~have,-we ·would-··point out that ·ours -is not the first circuitto do so. See United States v. Jodoin, 672 F.2d 232, 238 (1st 

Cir. 1982);-uDited States v. T1bboel, 753 F.2d 608, 610 (7th Cir. 

(continued on following page) 

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Having constructed our rule, we now apply it to the case at 

... hand. The .-period from. January 10 to February 3, 1986, was 

expressly allocated by the district court in part to the 

defendants for drafting pretrial motions and in part to the 

government for filing its response. We hold that that entire span 

of time is excluded from the seventy-day period by section 

316l(h)(l). 

The remainder of the interval between the Corporation's 

arraignment and trial is easily accounted for. From February 4 to 

February 20, 1986, seventeen days elapsed, none of which are 

excludable. On February 21, the appellants.filed their Motion to 

Dismiss for Violation of the Speedy Trial Act. The motion was 

taken under advisement by the court and denied on February 27. 

This seven-day period is excludable under section 316l(h)(l)(F). 

Finally, the three days from February 28 to March 2 are not 

excludable. Thus only fifty nonexcludable days elapsed in the 

entire prosecution of the Corporation, a total well within the 

limit prescribed by section 316l(c)(l). Finding no Speedy Trial 

Act violation in this segment of the case, we turn now to the 

period of delay associated with the prosecution of Mr. Philpot. 

As explained above, the period in which the government's 

interlocutory appeal resided in this court from October 6, 1984, 

(continued from previous page) 

1985); United States v. Wilson, 835 F.2d 1440, 1444 (D.C. Cir. 

1987). 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 27 
to-December 9, 1985, was=-exoludable under section 3161(h)(l)(E). 

We have established that the exclusion applied to the seventy-day 

, . ~'account,·of .. the Corporation, a par-ty to .the inter-locutory appeal. 

However, the issue remaining for us to resolve is the extent to 

which this exclusion and others incurred in the prosecution of the 

Corporation applied to Mr. Philpot, the Corporation's co-defendant 

under the indictment. 

Section 316l(h)(7) authorizes an exclusion for "[a] 

reasonable period of delay when the defendant is joined for trial 

with a co-defendant as to whom the time for trial has not yet run 

and no motion for severance has been granted." In United States 

v. Theron, 782 F.2d 1510, 1514 (lOth Cir. 1986), we stated that 

"[t]he obvious purpose behind the [section 316l(h)(7)] exclusion 

is to accommodate the efficient use of prosecutorial and judicial 

resources in trying multiple defendants in a single trial." We 

further noted that to satisfy this purpose, "the courts generally 

have held that extensions sought by one codefendant toll the limitations period of all." Id. (emphasis added). 

Indeed, every court of appeals that has construed section 

316l(h)(7) in this context has concluded that an exclusion 

attributable to one defendant is applicable to all co-defendants. 

See United States v. Rush, 738 F.2d 497, 504 (1st Cir. 1984), 

cert. denied, 470 u.s. 1004 (1985); United States v. McGrath, 613 

F.-2d·361, 366.(2d.Cir. 1979)-,·cert. denied, 466 u.s. 967 (1980); 

United States v. Novak, 715 F.2d 810, 815 (3d Cir. 1983), cert. 

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~denied, 465 u.s. 1030 (1984); United-States v. Holyfield, 802 F.2d 

846, 848 (6th Cir. 1986), cert. denied, 107 s. Ct. 1298 (1987); 

United States v. ··Fogarty, · 692 F. 2d· 542-, 546 (8th ·Cir. -1982), cert. 

denied, 460 U.S. 1040 (1983); United States v. Van Brandy, 726 

F.2d 548, 551 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 839 (1984); 

United States v. Struyf, 701 F.2d 875, 878 (11th Cir. 1983); 

United States v. Edwards, 627 F.2d 460, 461 (D.C. Cir.), cert. 

denied, 449 U.S. 872 (1980). The Guidelines to the Administration 

of the Speedy Trial Act (Guidelines) promulgated by the Judicial 

Conference of the United States have also endorsed this position. 

See Guidelines, Issuance #36 (Nov. 10, 1984), at 57-58. We now 

adopt this interpretation and hold that, subject to a 

"reasonableness" limitation, an exclusion under section 316l(h)(l) 

attributable to one defendant is applicable to all co-defendants 

under section 316l(h)(7). 

