Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-89-02276/USCOURTS-ca10-89-02276-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Arthur Maez
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ) 

) 

Plaintiff-Appellee, ) 

) 

v. ) 

) 

ARTHUR B. MAEZ, ) 

) 

Defendant-Appellant. ) 

. FILED Umtt:<~ States Court of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

ocr 15 1990 

&OBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

No. 89-2276 

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of New Mexico 

(D.C. Cr. No. 87-322 SC) 

Ann Steinmetz, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Albuquerque, New 

Mexico, for defendant-appellant. 

Robert J. Baca, Assistant u.s. Attorney (William L. Lutz, United 

States Attorney, with him on the brief), Albuquerque, New Mexico, 

for plaintiff-appellee. 

Before LOGAN and EBEL, Circuit Judges, and BROWN * , District Judge. 

LOGAN, Circuit Judge. 

* The Honorable Wesley E. Brown, Senior United States District 

Judge for the District of Kansas, sitting by designation. 

Appellate Case: 89-2276 Document: 01019311232 Date Filed: 10/15/1990 Page: 1 
Arthur Maez, who has pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting 

bank larceny in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(b) and 18 u.s.c. 

§ 2, appeals the district court's denial of his motion for the 

return of money seized by the FBI and given to the robbed bank. 

We affirm the district court's determination that the Western Bank 

was entitled to the money. 

In the evening following the two-man robbery of a Western 

Bank branch, FBI agents and Albuquerque police officers arrested 

Maez and searched his home. Eyewitnesses to the robbery had 

identified the license tag number and description of a truck that 

corresponded to one owned by Maez. In the master bedroom closet, 

an agent found a duffle bag containing $5,844 in cash, mostly 

small bills, "wadded up in a bunch of little different wads." V 

R. 150. 

Approximately $12,900 had been stolen from the Western Bank 

branch, of which four twenty-dollar bills were bait money. The 

agents did not find any of the bait bills, bank bags, or bank 

wrappers in the Maez home. Maez claimed that he had earned the 

seized money by collecting aluminum cans and doing odd jobs and 

that he usually kept his money in cash at his home. 

Maez was convicted at a trial in which the bank teller 

identified Maez as one of the robbers and two other eyewitnesses 

identified his truck as the one used by the robbers. This court 

reversed the conviction, holding that the district court should 

have suppressed Maez' statements and the items seized from his 

home as the fruits of an illegal arrest. United States v. Maez, 

872 F.2d 1444 (lOth Cir. 1989). 

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Appellate Case: 89-2276 Document: 01019311232 Date Filed: 10/15/1990 Page: 2 
On remand, Maez entered an Alford plea to aiding and abetting 

the larceny of the Western Bank branch. See North Carolina v. 

Alford, 400 u.s. 25 (1970). After sentencing, the district court 

entered a show cause order as to why the money seized from Maez' 

closet should not be returned to the bank. In response, Maez 

filed a motion pursuant to Fed. R. Crim. P. 41(e) for the return 

of the money to him. The district court denied the motion, ruling 

that the bank is entitled to the money. 

Proceedings surrounding the motion for return of property 

seized in a criminal case are civil in nature, but the interests 

of judicial efficiency permit a criminal trial judge to rule on 

the motion. United States v. Wright, 610 F.2d 930, 934-35 (D.C. 

Cir. 1979); United States v. LaFatch, 565 F.2d 81, 83 (6th Cir. 

1977), cert. denied, 435 U.S. 971 (1978). The judge is not bound 

by the criminal proceeding's standard of proof or its findings. 

LaFatch, 565 F.2d at 84-85; see also State v. Poxon, 514 N.E.2d 

652, 653 (Ind. App. 1987). 

We have previously held that "'[t]he seizure of property from 

someone is prima facie evidence of that person's entitlement, 

particularly when the seized property is money. . '" United 

States v. Estep, 760 F.2d 1060, 1064 (lOth Cir. 1985), quoting 

Wright, 610 F.2d at 939 (emphasis in original). An adverse 

claimant may rebut by either proving ownership by positive 

identification or proving that the claimant in possession holds 

the money unlawfully. Estep, 760 F.2d at 1064. The standard of 

proof is a preponderance of the evidence. Id. at 1065. 

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Appellate Case: 89-2276 Document: 01019311232 Date Filed: 10/15/1990 Page: 3 
Thus, a defendant may be acquitted of the crime under the 

reasonable doubt standard but found to possess property unlawfully 

because of the lower preponderance standard of proof. Id. at 

1064-65. We will uphold the district court's determination of 

ownership, unless clearly erroneous. 

Maez complains that the Western Bank did not itself contest 

his ownership. The government did, however, and we have no 

problem in finding that the government has sufficient interest in 

returning property in its possession to the true owner to sustain 

its participation in the proceedings, asserting the bank's 

ownership. 

Maez' pre-seizure possession of the money establishes a prima 

facie case that he is entitled to it. Here, the government cannot 

prove the bank's ownership by positive identification (i.e., the 

bait bills); but it offered considerable circumstantial evidence 

that Maez obtained the money unlawfully. 

First, Maez entered an Alford plea. Under Alford, a 

defendant may enter a plea of guilty to a charged offense, 

although he does not admit that he committed the charged offense. 

Alford, 400 u.s. at 37-39. However, for such a plea to be valid, 

it must be based on the defendant's intelligent conclusion that 

"the record before the judge contains strong evidence of actual 

guilt." Id. at 37. Thus, Maez himself recognizes the evidence of 

his participation in the bank robbery. Second, eyewitnesses have 

identified Maez as one of the robbers and his truck as the getaway 

vehicle. Third, a substantial amount of cash was found in the 

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Appellate Case: 89-2276 Document: 01019311232 Date Filed: 10/15/1990 Page: 4 
• 

Maez bedroom closet, slightly less than half of the total amount 

stolen by two men. 

We are not convinced by Maez' argument that, because banks do 

not keep their money in little wads, the money seized from his 

house could not be from Western Bank. If the two robbers divided 

the money after the robbery, they could have wadded it while 

stuffing it into their own bags. Neither does Maez' explanation 

of how he came to have $5,844 in cash in his closet seem credible. 

Maez presented no evidence at the hearing on the source of this 

money; instead, he relied on the presumption from his possession 

and his offer of proof at his trial that he had worked collecting 

aluminum cans and doing odd jobs for which he was paid in cash. 

Maez also offered no evidence that his wife had been saving her 

income in cash in their closet. 

The district court found, by a preponderance of the evidence, 

that Maez' possession of the money was unlawful and that the bank 

was entitled to it. The finding is not clearly erroneous. 

AFFIRMED. 

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