Opinion ID: 674597
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Thai's Sec. 1959 Conviction

Text: 188 Count 15 of the indictment charged that Thai had conspired to commit assault with a dangerous weapon on individuals at the Pho Bang Restaurant for the purpose of ... maintaining and increasing position in the BORN TO KILL, an enterprise engaged in racketeering activity, in violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1959. That section provides in pertinent part that [w]hoever, ... for the purpose of ... maintaining or increasing position in an enterprise engaged in racketeering activity, ... assaults with a dangerous weapon, ... or attempts or conspires so to do, shall be punished. 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1959(a). Thai argues that there was insufficient evidence for the jury to conclude that he committed the crime for the purpose of maintaining or increasing his position in BTK. We agree. 189 In order to establish that a crime of violence was committed for the purpose of ... maintaining or increasing position in a RICO enterprise, the government is required to prove, inter alia, that the defendant's general purpose in committing the crime of violence was to maintain or increase his position in the enterprise. See United States v. Concepcion, 983 F.2d at 381; United States v. Rosa, 11 F.3d 315, 340-41 (2d Cir.1993), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 1565, 128 L.Ed.2d 211 (1994). Self-promotion need not have been the defendant's only, or even his primary, concern, if it was committed as an integral aspect of membership in the enterprise. United States v. Concepcion, 983 F.2d at 381 (internal quotes omitted). The motive requirement is thus satisfied if the jury could properly infer that the defendant committed his violent crime because he knew it was expected of him by reason of his membership in the enterprise or that he committed it in furtherance of that membership. Id. 190 In Concepcion, for example, the Sec. 1959 defendant, a lieutenant in a narcotics enterprise, received a complaint from his workers that a competitor was trying to take over one of the defendant's retail spots, and the defendant led his associates into a gun battle against the organization's competitors. The jury in that case could properly have concluded that, as a leader of the enterprise, the defendant would have been expected to respond to reported threats to the organization's competitive position and that a failure to do so would have undermined the defendant's position and authority in his organization. See also United States v. Rosa, 11 F.3d at 340-41 (where Sec. 1959 defendant joined narcotics organization as a lower-level worker, rose to become one of its leaders, and ruthlessly killed an associate in a dispute over defendant's narcotics distribution spot, jury could properly find that the motive of the murder was the maintenance of defendant's position in organization). 191 In the present case, in contrast, there is no evidence from which the jury could conclude that Thai's motive for wanting to bomb the Pho Bang was other than purely mercenary. The only testimony we have seen as to why Thai wanted to bomb the Pho Bang came from the testimony of Tinh Ngo, to whom Thai gave the bomb and whom Thai instructed to get a new member of BTK to detonate it. Tinh Ngo's testimony was as follows: 192 Q. And did David Thai explain why he wanted you to do this? 193 A. Yes. I ask him why we do it for, and he said because somebody offer him big amount of money to do it. 194 Q. Did he say how much? 195 A. He said over $10,000. 196 Q. Did he say who or not? 197 A. He didn't say who. 198 (Tr. 1156.) When questioned as to whether he had asked Thai anything else about this event, Tinh Ngo said he asked whether Thai himself had made the bomb; but Tinh Ngo did not indicate that there had been any further questions or communications as to Thai's motive. 199 We do not see in this testimony any implication of a motive of the sort envisioned by Sec. 1959. There was no evidence, for example, that the bombing was to be a response to any threat to the BTK organization or to Thai's position as BTK's leader, nor any evidence that he thought that as a leader he would be expected to bomb the restaurant. And though Thai paid the expenses of gang members, any suggestion that he undertook to bomb the Pho Bang to obtain money in order to carry out that responsibility would be entirely speculative, since the government concedes that there was no evidence as to Thai's intended use of the money. 200 The government's defense of the sufficiency of its evidence to support the conviction on count 15 focuses principally on the proposition that this crime was part of BTK's criminal affairs. (Government brief on appeal at 123.) The government argues that since [t]he gang's purpose was to earn money by committing crimes of violence against Asians (id.), the jury could thus properly find that this crime, like all the others, was intended to maintain and enhance Thai's role in the charged enterprise--the leader of a violent gang that victimized Asians for profit (id. at 124 (emphasis added)). 201 Even if we agreed that this crime was like all the others, we could hardly find that argument persuasive since, aside from the murder of Sen Van Ta, the government did not charge or prove that any of the others was a violation of Sec. 1959. Indeed, the government's argument reveals too much: if it were valid, any Hobbs Act robbery or robbery conspiracy ordered by the leader of a RICO enterprise would automatically constitute a violation of Sec. 1959. 202 Nor do we think the jury could reasonably have inferred from the fact that there was a prior unsuccessful attempt to bomb the Pho Bang that Thai accepted the second bombing assignment in part to maintain or increase his position in BTK. The misdirected first bombing may have been relevant to show why Thai instructed Tinh Ngo to use new recruits for the Pho Bang bombing, and it defuses Thai's argument that the Pho Bang attempt was not really BTK-related. However, there was no evidence connecting that first bombing to Thai's motivation in the second bombing. For example, there was no testimony that the unsuccessful first bombing caused any concerns among gang members about Thai's leadership. Nor was there any evidence that in light of the first bombing anyone inside or outside the gang had challenged or even questioned Thai's ability to lead. In fact, there was no evidence that prior to Thai's discussion with Tinh Ngo any BTK member other than Minh Do even knew that the wrong building had been bombed. Given the lack of evidence, we believe that any link between the initial bombing and the conclusion that Thai was motivated to accept the second bombing assignment by a desire to maintain or increase his position would have to have been based on pure speculation. While a defendant's Sec. 1959 conviction is to be affirmed if a motivation to maintain or increase his position may be reasonably inferred from the evidence, such a conviction may not be affirmed where, as here, that inference is based on no more than guesswork. 203 We conclude that the evidence was insufficient to support a finding that Thai conspired to bomb the Pho Bang in order to maintain or increase his position in BTK. Accordingly, his conviction on count 15 must be reversed.