The appellants inform us that their review of the case law 

has not disclosed any precedent in which a delay of 398 days (the 

period from the first notice of appeal to the issuance of our mandate) has been found reasonable. We respond by pointing out that 

in deciding whether a period of delay is reasonable, it is 

essential to measure dimensions other than length. In Theron, we 

recognized that only a multi-faceted inquiry is proper when we 

stated that "[i]n determining reasonableness of the period 

excluded, all relevant circumstances must be considered." Theron, 

7~2 F.2d at 1514 (emphasis added). 

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The,,fi,r.st guidepost in our. attempt to determine 

reasonableness must be the legislative history of the Speedy Trial 

Act. In -,1974 the Senate Judiciary Committee-"explained the 

function of section 316l(h)(7): 

The purpose of the provision is to make sure that s. 754 

does not alter the present rules of severance of codefendants by forcing the Government to prosecute the 

first defendant separately or to be subject to a speedy 

trial dismissal motion under section 3162. 

S. Rep. No. 93-1021, 93d Cong., 2d Sess. 38 (1974}. Five years 

later, while considering amendments to the Act, the Committee 

addressed arguments for enlarging the time in which a defendant 

must be brought to trial. 

The observation has been made that the rigidity of the 

time limit will force the courts to disregard the 

principle of "judicial efficiency." Defendants who are 

properly charged with the joint commission of an 

offense should ordinarily be tried together to save 

time, expense and inconvenience of separate 

prosecutions. It has been reported that some trial 

judges have granted severances unnecessarily in 

multidefendant cases "so that a defendant whose case is 

moving slowly does not hold up the trial of his 

codefendants." In its own study the Department [of 

Justice] studied 180 multidefendant cases. It found no 

reflection of the occurrence of such incidents. Nor is 

there an indication of any such occurrence in the data 

compiled by the Administrative Office. If the Act has 

been so interpreted to require such a result, the 

Committee calls to the Senate's attentionS 316l(h)(7), 

which provides specifically for exclusion of "a 

reasonable period of delay when the defendant is joined for trial with a codefendant as to whom time for trial 

has not yet run." 

s. Rep. No. 96-212, 96th Cong., 1st Sess. 24-25 (1979). 

The Committee's remarks support our statement in Theron that 

in --:the appli-cation-~of: ,-the "--reasonableness" standard under sect ron 

316l(h)(7), judicial efficiency in the trial of multiple 

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defendants is to be~preferred to~n ·inflexible~adherence to the 

letter of the Speedy Trial Act. Theron, 782 F.2d at 1514. A 

··more forceful--·cyet equally· valid:~'expression of the point is the 

Eleventh Circuit's blunt comment that "[Congress] felt that the 

efficiency and economy of joint trials far outweighed the 

desirability of granting a severance where the criterion was 

simply the passage of time." United States v. Campbell, 706 F.2d 

1138, 1142 (11th Cir. 1983). 

We agree that "[w]hether the delay was reasonable will 

depend on the facts of each case." United States v. Dennis, 737 

F.2d 617, 621 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 868 (1984). 

Thus we must also ask whether the factual setting of this case 

dictates that it is reasonable to delay the trial of one 

defendant, Mr. Philpot, considering not only judicial economy but 

also procedural fairness to Mr. Philpot and the Corporation. To 

answer this question, we examine the role Mr. Philpot plays in 

the prosecution of the case and his status while awaiting trial. 

The opening paragraphs of the indictment identify the three 

defendants as Mobile Materials, Inc., a corporation, Mobile 

Materials Company, a partnership, and Mr. Gerald 0. Philpot, the 

president of the Corporation and the managing partner and 

president of the Partnership. These paragraphs disclose that 

Mr. Philpot is not only a principal defendant in the prosecution, 

---he:· is alao inextricably. caught up- in the. business affairs of his 

co-defendants. The indictment also states that when reference is 

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made to an act of either the Corporation or the Partnership, "the 

allegation shall be deemed to mean the "act • [of] its 

officers, .directors,.· partners, agents, employees or 

representatives." Record, doc. 1, at 3 {emphasis added). 

Moreover, Mr. Philpot is named as a defendant in all seven counts 

of the indictment, in league with the Corporation (in counts two 

and three) or with both the Corporation and the Partnership (in 

counts one, four, five, six, and seven). 

Whether the government's case unfolds in a single trial with 

multiple defendants or in a separate proceeding for each 

defendant, certain aspects of the prosecution remain constant: 

the government will recite a single factual history, put on a 

single array of evidence, and call a single group of witnesses. 

But most important to our inquiry here, whichever path the 

judicial process follows, the government will point to 

Mr. Philpot as a principal actor in every one of the allegedly 

illegal transactions it seeks to prosecute. These facts alone 

favor a delay in the prosecution of Mr. Philpot sufficient to 

allow a joint trial of all the defendants, United States v. 

