Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-14-02904/USCOURTS-ca8-14-02904-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Frantz Pierre
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit

___________________________

No. 14-2904

___________________________

United States of America,

lllllllllllllllllllll Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

Frantz Pierre,

lllllllllllllllllllll Defendant - Appellant.

____________

Appeal from United States District Court 

for the District of Minnesota - St. Paul

____________

 Submitted: March 13, 2015

 Filed: July 31, 2015

____________

Before WOLLMAN and COLLOTON, Circuit Judges, and WHITE, District 1

Judge.

____________

The Honorable Ronnie L. White, United States District Judge for the Eastern 1

District of Missouri, sitting by designation.

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COLLOTON, Circuit Judge.

This is an interlocutory appeal from an order of the district court denying

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Frantz Pierre’s motion to dismiss an indictment on double jeopardy grounds. A grand

jury in Minnesota charged Pierre with one count of conspiracy to defraud the United

States and one count of money laundering. He argues that the Double Jeopardy

Clause of the Fifth Amendment bars the prosecution because he was previously

convicted in Florida for the same conspiracy offense charged in the Minnesota

indictment. We conclude that the prior conviction did not encompass either the same

conspiracy as the present charged conspiracy or the money laundering offense

charged in the Minnesota indictment. We therefore affirm the district court’s order. 

I.

In May 2013, a grand jury in the District of Minnesota charged Pierre and three

co-defendants with conspiracy to defraud the government, in violation of 18 U.S.C.

§ 286. The indictment alleges that the defendants agreed to defraud the Internal

Revenue Service bysubmitting false tax returns and claiming undeserved tax refunds. 

According to the charge, Pierre and his co-conspirators filed approximately 1066

false tax returns, claiming approximately $6.9 million in fraudulentrefunds, fromJuly

2010 through May 2011. They used social security numbers belonging to Florida

prisoners on returns for tax years 2009 and 2010. The defendants also allegedly

incorporated fictitious businesses in Minnesota, opened bank accounts on behalf of

those businesses, and collected tax refunds in the bank accounts. In a second count,

the indictment charged Pierre with money laundering, in violation of 18 U.S.C.

§ 1957.

The Honorable Donovan W. Frank, United States District Judge for the

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District of Minnesota.

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In September 2012, before the Minnesota indictment was returned, Pierre and

two co-defendants were indicted in the Southern District of Florida. Pierre’s codefendants in the Florida indictment were not mentioned in theMinnesota indictment. 

The Florida indictment charged all defendants with conspiracy to defraud the United

States under 18 U.S.C. § 286, conspiracy to use unauthorized access devices under

§ 1029(b)(2), use of unauthorized access devices under § 1029(a)(2), and aggravated

identity theft under § 1028A(a)(1). The indictment also charged Pierre with

possession of fifteen or more unauthorized access devices(i.e., debit cards and social

security numbers), in violation of § 1029(a)(3). 

The Florida indictment alleged that Pierre and his co-conspirators agreed to file

fraudulent tax returns, use debit cards to receive tax refunds, and withdraw

fraudulently-obtained proceeds from those debit cards. At trial, the government

presented evidence that defendants used socialsecurity numbers of Florida prisoners

on false tax returns for tax year 2009. The defendants filed approximately 338 tax

returns and claimed approximately $2.2 million in refunds. To collect the refunds,

defendants applied for pre-paid debit cards on behalf of a fictitious business and

directed the Internal Revenue Service to deposit tax refunds onto the debit cards. 

Defendants withdrew approximately $560,000 fromthe debit cards. On June 1, 2010,

law enforcement discovered some of the cards in a traffic stop and then froze all debit

cards registered to the business. Agents searched Pierre’s Florida home in July 2012

and recovered seventy debit cards and a USB drive containing a list ofsocial security

numbers. A jury convicted Pierre on all counts charged against him in the Florida

indictment.

In the present case, Pierre moved three times to dismiss his indictment on

double jeopardy grounds, and the district court denied the motions. Pierre filed this

interlocutory appeal, arguing that the Double Jeopardy Clause bars the indictment

against him because the indictment charges him with the same conspiracy for which

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he was convicted in Florida. Pierre also argues the district court erroneously denied

his request for an evidentiary hearing.

II.

The Double Jeopardy Clause prohibits the government from subdividing a

single criminal conspiracy into multiple violations. Braverman v. United States, 317

U.S. 49, 53-54 (1942). In determining whether separately-charged conspiracies are

really a single conspiracy, this court applies a “totality of the circumstances” test. 

