Opinion ID: 75885
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Trafficking in Goods

Text: 14 Appellants Guerra and Tellez assert that the printing of labels in and of itself does not constitute trafficking in goods either under the meaning of 18 U.S.C. § 2320, or as charged in the indictment. Appellants Guerra and Tellez rely on United States v. Giles, 213 F.3d 1247 (10th Cir.2000), for the proposition that Section 2320 does not forbid the act of trafficking in counterfeit labels unconnected to any goods. At issue in the Giles case were wholesale patch sets, which consisted of a leather patch and gold medallion bearing a federally registered designer logo and a leather strap used to attach the medallion to a purse or piece of luggage. The patch set could be sewn or glued onto a generic purse or piece of luggage to give the appearance that the generic purse or luggage was actually a branded product. The Tenth Circuit found that the labels sold by the defendant in that case did not constitute goods. The Court reasoned that because the statute requires that a defendant intentionally traffic in goods, and that he or she knowingly use a counterfeit mark on or in connection with such goods, the term goods was intended to be viewed as separate and distinct from the marks they carry. Giles, 213 F.3d at 1251. But see United States v. Koehler, 24 F.3d 867 (6th Cir.1994) (upholding conviction under TCA without questioning the propriety of charging defendant with a separate count of trafficking in labels, where such labels were actually used on counterfeit auto parts provided by an undercover agent), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 1077, 115 S.Ct. 723, 130 L.Ed.2d 628. 15 Unlike in Giles, the indictment in this case did not charge Guerra and Tellez with trafficking in counterfeit labels as the goods, nor did Giles address the criminal liability of a label maker in the context of a conspiracy charge. The indictment charged each Appellant with knowingly trafficking and attempting to traffic in goods, to wit, cigars. Although there does not appear to be evidence that either Guerra or Tellez themselves transported, transferred, or otherwise disposed of the cigars, the labels they manufactured were actually used by a co-conspirator, Ordonez, to render the inferior cigars counterfeit, which he in turn sold for a profit. See 18 U.S.C. § 2320(d)(2) (defining traffic as to transport, transfer, or otherwise dispose of, to another, as consideration for anything of value). 4