Sutton, 801 F.2d 1346, 1365 (D.C. Cir. 1986), but there are more 

facts to consider. 

In our determination, we cannot ignore that prior to trial, 

including the lengthy period of the interlocutory appeal, 

Mr. Philpot was free-on bond. ·In· Theron, we commented that other 

"[c]ourts have excluded extended periods of delay when all 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 32 
-~- - defendants are out on bail." Theron, 782 F. 2d at 1514 (emphasis 

added) (citing United States v. DeLuna, 763 F.2d 897, 922-23 (8th 

Cir.), cert~ denied~ 474 U.S. 980 (1985))~ accord United States 

v. Campbell, 706 F.2d 1138, 1142 (11th Cir. 1983); United States 

v. Edwards, 627 F.2d 460, 461 (D.C. Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 

872 (1980). 

Nor can we overlook the fact that throughout the protracted 

history of. this prosecution Mr. Philpot has never filed a motion 

for severance under Rule 14 of the Federal Rules of Criminal 

Procedure. See Appellants' Reply Brief at 18; cf. Theron, 782 

F.2d at 1512. Normally, a motion for severance will adequately 

focus attention upon and allow the district court to relieve 

unfairness created by delay in favor of a joint trial. 

In view of Mr. Philpot's prominent position in the 

Corporation and the Partnership, his essential participation in 

all trial proceedings, and his release on bail during trial, we 

find that the facts of this case argue persuasively for a delay 

in the prosecution of Mr. Philpot to allow a joint trial with his 

codefendants. 

Finally, in determining the bounds of "a reasonable period," 

we consult the Guidelines to the Administration of the Speedy 

Trial Act, supra. The Guidelines recommend that in the situation 

we face here, a period of time excluded under section 316l(h)(7) 

has the-following starting and ending dates: 

Starting Date In the situation in which the (h)(7) 

exclusion is based on an exclusion applicable to a 

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codefendant, the starting date.is the starting date of 

the codefendant's exclusion. 

Ending Date In the situation in which the (h)(7) 

·exclusion is -·based on an exclusion .applicable to a 

codefendant, the ending date is the ending date of the 

codefendant's exclusion. 

Guidelines at 58-59. 

While the Guidelines are not binding on this court, 20 the 

formula they offer would allow us to avoid severance forced 

merely by the passage of time. As we have noted, this result is 

consistent with the purpose of section 316l(h)(7) as indicated by 

its legislative history and with the holdings of the courts of 

appeals that have extended the exclusion due to one defendant's 

delay to all co-defendants. It is also consistent with the goal 

of the entire Act, which is to provide certainty and fairness for 

defendants. See United States v. Campbell, 706 F.2d at 1143. 

We conclude that a delay in the prosecution of Mr. Philpot 

sufficient to allow his joint trial with his co-defendants is 

reasonable under section 316l(h)(7). Our method of reaching this 

result is not one of mathematical calculation, but one that 

considers the purpose of the Speedy Trial Act, the facts of the 

case, the status of the defendant, and the recommendations of the 

Guidelines to the Administration of the Speedy Trial Act. As a 

result, we do not express section 316l(h)(7)'s "reasonable 

20 The Guidelines are not binding interpretations of the Speedy 

Trial Act; they are intended only to advise the federal courts. 

See Guidelines at i. 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 34 
period" as a-.fixed span of time, the running of which forces 

dismissal of an indictment or the severance of a defendant. 

Rather, .. we ... declare that given the context of this case, the 

operation of section 316l(h)(7) has a twofold result: (1) a 

single speedy trial clock has been established to govern the 

timing of the prosecution of both the Corporation and 

Mr. Philpot, and (2) all excludable periods of delay attributable 

to the Corporation also apply to Mr. Philpot. Because no Speedy 

Trial Act violation occurred in the prosecution of the 

Corporation, none occurred in the synchronized prosecution of 

Mr. Philpot. 

Allegations of Judicial Misconduct 

The appellants' next argument takes issue with the trial 

judge's management of the case during trial and during the jury's 

deliberations. Specifically, the appellants raise three 

objections: (1) the court's evidentiary rulings were prejudicial 

to Mr. Philpot's efforts to show that he was not connected to a 

conspiracy to rig bids, (2) the court interjected unsolicited 

comments into the trial process, and (3) the court's post-trial 

admonitions to the jury coerced a verdict adverse to the 

appellants. We are unable to review these points in the absence 

of a transcript containing the statements on which the appellants 

rely. As noted, the responsibility for a proper designation of 

record lies with the parties, here the appellants, not with the 

court. of appeals ... Onited·States v.~-Hart, 729 F.2d 662, 671 -(lOth 

Cir. 1984), cert denied, 469 u.s. 1161 (1985). Moreover, because 

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.t~ial· counsel indicates. that he failed to object concerning the 

third point, we are unable to make a plain error assessment in 

the absence of a-complete record. 

