United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit 

Chicago, Illinois 60604 

Submitted October 23, 2017 

Decided October 24, 2017 

Before 

FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL S. KANNE, Circuit Judge 

DAVID F. HAMILTON, Circuit Judge

No. 17-1169 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v. 

GREGORY D. TORAN, 

 Defendant-Appellant.

 Appeal from the United States District 

Court for the Central District of Illinois.

No. 13-30072-002 

Sue E. Myerscough, 

Judge. 

O R D E R 

Gregory Toran and his business partner provided Medicaid recipients with 

transportation to and from healthcare providers. But over the years their company also 

billed the State of Illinois for hundreds of trips that never occurred. After a lengthy 

bench trial, Toran was convicted of conspiring to commit mail fraud, 18 U.S.C. §§ 371, 

1341, and mail fraud, id. § 1341. His business partner, who had pleaded guilty, was a 

principal witness for the government. Toran was sentenced to 60 months’ 

imprisonment—below the guidelines range—and ordered to pay $4.7 million in 

restitution. He filed a notice of appeal, but his newly appointed lawyer asserts that the 

appeal is frivolous and moves to withdraw under Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 

(1967). We grant counsel’s motion and dismiss this appeal. 

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 
No. 17-1169 Page 2 

Counsel’s supporting brief explains the nature of the case and addresses 

potential issues that an appeal of this kind might be expected to involve. Toran has filed 

a response opposing counsel’s motion. See CIR. R. 51(b). Because counsel’s analysis 

appears to be thorough, we limit our review to the subjects she discusses, along with 

the contentions in Toran’s response. See United States v. Bey, 748 F.3d 774, 776 

(7th Cir. 2014); United States v. Wagner, 103 F.3d 551, 553 (7th Cir. 1996). 

Toran’s indictment included a forfeiture count covering multiple bank accounts 

and real estate parcels. Early in the proceedings, Toran wanted to raise cash for his 

defense by selling two properties listed in that count. The government agreed to release 

its lis pendens as to those properties on condition that the sales proceeds be deposited 

into an escrow account that Toran could not access without court approval. After the 

transactions closed, Toran asked the district court to release $175,000 to pay his retained 

counsel and purchase software to assist counsel in reviewing voluminous billing 

records turned over by the government in discovery. The court authorized the release of 

nearly $50,000 but not the full amount requested. 

Appellate counsel now ponders whether Toran could argue that the district court 

abused its discretion by limiting the release to $50,000 (presumably on the theory that 

this amount was too small to assure his right to counsel). We agree with appellate 

counsel that this claim would be frivolous. The grand jury found probable cause to 

believe that Toran had committed the charged crimes, and that finding authorized the 

pretrial restraint of his assets, even if those assets would have been used to pay for his 

defense. See 21 U.S.C. § 853; Kaley v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 1090, 1095 (2014); 

United States v. Monsanto, 491 U.S. 600, 607 (1989). After taking evidence the district 

court found probable cause to believe that all but $50,000 of the escrowed funds was 

traceable to criminal conduct. A defendant has no right to spend stolen money for a 

lawyer or anything else. Kaley, 134 S. Ct. at 1096. 

Counsel also considers but rejects as frivolous a claim that the district court erred 

in refusing to grant a new trial on the ground that the government had “failed to 

establish the elements of each charge.” This is all Toran said about the evidence in his 

motion for new trial, see FED. R. CRIM. P. 33, and actually the quoted sentence just 

renews the motion for judgment of acquittal he made at the close of the evidence. 

See FED. R. CRIM. P. 29. No matter the label, however, the judge’s ruling is unassailable 

because the government presented overwhelming evidence of Toran’s guilt. “[T]he 

relevant question is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to 

the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the 
No. 17-1169 Page 3 

crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979); 

see United States v. Dingle, 862 F.3d 607, 614 (7th Cir. 2017). Toran was co-owner of the 

company and in charge of billing. The sheer amount of fictitious charges—$4.7 million 

out of $7.3 million billed during the company’s operations—eliminates any plausible 

doubt about Toran’s knowledge and leadership of the fraud. And if that reasonable 

inference were not enough, multiple former employees testified that they billed for 

transporting Medicaid-approved clients, regardless whether they were transported or, 

for that matter, still alive. Toran’s company frequently billed for more riders than its 

vans could physically transport. A rational trier of fact certainly could have found 

Toran guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. 

