Opinion ID: 215914
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The New-Trial Motions Based on the Discovery of Cutolo's Body

Text: Persico and DeRoss pursue their contention that they are entitled to a new trial based on the government's posttrial discovery of Cutolo's buried body, and its new information that DeMartino, while involved in planning Cutolo's murder, was not the actual shooter. Persico argues that the government's case against him was weak, shored up only by the summation theory that Vincent `Chickie' DeMartino had killed Cutolo at Persico's behest and dumped Cutolo's body in the ocean. (Persico brief on appeal at 24; see id. at 25-26.) DeRoss argues that [h]ad the jury been informed that DeMartino was not the shooter and that the evidence demonstrated the involvement of three other individuals from another Colombo crew, the jury would have certainly acquitted DeRoss because the government's entire theory was that DeRoss carried out the order by directing DeMartino to murder Cutolo. (DeRoss brief on appeal at 38.) We reject all of defendants' contentions. The Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure allow the district court, upon the defendant's motion, to grant a new trial if the interest of justice so requires. Fed.R.Crim.P. 33(a). Our standard for the grant of such a motion requires that (1) the evidence be newly discovered after trial; (2) facts are alleged from which the court can infer due diligence on the part of the movant to obtain the evidence; (3) the evidence is material; (4) the evidence is not merely cumulative or impeaching; and (5) the evidence would likely result in an acquittal. United States v. Owen, 500 F.3d 83, 87-88 (2d Cir.2007) ( Owen ), cert. denied, 552 U.S. 1237, 128 S.Ct. 1459, 170 L.Ed.2d 287 (2008). The `ultimate test' is `whether letting a guilty verdict stand would be a manifest injustice.... There must be a real concern that an innocent person may have been convicted.' United States v. Canova, 412 F.3d 331, 349 (2d Cir.2005) (quoting United States v. Ferguson, 246 F.3d 129, 134 (2d Cir.2001)). The motion is not favored, United States v. Gilbert, 668 F.2d 94, 96 (2d Cir.1981), cert. denied, 456 U.S. 946, 102 S.Ct. 2014, 72 L.Ed.2d 469 (1982), and the denial of such a motion will not be reversed except for abuse of discretion, see, e.g., United States v. Mayo, 14 F.3d 128, 132 (2d Cir.1994); United States v. Siddiqi, 959 F.2d 1167, 1173 (2d Cir.1992); United States v. Parker, 903 F.2d 91, 103 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 872, 111 S.Ct. 196, 112 L.Ed.2d 158 (1990). The district court denied defendants' discovery-of-the-body new-trial motions principally on the ground that they failed to establish the third and fifth requirements of the Owen standard, i.e., that the new evidence be material and that it be likely to result in an acquittal. The court noted that the government had not contended that either Persico or DeRoss actually pulled the trigger or that either was even present at Cutolo's murder, and it saw no contradiction between the government's theory of the murder, i.e., that Persico and DeRoss ordered and arranged for others to execute Cutolo, and the discovery of Cutolo's body, which the coroner had determined evidenced a homicide. See District Court 2008 Order at 25. As the court stated in denying defendants' motions for reconsideration, the shooter's identity and the burial site location are relevant, but neither are exculpatory, nor do they serve to impeach the credibility of any of the government's key witnesses. Memorandum and Order dated February 17, 2009, at 6. We agree. Although Persico and DeRoss argue that the discovery of Cutolo's body undercut the government's entire theory at trial ( e.g., DeRoss brief on appeal at 38), that discovery in fact undercut only the theory advanced in summations as to how Cutolo's dead body had been concealed. Nothing about the discovery of the body undercuts the government's contention that the murder was ordered and arranged by Persico and DeRoss. Persico, although not challenging the legal sufficiency of the evidence to support the jury's verdict against him on the murder count, contends that the discovery of Cutolo's body warranted the granting of his motion for a new trial because the government's case against him was unpersuasive without the suggestion that he had called the marina to arrange for Cutolo's burial at sea. Persico argues that the case against him was stitched together and quite thin, prov[ing] little more than that he may have learned that Cutolo was dead and apparently was not saddened by the news. (Persico brief on appeal at 20-21.) Persico's characterizations do not do justice to the record. As described in Parts I.A., B., and C. above, the record included evidence that: (1) in the Colombo Family war centering on whether the new boss would be Orena or Persico, in which a dozen people were killed, Cutolo had supported Orena; (2) Persico was aware in 1999 that Cutolo himself wanted to become the family's bossand might try to kill Persico to achieve that goalgiving Persico motive to kill Cutolo; (3) Persico needed to have Cutolo killed because Persico was about to go to jail on the gun charge and Cutolo had gotten so powerful that he would have taken, and refused to yield, control of the family; (4) Cutolo expected to meet Persico on May 26 at 92nd and Shore, but Persico never showed up; (5) Cutolo disappeared from 92nd and Shore on May and was killed; (6) after May 26, Persico never tried to reach Cutolo again; (7) an underboss cannot be killed without permission from the family's boss; (8) after underboss Cutolo's disappearance, Persico launched no investigation in search of an explanation; (9) Persico was present for and silently endorsed DeRoss's statements to DiLeonardo and Campanella shortly after May 26 indicating that Cutolo had been killed; and (10) Persico himself told the boss and underboss of the Bonanno Crime Family that Cutolo was gone because he had tried to take what [wa]s not his, i.e., control of the Colombo Crime Family. In sum, there was solid evidence, taken as a whole, that Persico had a strong motive to have Cutolo killed; that Persico made or endorsed statements telling important members of other crime families that Cutolo had been killed; and that Persico lured Cutolo to a secluded location from which he could be kidnaped to be killed. In light of this evidence and the evidence against DeRoss discussed in Part II.B.1. above, we see no likelihood that innocent men have been convicted, no injustice in the guilty verdicts, and no error or abuse of discretion in the district court's conclusion that the discovery of Cutolo's body did not warrant the granting of a new trial.