Source: https://www.pbwt.com/second-circuit-blog/category/white-collar-crime
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 14:21:18+00:00

Document:
In a decision extolling jurors’ use of “common sense” to evaluate insider trading charges, the Second Circuit affirmed the conviction of Robert Schulman in United States v. Klein (Schulman), No. 17-3355. Though the government’s case rested on only one piece of direct evidence—a statement by Schulman to a friend that he’d like to be “king for a day,” the Court (Katzmann, Kearse, Chin) rejected Schulman’s challenge to the sufficiency of evidence that he intended to pass on inside information to his investment advisor for purposes of trading. The standard of review for sufficiency of the evidence on appeal is very deferential to the government, drawing all permissible inferences in favor of guilt. Here, even one “boastful, impudent” remark has resulted in a criminal conviction.
In United States v. Demott, No. 13-3410 (2d Cir. Oct. 9, 2018) (Leval, Pooler, Wesley), the Second Circuit vacated two convictions under the Controlled Substance Analogue Enforcement Act of 1986 (the "Analogue Act"), 21 U.S.C. § 802(32)(A), 813, due to errors in the district court’s jury instructions relating to the statute’s knowledge element. The Court also found error in the admission of certain hearsay testimony by a case agent about the underlying investigation. The defendants in Demott were convicted of participating in a conspiracy to distribute two different synthetic “designer drugs” substantially similar to the listed controlled substance MDMA. The defendants were thus prosecuted under the Analogue Act, which functions as a catch-all statute to enable prosecutions of crimes involving drugs that are substantially similar to drugs already listed in the schedule set forth in the Controlled Substances Act (“CSA”), 21 U.S.C. § 812. See id. §§ 802(32)(A), 813.
In an important decision issued on August 24, the Second Circuit limited the reach of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) by holding that theories of conspiracy or complicity cannot be used to charge non-U.S. citizens who do not work for an American business and whose furtherance of corrupt schemes takes place outside the United States. Judge Pooler wrote the majority decision in United States v. Hoskins, No. 16-1010, and Judge Wesley authored a concurring opinion. This decision is notable because FCPA cases are rarely litigated because the stakes are ordinarily too high for corporations to challenge the government’s theory of liability in court, and individual prosecutions are rare. Hoskins is also particularly interesting because it appears to contradict the DOJ and SEC’s own interpretation of the FCPA, as set out in the FCPA resource guide.
Robert du Purton was convicted of mail fraud and conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud in 2001 for participating in an “elaborate scheme of fraudulent representations” in his rare coin business. According to trial evidence, du Purton lied to customers about the sources of coins, concocted phony auctions to drive up prices, and had his employees impersonate competitors or independent sources, among other things. His conviction was affirmed on direct appeal. Nearly fifteen years later, he brought a petition for writ of error coram nobis, claiming that the government presented false expert testimony at trial. In a per curiam decision, the Second Circuit (Katzman, Leval, Andrew Carter, District Judge) affirmed the denial of the petition.
In United States v. Mark Henry, the Second Circuit (Jacobs, Cabranes, and Wesley, Js.) affirmed that the Arms Export Control Act (“AECA”), 22 U.S.C. § 2751 et seq., does not constitute an unconstitutional delegation of legislative authority to the executive branch, in addition to addressing various issues of trial procedure. The defendant, Mark Henry, appealed his 2014 conviction following a jury trial of violating and attempting to violate the AECA by exporting “ablative materials”—military-grade technology used in rockets and missiles—and microwave amplifiers to customers in Taiwan and China. The AECA prohibits the exportation of ablative materials, microwave amplifiers, and other “defense articles” except pursuant to a license issued by the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls, a division of the U.S. Department of State. The government presented evidence at trial that the defendant was aware of the need for an export license, that he did not have such a license, and that instead of acquiring a license the defendant took steps to conceal his exportation of restricted materials through the use of intermediaries, fictitious companies, and falsified documents, among other things. The court allowed the defendant, who is from China and primarily speaks Mandarin, to testify at trial in English through the help of a standby interpreter, although the court otherwise required a translator to assist the defendant throughout the trial.
The Second Circuit has denied the government’s request for rehearing en banc in United States v. Allen, et al. (16-cr-98).
A divided Second Circuit panel (Katzmann, Pooler (dissenting), Chin) on Wednesday upheld the insider trading conviction of former SAC Capital portfolio manager Mathew Martoma. Confronting its precedent in United States v. Newman, 773 F.3d 438 (2d Cir. 2014), for the first time since the Supreme Court struck down part of the Newman tippee liability standard this past December, see Salman v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 420 (2016), the Court ruled that the “meaningfully close personal relationship” requirement of Newman is no longer good law. See United States v. Martoma, 14-3599 (2d Cir. Aug. 23, 2017).