Severity of the Sentence Imposed 

The appellants argue strenuously that the sentence imposed 

by the district court is grossly disproportionate to others given 

for conviction of the same crimes and that the sentence ignores 

the "individual circumstances" of both Mr. Philpot and the 

Corporation. The appellants point out that Mr. Philpot received 

the most severe monetary penalty allowed under section 1 of the 

Sherman Act and that his term of imprisonment is far in excess of 

the average sentence imposeQ for similar Sherman Act violations. 

In the appellants' view, the sentence is more appropriate for a 

ringleader of bid-rigging on a multi-state scale and stands as "a 

further indication of the trial court's antipathy toward these 

Appellants, which • permeated the trial itself." Appellants' 

Brief in Chief at 46. With respect to the Corporation's sentence, the appellants tell us that the total fine of $510,000.00 

is twenty percent greater than the net worth of Mobile Materials, 

Inc. when it was dissolved in 1982. 

This court's most comprehensive statement on the prerogative 

of an appellate court to overturn a sentence was announced in 

United States v. Espinoza, 771 F.2d 1382 (lOth Cir.), cert. 

,.,.,denied, ---474 U.S. 1023- ( 1·985). In '9:hat case we- explained -

that when a sentence is imposed within statutory limits, it is not ordinarily subject to appellate 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 36 
review. We will.review .the sentences only if the trial 

judge based them on "misinformation of constitutional 

magnitude" or failed to exercise any discretion in the 

sentencing process. Appellate review is appropriate 

"when a· trial court fails to ·afford individual 

treatment, imposes a sentence mechanically, or refuses 

to consider all the mitigating circumstances." However 

"a sentencing judge has considerable discretion and 

leeway in determining, from the totality of the 

circumstances, the extent of the individual punishment 

to be meted out for each offense committed." 

Id. at 1403 {citations omitted); ~also United States v. 

Brown, 784 F.2d 1033, 1039-40 (lOth Cir. 1986). Consistent with 

our holding in Espinoza, our examination of the sentencing phase 

of trial is limited to a review of the district court's exercise 

of discretion in meting out punishment. 

The penalties imposed on Mr. Philpot for his bid rigging 

activity, both the three-year term of imprisonment and the 

$100,000 fine, are permitted under the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. 

S 1. The penalties imposed on Mr. Philpot for his false and 

misleading statements, both the three-year term of imprisonment 

and the $10,000 fine, are permitted under the controlling 

federal statute, 18 u.s.c. S 1001. Precisely the same is true 

of the sanctions imposed upon the Corporation; they are 

contemplated by the same statutory provisions. 

Peering behind the facial legality of the sentences, as 

urged by the appellants and permitted under the Espinoza 

standard, we look for evidence that the district court failed to 

temper its judgment with-consideration fOT the circumstances of 

the appellants. The appellants have provided us with nothing 

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--· pertaining.c-to this case to convince us- that the district court 

imposed sentence mechanically or failed to consider all the 

-.materials, submi-tted in- mitigation. Thus we conclude that the 

court remained within the bounds of the discretion allowed it 

when sentencing defendants. Its ruling is affirmed. 

The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED. 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 38 
No. 86...,.1756...,. UNITED. STATES OF AMERICA· v •. .MOBILE MATERIALS, INC. 

and GERALD 0. PHILPOT 

MCKAY, Circuit Judge, dissenting: 

I respectfully dissent. 

Appellants contend that count one of the indictment returned 

by the grand jury was "constitutionally and procedurally defective" due to the vagueness of its language. The appellants maintain that the charging section of count one lacks sufficient 

detail to protect their rights to due process of law guaranteed by 

the Fifth and Sixth Amendments to the United States Constitution. 1 

Generally, three clauses of the Fifth Amendment are implicated by a claim that an indictment is unconstitutionally vague. 

The Amendment provides that "[n]o person shall be held to answer 

for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury • . . nor shall any person be 

subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy • • • nor 

be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of 

law II Of equal relevance is the Sixth Amendment's guarantee that "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy 

1 The appellants offer only a cursory argument on this issue in 

their Brief in Chief. They refer us, however, to their Brief in 

Support of the Motion to Dismiss Count One for Vagueness, a 

document submitted to the district court and now included as part 

of the record before us. It is in the supporting brief that the 

appellants ground their objection to the language of count one in 

the guarantees of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. Record, doc. 