United States v. Thomas, 759 F.2d 659, 662 (8th Cir. 1985). In applying that test, our

cases consider: (1) the timing of the alleged conspiracies; (2) the identity of alleged

co-conspirators; (3) the offenses charged in the indictments; (4) the “overt acts

charged . . . or any other description of the offenses charged which indicate the nature

and the scope of the activity” charged; and (5) the locations of the alleged

conspiracies. Id. “The essence of the determination is whether there is one

agreement to commit two crimes, or more than one agreement, each with a separate

object.” Id. In evaluating these factors, courts may look beyond the indictments and

consider evidence adduced at a previous trial. Id. 

We review the district court’s denial of a motion to dismiss an indictment on

double jeopardy grounds de novo and its related factual findings for clear error. Id. 

Although the indictment charges both a conspiracy to defraud and a substantive count

ofmoney laundering, Pierre’s argument focuses primarily on the conspiracy. Because

the district court concluded that Pierre’s double-jeopardy claim was non-frivolous,

the government must show by a preponderance of the evidence that the Minnesota

and Florida indictments charge separate conspiracies. Id.

As to the first factor, we agree with the district court that the conspiracies

transpired at different times. The Florida conspiracy began as early as January 2010,

when defendants incorporated Tax Professors, Inc., and then ordered debit cards on

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behalf of the business. That conspiracy ended shortly after June 1, 2010, when

investigators found a portion of the cards during a traffic stop and froze all debit

cards associated with Tax Professors, Inc. In contrast, the Minnesota conspiracy

began at the earliest in July 2010, when Pierre allegedly filed false tax returns,

incorporated the first business in Minnesota, and opened bank accounts for that

business. Defendants continued to receive tax refunds until May 2011. 

Pierre points to testimony by an IRS agent at the Florida trial that one of the

fictitious Minnesota businesses began receiving undeserved tax refunds on July 22,

2010. This testimony, Pierre asserts, shows that some of the tax returns requesting

refunds directed to Minnesota bank accounts were filed before June 1, 2010, and that

the alleged Minnesota conspiracy thus began before the end ofthe Florida conspiracy. 

The record does not show precisely when the conspirators filed the tax returns that

led to the Minnesota refunds in July 2010. But even assuming that the first tax

returns in the Minnesota conspiracy were filed before the end of the Florida

conspiracy, the Minnesota conspiracy continued until May 2011, while the Florida

conspiracy ended in June 2010. Some temporal overlap does not preclude a

determination of separate conspiracies, particularly where the timing of one

conspiracy extends beyond the end of the other. See United States v. Kienzle, 896

F.2d 326, 329 (8th Cir. 1990).

Pierre also argues that the Florida conspiracy continued beyond June 2010

because tax returns involved in the Minnesota indictment were filed from Florida

computers after the alleged end of the Florida conspiracy. That tax returns in the

Minnesota conspiracy were filed from a Florida computer, however, does not

establish that the post-June 2010 tax returns were part of the conspiracy charged in

Florida. Other factors show that the Florida computers were used after June 2010 in

furtherance of the separate conspiracy charged in Minnesota.

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The second factor concerning the identityof conspiratorslikewise suggeststhat

the conspiracies are separate. The Florida conspirators were Pierre, Terry Pierre, and

Christmanie Bissainthe, while the Minnesota indictment identifies Pierre, Ronnie

Bussell, Christopher Torh, Junior Tervil, N.W., and C.M. as conspirators. There was

no evidence at the Florida trial that the conspirators identified in the Minnesota

indictment took part in any overt act during the Florida conspiracy. That Frantz

Pierre is the only conspirator allegedly involved in both conspiracies weighsin favor

of a determination that the conspiracies are separate. See United States v. Tanner,

860 F.2d 864, 866-67 (8th Cir. 1988). 

Pierre urges us to disregard the separate groups of conspirators because the

difference in participants is explained by Pierre’s decision to move the Florida

conspiracy to Minnesota after law enforcement uncovered the debit-card scheme in

Florida. He points to arguments by the prosecutor at Pierre’s sentencing in Florida

that Pierre moved to Minnesota to “perpetrate this fraud up there” and that Pierre’s

sentence should be enhanced because he “relocated . . . a fraudulent scheme to

another jurisdiction to evade law enforcement.” USSG § 2B1.1(b)(10)(A). But the

prosecutor’s assertion that Pierre moved to Minnesota to “perpetrate this fraud up

there” does not preclude the possibility that Pierre formed a new conspiratorial

agreement with Minnesota co-conspirators. And the district court in Florida found

that there was insufficient evidence to justify the enhancement for relocating a

fraudulent scheme.