In a highly anticipated decision, a divided Second Circuit panel (Katzmann, Pooler (dissenting), Chin) today upheld the insider trading conviction of former SAC Capital portfolio manager Mathew Martoma, ruling that the “meaningfully close personal relationship” requirement set out by the Court in United States v. Newman, 773 F.3d 438 (2d Cir. 2014), does not survive the Supreme Court’s decision in Salman v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 420 (2016). See United States v. Martoma, 14-3599 (2d Cir. Aug. 23, 2017).
The Chiclets and Runts vending machine at your local car repair shop last decade may have been one piece of a fraudulent enterprise that ensnarled roughly 7,000 victims. As CEO of Vendstar, Defendant Edward (“Ned”) Weaver directed a scheme that enticed victims to make substantial up-front investments in quarter-slot candy dispensers with false promises of significant returns—even hundreds of a dollars a day. Despite assurances that this “home-based vending business” had “little risk,” many customers lost their entire investment.
In United States v. Weaver, 16-3861 (June 21, 2017) (Newman, Cabranes, Lynch), the Court held in a per curiam order that contractual disclaimers signed by victims of Weaver’s fraud did not render the fraudulent statements “immaterial” as a matter of law and negate criminal liability.
On July 19, 2017, in United States v. Allen, et al. (16-cr-98) (Cabranes, Pooler, Lynch), the Second Circuit issued a decision reversing the convictions of defendants Anthony Allen and Anthony Conti for wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud. This was the first federal criminal appeal in connection with the London Interbank Offered Rated (“LIBOR”) prosecutions, which involved allegations that various individuals and banks manipulated the LIBOR. The LIBOR is a benchmark interest rate intended to reflect the available rates at which banks borrow money from other banks; the LIBOR is incorporated into the terms of financial transactions worldwide. We provided a brief summary of the opinion a few hours after the decision was rendered; here is our more detailed summary.
On July 19, 2017, in United States v. Allen, et al. (16-cr-98) (Cabranes, Pooler, Lynch), the Second Circuit issued a decision reversing the convictions of defendants Anthony Allen and Anthony Conti for wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud. This was the first federal criminal appeal in connection with the London Interbank Offered Rated (“LIBOR”) prosecutions, which involved allegations that various individuals and banks manipulated the LIBOR.
In a decision that will provide reassurance both to prosecutors and to the institutions with whom they enter into deferred prosecution agreements (“DPAs”), the Second Circuit (Katzmann, Lynch, Pooler (concurring)) held in United States v. HSBC Bank USA, N.A., No. 16-308(L), that the periodic reports submitted by an independent monitor responsible for evaluating compliance with a DPA are not “judicial documents” to which the public enjoys a First Amendment right of access. To reach its holding, the Court was required to address foundational separation-of-powers questions regarding a court’s role in approving and supervising the implementation of a DPA. The decision, written by Chief Judge Katzmann, will discourage courts from second-guessing decisions made by the executive branch in the legitimate exercise of its prosecutorial discretion. Along with the Second Circuit’s decision in SEC v. Citigroup Global Markets, Inc., 752 F.3d 285 (2d Cir. 2014), which held that a district court reviewing a proposed SEC consent decree may only reject it under limited circumstances, last week’s decision makes clear that the Second Circuit envisions that district courts will not play a significant role in assessing the fairness of the government’s settlements with financial and other institutions.
This morning the Second Circuit (Cabranes, Wesley, Sessions, D.J.) released an opinion vacating the conviction of Sheldon Silver and remanding the case to the district court for further proceedings including a retrial. The Second Circuit concluded that the evidence of guilt was sufficient to permit a retrial, but found that the jury instructions did not comport with the Supreme Court’s McDonnell decision and that the error was not harmless. The panel took no joy in rendering its decision, observing that “many would view the facts adduced at Silver’s trial with distaste.” Nor did the panel blame either the district court or the government for today’s reversal, recognizing that the McDonnell decision—which changed the law of the Circuit—was issued after the Silver trial had concluded. Nevertheless, the panel felt itself compelled by McDonnell and the facts of the case to decide the matter as it did.