44, at 4-6. 

Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 39 
the right • • • to be., informed of "the nature and cause of the 

accusation." 

In Russell v. United States, 369 u.s. 749 (1962), the Supreme 

Court observed that the process of grand jury indictment is 

designed to guarantee a defendant in a criminal prosecution the 

"substantial safeguards" of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. Drawing on the Court's explication in Russell, we have held that 

[t]he purposes and requirements for the sufficiency of 

indictments have been variously stated, but the essentials are clear. First the indictment must contain the 

elements of the offense and sufficiently apprise the 

defendant of what he must be prepared to meet • • • • 

And a purpose corollary to the first is that the indictment inform the court of the facts alleged, so that it 

may decide whether they are sufficient in law to support 

a conviction, if one should be had. Furthermore, and of 

paramount importance, a sufficient indictment is 

required to implement the Fifth Amendment guaranty and 

make clear the charges so as to limit a defendant's 

jeopardy to offenses charged by a group of his fellow 

citizens, and to avoid his conviction on facts not 

found, or perhaps not even presented to, the grand jury 

that indicted him. 

United States v. Radetsky, 535 F.2d 556, 562 (lOth Cir. 1976) 

(citations omitted); ~United States v. Bohomus, 628 F.2d 1167, 

1173 (9th Cir. 1980). These requirements stand in conjunction 

with each other; all must be satisfied by the language of an 

indictment or the indictment is fatally defective. 

Though the appellants address all of these requirements in 

their challenge to count one's sufficiency, their arguments focus 

on only two: "whether Count One as a whole conveys sufficient 

information to enable the [appellants] to prepare for trial, and 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 40 
·.to -identify.;.the..conduct .relied upon by ethe Grand. Jury in making 

the charge." Record, doc. 44, at 6. 

When determining whether an indictment is drafted with enough 

detail to protect a defendant's constitutional rights of due process, we examine the entire document. United States v. Metropolitan Enterprises, Inc., 728 F.2d 444, 453 (lOth Cir. 1984}. This 

rule applies when the entire indictment is challenged, or where, 

as here, the sufficiency of only part of the document is at issue. 

So in responding to the appellants' constitutional challenge to 

count one, we look first to the charging statement and related 

provisions of count one, then to the remaining paragraphs of that 

count, and finally to all "four corners" of the indictment for 

factual details that will support the government's allegations of 

collusive, anticompetitive conduct. 

The charging statement in paragraphs fourteen, fifteen, and 

sixteen, the allegation of anticompetitive effects in paragraph 

seventeen, and the allegation of jurisdiction and venue in paragraph eighteen comprise the heart of count one. These paragraphs 

read in their entirety: 

OFFENSE CHARGED 

14. Beginning at least as early as July 1978, and continuing thereafter at least through February 1982, the 

exact dates being unknown to the Grand Jury, the defendants and co-conspirators engaged in a combination and 

conspiracy in unreasonable restraint of trade and commerce in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act (15 

· u.s.c. section-1). 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 41 
15. The.:aforesaid combination ,and conspiracy consisted 

of an agreement, understanding, and concert of action 

among the defendants and co-conspirators, a substantial 

term of which was to submit collusive, noncompetitive, 

-and rigged bids to, or to···withhold bids -from, the 

Oklahoma Department of Transportation and the Oklahoma 

Turnpike Authority for the award of highway construction 

projects, some of which were federally funded. 

16. For the purposes of forming and effectuating the 

aforesaid combination and conspiracy, the defendants and 

co-conspirators did those things which they combined to 

do, including: 

(a) Discussing the submission of prospective 

bids on highway construction projects in 

Oklahoma; 

(b) Agreeing upon the successful low bidder 

on highway construction projects in Oklahoma; 

(c) Submitting intentionally high, noncompetitive bids, or withholding bids, on highway construction projects in Oklahoma; and 

(d) Submitting bid proposals on highway construction projects in Oklahoma containing false, fictitious, and fraudulent statements 

and entries. 