Counsel last considers and correctly declines to pursue a challenge to the district 

court’s admission of the government’s summary charts into evidence. See FED. R. EVID.

1006. Toran explicitly conceded that his company’s billing records are voluminous, and 

the very point of Rule 1006 is to facilitate the fact finder’s consideration of such 

evidence. United States v. Stoecker, 215 F.3d 788, 792 (7th Cir. 2000). Toran’s trial counsel 

acknowledged that the summarized records had been available to the defense for 

almost two years before trial, and counsel also admitted that the charts are accurate. 

Thus it would be frivolous to claim that the judge abused her discretion in admitting 

the summary charts. See United States v. Chhibber, 741 F.3d 852, 854–58 (7th Cir. 2014); 

United States v. Isaacs, 593 F.3d 517, 527–28 (7th Cir. 2010). 

In his Rule 51(b) response, Toran proposes to argue that several times during 

closing argument the prosecutor engaged in misconduct by misstating the evidence. 

See United States v. Haldar, 751 F.3d 450, 459 (7th Cir. 2014) (explaining that prosecutors, 

like all lawyers, must avoid misstating the evidence). None of the three instances Toran 

cites, however, would support a nonfrivolous appellate claim. First, he insists that 

former employee Lynn Reasonover testified that the supplier of the company’s billing 

software trained her to use it, whereas the prosecutor suggested that Toran had trained 

her. In fact, what Reasonover said is that she went to the software supplier with Toran 

and others for training; she did not say who trained her, and the prosecutor’s assertion 

that it was Toran was a reasonable inference. Second, Toran asserts that the prosecutor 

falsely stated that he had run, or actively participated in running, the business while 

incarcerated for a different crime. Yet several witnesses testified that they visited or 

telephoned Toran to discuss business matters during his imprisonment, and emails he 

sent from prison discuss business matters. Third, Toran argues that the prosecutor 

mischaracterized the content of two of his emails. He sent one of those emails 

immediately after learning that authorities were investigating the company. He wrote 
No. 17-1169 Page 4 

his business partner, Tina Kimbrough, saying that, “if they are going to get our money, 

we will be better off paying our bills.” Afterward he paid himself a significant sum from 

company funds and used that money to pay several personal bills. Toran sent the other 

email from prison; he told a billing employee how to charge 26 times over a period of 

months for transporting a client who never once was actually transported. The 

prosecutor accurately described these emails. 

Toran also contends in his Rule 51(b) response that his convictions must be 

reversed because, he says, the government elicited perjured testimony from 

Kimbrough. The government may not knowingly use false evidence to obtain a 

conviction, Napue v. Illinois, 360 U.S. 264, 269 (1959), but that did not happen here. 

On direct examination Kimbrough testified that she had conspired with Toran to 

overbill, but then on cross-examination she said that the two of them did not have a 

“plan” to commit fraud. The prosecutor then asked Kimbrough on redirect, in light of 

the apparent inconsistency, if she wanted to withdraw her guilty plea. Kimbrough 

declined, explaining that defense counsel’s cross-examination had confused her. In fact, 

she clarified, there had been a conspiracy because she and Toran knew they were 

overbilling, discussed the matter, and then did nothing about it. They intentionally 

failed to tell other billers about the issue or even tell them to exercise greater care in 

billing. Kimbrough assured the judge that she had not been threatened, coerced, or 

promised anything in exchange for testifying as a government witness. Her waffling on 

cross-examination does not establish that the government elicited false testimony on 

direct or redirect, and it was up to the factfinder to decide what weight to give to her 

testimony. See United States v. Rebolledo-Delgadillo, 820 F.3d 870, 877 (7th Cir. 2016) 

(noting that witness’s testimony suggested confusion, not deliberate falsehoods, and 

explaining that defendant had adequate opportunity on cross-examination to expose 

any falsehood). This appellate claim, like Toran’s proposed argument concerning the 

prosecutor’s closing argument, would be frivolous. 

Counsel’s motion to withdraw is GRANTED, and the appeal is DISMISSED.