On July 10, 2017, in United States v. Boyland, No. 15-3118 (Kearse, Walker, Hall), the Second Circuit affirmed the conviction of former New York State Assembly member William F. Boyland, Jr. on twenty-one counts of public corruption offenses, including eleven counts of honest services fraud. Many of these counts involved determining that the benefits Boyland offered in exchange for bribes amounted to “official acts” under 18 U.S.C. § 201, the federal bribery statute prohibiting public officials from “being influenced in the performance of any official act.” Id. § 201(b)(2)(A). The U.S. Supreme Court recently narrowed the definition of this term in McDonnell v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 2355 (2016), which led the government to concede in Boyland’s appeal that the trial court’s jury instructions on the meaning of “official act” were in part erroneous. The Second Circuit, however, determined on plain error review that the error did not affect Boyland’s “substantial rights” and thus affirmed his convictions. This decision may prove problematic for other high-profile former elected officials whose appeals are currently pending before the Second Circuit.
In United States v. Bodouva, 16-3937 (March 22, 2017) (Katzmann, C.J., Pooler and Lynch, J.), the Court held in a per curiam order that a defendant convicted of embezzlement must forfeit the full amount of her illicit gains to the government even after paying restitution to victims. The ostensibly “duplicative” financial penalty entered against the defendant was not only permissible, but in fact required by statute. The district court thus appropriately ruled at sentencing that it lacked discretion to modify the forfeiture amount. With this decision, the Second Circuit joined several other circuits in holding that restitution and forfeiture serve distinct purposes and, absent clear statutory authority to the contrary, may not offset each other.
In a summary order on March 8, 2017, the Second Circuit (Katzmann, C.J. and Pooler and Lynch, J.) affirmed the conviction and sentence for wire fraud in United States v. Frenkel. The case attracted some public attention because Frenkel’s co-conspirator, Mark Stern, was a cooperating witness in a number of public corruption cases brought by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. The underlying facts involved Frenkel’s fraudulent inducement of Citigroup to lend $126 million to finance the purchase of shopping malls. Although the decision has no precedential value, it presented four interesting issues.
In United States v. Huggins,15-1676, the Second Circuit (Winter, Cabranes, and Restani, sitting by designation) limited the scope of two Guidelines enhancements often applicable to white-collar crimes: (1) U.S.S.G. §2B1.1(b)(16)(A), which provides for a two-level enhancement when the conduct derived more than $1 million from financial institutions; and (2) U.S.S.G. §3B1.3, which permits a two-level increase when a defendant has abused a position of public or private trust. Huggins marks the first time the Court has given thorough consideration to the first enhancement and further clarified how courts should apply the second.
The Supreme Court today decided a major insider trading case, Salman v. United States, 15-628.
The line that separates lawful tax shelters from unlawful ones is notoriously hazy, particularly at the margins. There is little question, however, that a transaction that serves no meaningful business purpose other than to reduce one’s tax liability will be treated as an illegitimate tax shelter.
In United States v. Noramie Jasmin, 15-2546-cr, a Second Circuit panel (Walker, J., Cabranes, J. and Lohier, J.), affirmed by summary order the bribery conviction of Noramie Jasmin, a former mayor and trustee of the Village of Spring Valley, New York, a town in Rockland County, New York. Jasmin was convicted of participating in a scheme to obtain financial benefits for herself in exchange for exercising her official powers to facilitate the construction of a community center. Jasmin appealed from a conviction of one count of mail fraud in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1341 & 1346, and one count of Hobbs Act extortion in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1951, and her sentence of four years imprisonment.
In United States v. Tagliaferri, 15-536 (May 4, 2016) (Leval, Pooler, Wesley), the Court issued a per curiam order affirming Defendant’s conviction for violations of the Investment Advisors Act of 1940, 15 U.S.C. § 80b-6 (the “1940 Act”), entered by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Abrams, J.). In the underlying appeal, the Defendant raised several challenges to his conviction by a jury for violations of the 1940 Act, as well as securities fraud, wire fraud, and violations of the Travel Act.
In United States v. Rivernider, 13-4865, the Court (Livingston, J., Lynch, J. and Rakoff, D.J., sitting by designation) affirmed the judgment entered by the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut (Chatigny, J.) against two defendants, Robert Rivernider and Robert Ponte. The defendants pled guilty and were sentenced for multiple counts of wire fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and tax evasion stemming from a Ponzi scheme and real estate scheme the two ran together.
Defining the Terms: What Constitutes a “Federally Insured Financial Institution” Under 18 U.S.C. § 1344 or a “Bank” Under 18 U.S.C. § 1014?
