Opinion ID: 500408
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: jurisdiction

Text: 10 We have jurisdiction over appeals from final judgments of conviction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1291.III. DISCUSSION 11 Appellant attacks his conviction on the grounds that the government failed to establish the materiality of an alias to eligibility for appointed counsel. Materiality under Sec. 1623 is a question of law, United States v. Prantil, 764 F.2d 548, 557 (9th Cir.1985), and therefore subject to de novo review. United States v. McConney, 728 F.2d 1195, 1201 (9th Cir.1984) (en banc). 12 To sustain a perjury conviction under section 1623, the government must prove that the defendant made a false material declaration. 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1623(a). A false statement is not perjurious unless material. Prantil, 764 F.2d at 556; United States v. Ponticelli, 622 F.2d 985, 989 (9th Cir.1980). 13 The indictment in appellant's case stated that the purpose of the hearing before the magistrate was to determine the financial status of the defendant for the appointment of counsel. Appellant argues that since the government neither alleged that the financial information he offered was untrue nor offered any evidence to show what effect the use of another name would have on an indigency determination, it failed to prove materiality. 14 Since materiality is a legal question, the government need not prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. But since it is an element of a Sec. 1623 offense, the burden still rests with the government to advance some showing. In the more common context in which Sec. 1623 prosecutions appear--lying before a grand jury--other circuits have held that the government must establish materiality by showing a nexus between the false statements and the scope of the grand jury investigation. See United States v. Farnham, 791 F.2d 331, 333 (4th Cir.1986); United States v. Berardi, 629 F.2d 723, 727 (2d Cir.1980). The government concedes that in the case before us, it bore the burden of showing a nexus between Martinez's statement and the scope of the tribunal's investigation. 15 In the grand jury context, a false statement is material if it is relevant to any matter before the grand jury and if its falsity would have the natural tendency to influence the grand jury's investigations. Prantil, 764 F.2d at 557; United States v. Anfield, 539 F.2d 674, 678 (9th Cir.1976). The government need not show that the falsity in fact impeded its inquiries; it is enough if it has a tendency to influence, impede, or hamper a tribunal from pursuing its investigation. Anfield, 539 F.2d at 678; see also United States v. Percell, 526 F.2d 189, 190 (9th Cir.1975) (commenting on a conviction for perjury before the grand jury, the court noted that materiality is tested as of the time the false statement is given. Later proof that a truthful declaration would not have helped the government does not make the statement immaterial). In the sentencing context, our court found use of an alias material where it prevented the judge from finding the convicted person's prior criminal record. United States v. Plascencia-Orozco, 768 F.2d 1074, 1077 (9th Cir.1985). Although the court expressed the test in terms of actual obstruction of justice, it was based on the facts of that case. It would seem the proper test is to judge materiality in terms of its potential for obstructing justice at the time the statement is made, rather than to determine whether it actually misled the court. 16 To establish materiality, the government offered only the fact that the hearing was to determine financial eligibility for appointed counsel. It did not suggest how the identity of the defendant had any bearing on this issue. The sole purpose of such a hearing is to ascertain whether the defendant can pay for his own counsel or not. As the Second Circuit has observed, while a grand jury has wide-ranging investigative function[s], the objectives of a hearing to proceed in forma pauperis are by comparison limited or more precisely defined. Berardi, 629 F.2d at 728. On appeal, the government maintains that appellant's use of an alias effectively prevented the magistrate from gathering the facts necessary to decide whether to appoint counsel. But the government failed at trial to provide adequate support for this contention, or to demonstrate that the name a defendant gives is material to the inquiry. Quite to the contrary, the government's witness, INS Agent Meek testified that when Martinez refused to sign his name on the financial status report, the magistrate said it was not material to the issues at the hearing. 1 17 We do not suggest that the use of an alias could never be material to a determination of indigency for purposes of appointment of counsel. We merely reaffirm that the burden rests on the government to prove materiality in each case. Here the government failed to make such a showing. Under the circumstances of this case, the government utterly failed to show that the defendant's use of a name under which the defendant had lived for seven years was material to a hearing devoted solely to determining financial eligibility for appointment of counsel. The government did not present evidence sufficient to take the case to the jury on this count. We therefore reverse Martinez's conviction with prejudice. 18 REVERSED.