Opinion ID: 151577
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Sufficiency of the Indictment as to Brunn

Text: Brunn challenges the sufficiency of Counts 4–8 of the indictment. We review de novo. See United States v. Rodriguez, 360 F.3d 949, 958 (9th Cir. 2004). An indictment “must be a plain, concise, and definite written statement of the essential facts constituting the offense charged. An indictment is sufficient if it contains the elements of the charged crime in adequate detail to inform the 4 defendant of the charge and to enable him to plead double jeopardy.” United States v. Awad, 551 F.3d 930, 935 (9th Cir. 2009) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). The relevant counts of the indictment were sufficient in this case. They adequately informed Brunn of the elements of the charge—indeed, they reproduced those elements almost verbatim—and they would have enabled him to plead double jeopardy if such a plea were appropriate. Brunn makes four specific arguments, but none are persuasive. First, Brunn’s reliance on United States v. Cecil, 608 F.2d 1294 (9th Cir. 1979), is misplaced. In Cecil, the only specific allegations in the indictment were that the defendants were conspirators and that the conspiracy took place in Arizona, Mexico, and elsewhere. Id. at 1296–97. Brunn’s indictment, in contrast, specified who took what from whom, and how and when, with detail. Second, it does not matter whether Brunn said, “whatever you like give me” or, “whatever you like imagine” when he was speaking to Charles Gilman. The threatening part of his statement was when he said, “just rememba, as you sitting in OCCC, you cannot do nothing, right?” Besides, liability for conspiracy requires only that one of the conspirators perform an overt act. See United States v. Mincoff, 574 F.3d 1186, 1198 (9th Cir. 2009). No matter what Brunn said to Gilman, the indictment charged that Brunn and Terragna entered into a conspiracy and listed 5 several overt acts that Terragna performed in furtherance of that conspiracy. Even without the challenged statement, the indictment would have been sufficient, so Brunn suffered no prejudice from any transcription error. Third, that the indictment did not detail exactly which official acts Brunn did not perform after extorting money did not make it insufficient. An indictment need not set forth all of the evidence to be proved at trial; both implication and common sense may serve to fill any gaps. See United States v. Blinder, 10 F.3d 1468, 1476 (9th Cir. 1993); United States v. Buckley, 689 F.2d 893, 899 (9th Cir. 1982). The indictment was sufficient in that it alleged that Brunn was a police officer, that he knew of Charles Gilman’s criminal activity, and that he both threatened Gilman and, in exchange for money, omitted some act that a police officer with knowledge of criminal activity would ordinarily perform. Finally, the indictment was sufficient despite not giving details about other conspirators who were “known and unknown to the Grand Jury.” First, a conspiracy in which only Terragna and Brunn were involved would still be a conspiracy. Second, the Government’s “concession” that only Brunn and Terragna were involved was no such thing. The statements that “just Terragna and Brunn are charged” and that “just the two are charged” meant only that those two (and not the Gilmans) were charged. It did not mean that no one else was involved. The 6 Government is not required to indict every conspirator. See, e.g., United States v. Sangmeister, 685 F.2d 1124, 1127 (9th Cir. 1982).