EFFECTS 

17. The aforesaid combination and conspiracy had the 

following effects, among others: 

(a) Prices for Oklahoma highway construction 

projects were fixed and established at artificial and noncompetitive levels; 

(b) Competition for the award of Oklahoma 

highway construction projects was restrained, 

suppressed, and eliminated; 

(c) The state of Oklahoma was denied the 

right to receive competitive bids for highway construction projects; and 

(d) The State of Oklahoma and the United 

States of America were denied the benefits of 

free and open competition for the award of 

·highway construction projects. 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 42 
... JURISDICTION AND VENUE 

18. The aforesaid combination and conspiracy was 

formed and carried out, in part, within the Western 

'District of---Oklahoma within -the five years preceding 

the return of this indictment. 

Record, doc. 1, at 7-9. 

As with the entire indictment challenged in Russell, the 

defect in the charging statement and its complementary provisions 

lies in their failure "to inform the defendant of the nature of 

the accusation," Russell, 369 u.s. at 767, by descending to the 

particulars of time, manner, and circumstance associated with the 

alleged offense. See id. at 765. Paragraph fourteen of the 

indictment merely sketches the antitrust violation charged by 

paraphrasing the language of section 1 of the Sherman Act. This 

derivative of statutory text ignores the rule in Russell that 

"where guilt depends so crucially upon a specific identification 

of fact • • • an indictment must do more than repeat the language 

of the criminal statute." Id. at 764. In addition, it leaves to 

the remaining sections of the charging statement the substantial 

task of bringing home to the appellants the facts of the alleged 

offense. 

Paragraph fifteen builds upon the bare charge of unlawful 

concerted action found in paragraph fourteen. It characterizes 

the alleged unlawful conduct as bid-rigging but in doing so 

achieves only two unremarkable results. It plucks the conduct of 

which the appellants are accused from the vast sea of acts illegal under section 1 of the Sherman Act and ties that conduct to 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 43 
... _, the .. contract"'~'letting -procedures of the -Oklahoma- Department of 

Transportation. Given the meager substance of paragraph four-

.. teen,-- the inf-ormation-· supplied in paragraph fifteen is a necessary buttress to the charging statement. Yet the coupling of 

the two paragraphs does not sufficiently strengthen the definition of the antitrust charge to allow the appellants to prepare 

their defense. 

Paragraph sixteen continues the government's flawed technique of charging collusive conduct. It lists four types of 

overt acts by which the government alleges the appellants 

advanced their bid-rigging conspiracy but fails to refine the 

allegations of the two preceding paragraphs. Its coarse parsing 

of conduct is simply unable to provide the specifications of 

time, place, and circumstance needed to tell the appellants which 

of their acts constitute the alleged offense. 

Paragraphs seventeen and eighteen conclude the government's 

definition of the antitrust violation, but their content is 

inadequate to cure the infirmities of the charging statement. In 

paragraph seventeen the government claims that prices have been 

fixed, competition has been restrained, and that Oklahoma and the 

United States have been denied the benefits of free competition. 

But nowhere in the paragraph does the government tie these nebulous allegations to specific instances of criminal wrongdoing by 

the appellants. Paragraph eighteen, the final provision of count 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 44 
one, is similarly-ineffective. It merely identifies a broad geographical area in which the government believes at least "part" 

- of ,the -.conspiracy. transpi-red •... How the-.. government- .has ,-divided the 

alleged conspiracy for the purposes of this claim, whether in 

time or by site of illicit conduct, is not disclosed. 

Considering the remainder of count one, we note that paragraphs one through thirteen perform several functions. They 

define terms peculiar to an indictment charging illegal collusion 

in the highway construction business, identify the accused, and 

allege the involvement of unspecified co-conspirators. In addition, the paragraphs claim that interstate trade and commerce are 

affected by the illegal conduct charged and incorporate an affidavit and regulations pertinent to Oklahoma's contract-letting 

procedures for highway construction projects. Taken together, 

these introductory provisions of count one provide a framework on 

which the remainder of the indictment hangs, but they offer no 

specific details to bolster the allegation of an antitrust violation. 

We turn then to counts two through seven of the indictment 

for factual detail sufficient to revive count one. The charge 

under counts two and three is that the appellants falsely represented to a federal agency that they had not participated in any 

scheme to fix prices when bidding on construction projects. Each 

..... count-specifies-the date on which a-bid proposal-was submitted 

and the exact federal-aid highway construction project that is 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 45 
,-the .object ,of the ,proposal. The precise drafting of the allegations in both counts contrasts markedly with the loose construe-

. tion of--count~·one and-,thoroughly··informs the appellants of the 

charges against them. Though these charges are rooted in the 

appellants' participation in the Oklahoma highway construction 

industry, we may not pour their particulars into the empty allegations of count one. To do so would threaten the appellants 

with factual assertions that may not have been presented to the 

grand jury, a result which, as we explained in Radetsky, the 

Fifth Amendment will not abide. The risk of violating this constitutional guarantee springs from the textual differences 

between count one and counts two and three: paragraph fifteen of 

count one alleges that only "some" of the unspecified construction projects on which the appellants submitted rigged bids are 

federally funded. Yet both projects referred to in counts two 

and three were paid for--at least in part--by federal monies. 