In United States v. Bouchard, 14-4156, the Court (Parker, J., Lynch, J., and Lohier, J.) reversed the conviction of defendant Michael Bouchard after finding that the Government’s evidence only showed that Bouchard had made false statements in order to defraud BNC Mortgage (“BNC”), a mortgage lender that did not fall within the Title 18 definition of a “federally insured financial institution” or “bank” as would be required by statute for a conviction.
In Gilman v. Marsh & McLennan Cos., No. 15-0603-cv (Kearse, Winter, Jacobs), the Second Circuit held that a corporation can fire an employee for cause if the employee refuses to participate in an internal investigation of the company’s possible criminal wrongdoing. Masquerading as an employment dispute, the decision could have important consequences for how a corporation and its employees handle internal investigations when there is the potential for criminal prosecution.
In United States v. Rowland, No. 15-985, the Second Circuit (Winter, Chin, Carney) rejected challenges by former governor of Connecticut John Rowland to both his conviction and sentence on seven counts of violating campaign finance laws and falsifying records. In so doing, the panel issued an important decision regarding the interpretation of 18 U.S.C. § 1519, a provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which prohibits the falsification of documents for the purpose of misleading government investigators. The Rowland decision tacks in a different direction from the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Yates v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1074 (2015), in which the Court narrowed the reach of this statute by adopting an interpretation rooted in the statute’s purpose. Rowland, by contrast, seems to take a broader approach.
In United States v. Stavros Ganias, 12-240, the Second Circuit, in a rare en banc ruling jointly written by Judges Livingston and Lynch, sidestepped a complicated Fourth Amendment issue related to the government’s retention of files from a hard drive outside the scope of a warrant, and instead affirmed the defendant’s conviction on the ground that, regardless of whether there was a Fourth Amendment violation, the government reasonably relied in good faith on a later warrant to search those files. The en banc holding reversed the decision of a divided Second Circuit panel that came down nearly a year ago, which reversed the district court’s denial of the motion to suppress and vacated the judgment of conviction. All of the judges on the Court, except for Judge Chin, either joined in the opinion or concurred in the result. The novel and important question raised in this appeal—whether the government can retain electronic files collected pursuant to a search warrant and later search those files for a separate purpose, pursuant to a second search warrant—will need to be addressed in another case or by Congress.
In USA ex rel. v. Exelis, Inc. (14-4155), the Second Circuit (Kearse, Pooler, Droney) held that the right to bring a qui tam suit on behalf of the federal government can be contractually released, but that such a release is unenforceable as against public policy where the government did not have knowledge of the allegations of fraud before the release was signed. The decision complicates somewhat the process of negotiating binding releases with employees at companies that are engaged in government contracting work. That said, such releases still have value to employers and will often be enforceable because in many cases the government will have knowledge of the fraud allegations before the release is signed.
In Haber v. United States of America, No. 15-2078, the Court (Calabresi, J., Lynch, J., and Lohier, J.) considered and rejected petitioner James Haber’s challenges to an administrative summons issued by the IRS. Among his other challenges, Haber contended that the summons was improper because a criminal referral to the DOJ was still in effect. The Court rejected this argument and Haber’s suggestion that the Government must use precise language to terminate a criminal referral. Instead, the Court took a common-sense view of the evidence and concluded that the DOJ had indeed terminated its investigation of the IRS’s criminal referral, and so the administrative summons was properly issued. DOJ need not use any particular words to declare the termination of the investigation; it need only be clear from the record that the investigation has ended.
In United States v. Kent, 14-2082, 14-2874, the Court (Livingston, J., Hall, J., and Hellerstein, J. sitting by designation), the Court vacated the sentence imposed by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Forrest, J.) and held that the record was insufficient to impose Guidelines Section 3B1.1(a)’s leadership enhancement. Section 3B1.1 provides for a four-level increase in offense level if the defendant “was an organizer or leader of a criminal activity that involved five or more participants or was otherwise extensive.” In Kent, the Court restated that the “otherwise extensive” prong of this enhancement is not meant to be a qualitative assessment of whether the crime was serious, but rather involves a quantitative question about the number of criminally responsible and unknowing participants in the offense. Because the district court did not conduct the required analysis, the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded the case.
In United States v. Bonventre, 14-4714-cr (April. 20, 2016) (JMW, RR, CFD), the Court affirmed by summary order the convictions of five former employees of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities (the “Appellants”) convicted in the Southern District of New York (Swain, J.) for multiple counts of conspiratorial and substantive securities fraud, bank fraud, and records falsification; making false SEC and IRS filings; obstructing enforcement of tax laws; and tax evasion.

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