Opinion ID: 564325
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Good Faith Instructions.

Text: 29 My colleagues conclude: The district court should have instructed the jury that, if it found that the reliance [on section 1058 as appellants interpreted it] was held in good faith, the defendants could not be held criminally liable for proceeding in accordance with that reliance. The district court in fact gave the following instructions with regard to good faith: 30 If you find that the defendant acted in good faith in the honest belief that the representations he made were true, that he did not intend to defraud anyone, this constitutes a complete defense to the crime of mail or wire fraud. 31 .... 32 The defendants contend the government has failed to prove that they did not act in good faith. 33 Mr. Regan submits that it was his belief, based on his general knowledge of the tax laws and buttressed by the willingness of Akroyd and Merrill Lynch to engage in these trades, that both the day trades done in 1984 and the 31 day trades done in 1985 were entirely proper for tax purposes. 34 The other Princeton/Newport defendants contend that they relied on Mr. Regan's opinion as to the propriety of the trades.... 35 In connection with the false return counts, the court additionally instructed as follows: 36 If the defendant signed the tax return in good faith and believed it to be true in all material matters, he has not committed a crime and must be acquitted on these counts, even if the return was incorrect. 37 If you find that the tax return was not true as to a material matter, the central question is whether or not the defendant honestly believed that the return was true. The government has the burden of proving that the defendant did not have an honest belief in the truthfulness of the return. 38 Characterizing these rather extensive instructions as a generalized charge on good faith, my colleagues find them insufficient to instruct the jury concerning the appellants' specific good faith defense based on section 1058. In other words, the defendants were prejudiced by an instruction that their good faith defense was premised on Regan's general knowledge of the tax laws, because defendants more specifically contended that Regan relied on section 1058. I am unpersuaded that a district court is required to present a defendant's contentions with this level of particularity. The fact is that the theory of defense--to wit, bona fide reliance on the tax code--was squarely presented to the jury. It is unlikely that the jurors were misled because the district court failed to remind them of Regan's contention that section 1058 was at the center of his tax analysis. 39 Even assuming, however, that the district court arguably should have given an instruction more closely patterned after the defendants' section 1058 contention, the record does not disclose the specific objection to the court's instruction on the intent issue required by Fed.R.Crim.P. 30 to preserve a claim of instructional error. Defendants' proposed jury instructions included a paragraph that essentially summarized Regan's trial testimony regarding reliance on section 1058. When Judge Carter indicated at the charging conference that his instructions would not refer to section 1058, however, counsel did not contest the ruling, let alone argue that the defense theory would be gutted. After delivery of the charge, the only objections relating to defense contentions were that the court (1) failed to instruct that defendant Zarzecki contended that he never participated in any illegal activity, and (2) failed to instruct the jury on all the defense contentions concerning the manipulation of C.O.M.B. Co. securities. In response, the district court gave a supplemental instruction that both the government and the defendants had set forth more contentions than those presented in the jury charge. 40 In these circumstances, reversal may be premised only upon plain error in the jury instruction, see Fed.R.Crim.P. 52(b); i.e., where failure to reverse would result in 'a miscarriage of justice which denied the defendant a fair trial.'  United States v. Scarpa, 913 F.2d 993, 1021 (2d Cir.1990) (quoting United States v. Civelli, 883 F.2d 191, 194 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 409, 107 L.Ed.2d 374 (1989)). This doctrine is to be invoked sparingly, see Scarpa, 913 F.2d at 1021 (collecting cases), and I see no occasion for its application here. 41