The single conclusion that we may draw from the conjunction of 

these statements is that the object of the appellants' alleged 

antitrust violations are projects different from or in addition 

to those listed in counts two and three. It is irrelevant which 

of these possibilities is correct; the existence of either 

invalidates any attempt to imply a correspondence between the 

projects at issue in count one and those specified in counts two 

and three. 

-aAppellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 46 
. Counts-fou~ through seven of the indictmen~ contain factual 

detail comparable to that in counts two and three. Their allega-

- tions -refer .to-construction projects-by project--number and by 

citation to warrants for payment submitted by the appellants to 

the Oklahoma Department of Transportation. These references are 

sufficient to apprise the appellants of which transactions the 

government believes violate 18 u.s.c. S 1341. However, nothing 

in the text of these criminal charges compels the conclusion that 

the projects on which the appellants submitted warrants are the 

same as those associated with the antitrust violation alleged in 

count one. As a result, we may not read the specifications of 

counts four through seven into count one without once again subjecting the appellants to a criminal prosecution based on charges 

the grand jury may not have considered. 

When we explore the entire indictment in search of the particulars necessary to sustain a charge of anticompetitive conduct, we view the same landscape the Court of Appeals for the 

Ninth Circuit surveyed in United States v. Cecil, 608 F.2d 1294, 

1296-97 (9th Cir. 1979): 

The present indictment is a rather barren document. Aside from tracking the language of the pertinent 

statute in setting out the elements of the offense with 

which the defendants were charged, the indictment makes 

only two specific allegations concerning the conspiracies. It states that the conspiracies occurred in 

Arizona, Mexico, and elsewhere and offers the names of 

some of the alleged co-conspirators. The indictment 

fails to state any other facts or circumstances pertain- ing to the conspiracy or any overt acts done in furtherance thereof.-- More· importantly, the indictment fails to 

place the conspiracies within any time frame. The language "beginning on or about July, 1975, and continuing 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 47 
thereafter until Qn OL after October,_l975," is openended in both directions. 

The only specific allegation pertinent to the antitrust violation charged is that a bid-rigging scheme was directed against 

the Oklahoma Department of Transportation and the Oklahoma 

Turnpike Authority. Nothing is disclosed about the site (or timing) of illegal activity other than "part" of it occurred in the 

Western District of Oklahoma. The appellants' co-conspirators are 

not identified, the circumstances of the collusive dealings are 

not revealed, and the projects the appellants are accused of rigging are not specified. Finally, the period in which the government claims the conspiracy transpired is anchored as loosely as 

that in the Cecil indictment. The phrase "at least as early as 

July, 1978 and continuing thereafter at least through February, 

1982" describes an unbounded span of time. Moreover, it conflicts 

with the statement in paragraph eighteen that the combination and 

conspiracy were formed within five years of August 22, 1984, the 

date the indictment was returned.2 

The government responds to the appellants' allegations of 

vagueness with two arguments. Citing our decisions in United 

2 A statistic the appellants have provided indicates but one of 

the difficulties imposed on them by the indictment's lack of 

detail. The appellants claim that in the 43-month period mentioned in paragraph fourteen, the Oklahoma Department of Transportation invited bids on more than 700 highway construction projects. Record, doc. 44, at 3. Even if this figure is overesti-

·mated-by a ·factor of ten, the number of projects the appellants 

are left to sort through is guaranteed to exhaust their capacity 

to mount an informed defense. 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 48 
~':...~States.v. Boston,718 F.2d 1511 (lOth-Cir. 1983), cert. denied, 

466 u.s. 974 {1984), and United States v. Neal, 692 F.2d 1296 

(lOth Cir. 1982), -the government first- asserts that an indictment 

is not required to include the evidentiary details of the intended 

prosecution. However, neither of these cases stands for this 

broad proposition. In Boston, an appeal of a conviction under the 

Hobbs Act, we said no more than "it is not necessary for the 

indictment in a Hobbs Act case to allege the exact nature of the 

interference with commerce." 718 F.2d at 1515. Our holding in 

Neal was similarly tailored to address the point of law at issue. 