On the third factor, both indictments charge defendants with conspiracy to

defraud the United States, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 286. “The fact that both

indictments charge some of the same statutory violations is not particularly

important,” however, because “[i]t is possible to have two different conspiracies to

commit exactly the same type of crime.” Thomas, 759 F.2d at 666. The Florida

indictment also charged the defendants with conspiracy to use unauthorized access

devices—i.e., debit cards—under § 1029(b)(2) and use of unauthorized access

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devices under § 1029(a)(2). The Minnesota indictment contains no similar charges

and does not allege that the defendants used debit cards to carry out the conspiracy.

Under the fourth factor, the nature and scope of the activities charged in the

two conspiracies were substantially different. In the Florida conspiracy, the

defendants established fictitious businesses in Florida and collected refunds on prepaid debit cards. The Minnesota conspiracy involved incorporating five businesses

in Minnesota and receiving tax refunds in those businesses’ bank accounts, not onto

debit cards. There are some similarities in how the schemes were carried out—tax

returns in both cases were submitted from Florida computers and contained social

security numbers of prisoners in Florida—but the basic methodology of the two

conspiracies was not the same.3

Pierre points to his conviction in Florida under 18 U.S.C. § 1029(a)(3) for

possession of unauthorized access devices, which included stolen social security

numbers. See 18 U.S.C. § 1029(e)(1) (defining “access device” as “any . . . personal

identification number . . . that can be used . . . to obtain money, goods, services, or

any other thing of value, or that can be used to initiate a transfer of funds”). That

charge arose from the July 2012 search of Pierre’s Florida home, where officers

recovered stolen social security numbers used on tax returns filed in the Minnesota

conspiracy. Pierre argues that he has therefore been charged twice based on the

“same course of conduct.” The Double Jeopardy Clause, however, does not forbid

a conspiracy prosecution merely because the defendant previously was convicted for

a substantive offense that might have constituted an overt act in the conspiracy. See

United States v. Felix, 503 U.S. 378, 391-92 (1992). 

Pierre also asserts that social security numbers used in the tax returns from

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both alleged conspiracies were obtained fromthe same source and that the W-2 forms

submitted with the returns identified the same employers. But he points to no

evidence in support of these assertions, and the additional facts if true would not

outweigh other factors in any event.

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The final factor concerns the location of the two conspiracies. The Florida

conspiracy took place almost exclusively in Florida. The conspirators incorporated

Tax Professors, Inc., in Florida; the debit cards were mailed to the Florida address of

another fictitious business; and almost all ATM withdrawals attributed to the debit

cards occurred in Florida, except for “a couple” of transactions in Minnesota. In

contrast, substantial parts of the Minnesota conspiracy took place in Minnesota. The

conspirators incorporated five tax preparation businessesin Minnesota, opened bank

accounts in Minnesota on behalf of those businesses, and directed the IRS to deposit

refunds into the bank accounts. Pierre contends that the locations of the two

conspiracies overlapped insofar as (1) tax returns involved in the Minnesota

conspiracy were filed froma Florida computer, (2) the tax returns used socialsecurity

numbers of Florida inmates, and (3) evidence of the Minnesota conspiracy wasfound

in Pierre’s Florida home. Despite some geographical overlap between the two

conspiracies, however, significant acts involved in the Minnesota conspiracy took

place in Minnesota, a location that was not involved in the Florida conspiracy.

We conclude that the government has shown by a preponderance of the

evidence that the Florida and Minnesota indictments charge separate conspiracies. 

The conspiraciesinvolved different co-conspirators, occurred at different times, used

distinct methodologies, and were focused in different States. The substantive count

of money laundering also does not place Pierre in jeopardy twice, because no money

laundering was charged in the Florida case.

Pierre complains that the district court erroneously denied him an evidentiary

hearing on the double jeopardy issue. For a motion to dismiss on double jeopardy

grounds, “a separate evidentiary hearing may be required,” but only where “relevant

facts cannot otherwise be ascertained.” United States v. Hively, 437 F.3d 752, 762

(8th Cir. 2006); see United States v. Curry, 328 F.3d 970, 973-74 (8th Cir. 2003).

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We conclude the district court did not abuse its discretion in resolving the

motion without a hearing. Pierre contends that an evidentiary hearing would have

allowed him to elicit evidence that he returned to Florida to continue his

conspiratorial acts after establishing businesses and bank accountsin Minnesota. The

government, however, did not dispute that Pierre returned to Florida or that

information used to submit the Minnesota tax returns was found in Pierre’s Florida

home. The district court simply determined that those facts did not show that the two

indictments charged the same conspiracy, and we agree. Pierre’s motion requesting

a hearing adverted only to developing “[t]his fact”—i.e., that “Pierre returned to

Florida to continue to scheme,” R. Doc. 132, at 3—and did not cite other facts that

would be developed at a hearing.

For the foregoing reasons, the district court’s order denying Pierre’s motion to

dismiss is affirmed.

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