There we distinguished the determination that must be made in 

prosecutions under 2 u.s.c. S 192 (refusal of witnesses to testify 

or produce papers) from that which must be made in prosecutions 

under 18 U.S.C. S 894 (using extortionate means to collect an 

extension of credit). Because the indictment had adequately 

alleged that one identified person had repeatedly threatened 

another in stated locations between certain dates, we concluded 

that "the content of [the defendant's] alleged threats would of 

course be material at trial, but greater specificity thereof in 

view of the other facts alleged in the indictment is not required 

in order 'to sufficiently apprise the defendant "of what he must 

be prepared to meet.""' Neal, 692 F.2d at 1302 (quoting Russell, 

369 u.s. at 764). 

Even if the holdings of Boston and Neal were precisely as the 

-government has characterized them, the argument misses the point 

at issue. The appellants do not contend that the government has 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 49 
.. failed to disclose its evidence •. Rather, they.argue that the government has not adequately defined the factual allegations against 

them which~it hopes.to support with its evidence. 

The government also defends the sufficiency of the present 

indictment on the ground that others similar to it have withstood 

appellate court scrutiny. The indictment employed in the prosecution underlying United States v. Washita Construction Co., 789 

F.2d 809 (lOth Cir. 1986), and the indictment at issue in United 

States v. Fischbach and Moore, Inc., 750 F.2d 1184 (3d Cir. 1984), 

cert. denied, 470 U.S. 1029 (1985), are offered as examples. 

The prosecution of Washita Construction Company was in all 

relevant respects identical to that which the government pursued 

against the appellants here. In a seven-count indictment, the 

government charged Washita and its president with submitting collusive, noncompetitive and rigged bids to, and withholding bids 

from, the Oklahoma Department of Transportation; making false, 

fictitious, and fraudulent statements; and engaging in mail fraud 

by receiving progress payments from the state of Oklahoma. While 

the prosecutions in the two cases may be substantive twins, the 

language of the indictment returned in Washita was not, as the 

government claims, "essentially identical" to that involved in 

this matter. The indictment in Washita not only charged that the 

defendants had rigged bids on a specified number of highway con-

.· -struction projects (seven), it also identified the projects by 

project number and date of contract-letting. 789 F.2d at 812 n.3. 

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Thus, the defendants in Washita were given ample--information 

regarding the particulars of the government's charge and did not 

~~- :even contest :the suff-iciency. o-f the: indictment on appeal. 

It is impossible for us to comment upon the language of the 

indictment brought before the court of appeals in Fischbach and 

Moore. The court's opinion in that case contains only fragmentary 

quotations from the indictment, 3 and the government has not provided a copy of it for us to examine. We note, however, that just 

as in Washita, the sufficiency of the indictment was not challenged on appea1. 4 

3 We learn the details of the prosecution only from the court's 

statement of the procedural history of the case: 

"As a result of investigating [a) bid-rigging scheme, 

the government accused a number of the electrical contractors and their employees of antitrust violations. 

The indictment charged them with violating § 1 of the 

Sherman Act by conspiring to allocate electrical construction projects at the Western Pennsylvania Works, to 

fix the prices at which those projects were bid, and to 

submit noncompetitive, collusive, and rigged bids on 

those projects. 

Fischbach and Moore, 750 F.2d at 1188. 

4 An indictment couched in terms strikingly similar to those 

challenged here may be found in the margin of United States v. 

Braniff Airways, Inc., 428 F. Supp. 579 (W.O. Tex. 1977). Although it dismissed the indictment for other reasons, the Braniff 

court commented in passing: "Any close examination of the indictment strongly suggests that it fails to set forth the specific _ -acts--and-particular facts constituting the alleged offenses, and 

thus failed to state the essential elements of the crime which is 

charged." Id. at 584-86 n.5. 

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Appellate Case: 86-1756 Document: 01019300934 Date Filed: 03/22/1989 Page: 51 
• 

In view of the deficiencies described, I believe that count 

one of the indictment failed to inform the appellants of the 

~nature~and cause of the accusation"- against them in violation of 

the Sixth Amendment. As a result, the appellants were forced to 

resort to speculation and inference when answering the government's accusations and were thereby deprived of the opportunity to 

prepare a proper defense.s 

Although I would reverse on the issue regarding the sufficiency of the indictment, I concur with the majority's disposition 

of all other issues presented. 

5 While this Sixth Amendment violation alone is sufficient to 

invalidate count one, I also conclude that the same infirmities 

subvert the Fifth Amendment guarantee that the appellants will be 

convicted only upon facts presented to the grand jury that --~, 

indicted them--an infirmity which even a bill of particulars or 

additional discovery could not possibly cure. 

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