Opinion ID: 323383
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: claims of error raised by defendant evans.

Text: 47
48 Count 2 charged in summary that Allen and others including Evans devised a scheme to defraud American Oil Company in which Allen would obtain stolen checks and would 'request, persuade, inform and otherwise arrange for' each of the other defendants to assist in negotiating the checks by depositing them in accounts and withdrawing the proceeds, and that Allen and Evans for the purpose of executing the scheme, knowingly and willfully mailed and caused to be mailed a specific American Oil Company check to the First National Bank. 49 If we understand defendant Evans' argument, it is that since her deposit of the stolen check may have been otherwise arranged for, the element of guilty intent on her part has not been sufficiently charged. Count 2 did, however, charge her with participation in devising the scheme to defraud and knowingly and willfully using the mail to execute it. We can find no defect in the indictment. 50
51 Defendant Evans sought a particularization of certain elements of the indictment. She asked that the Government be required to state whether Allen requested, persuaded, informed or otherwise arranged for her to assist in negotiating the checks; to define what 'otherwise arrange for' means; to state the false and fraudulent pretentions, representations and promises referred to, who made them, to whom made, and when made; and to state whether Allen or Evans is alleged to have stolen the checks. 52 Defendant Evans concedes that ordering a bill of particulars is within the court's discretion. Here the documentary evidence in respect to Evans was made available to her in advance of the trial. The Government was apparently unprepared to show the details as to how Allen obtained Evans' assistance, by whom the checks were stolen, nor the false pretenses involved other than those implicit in depositing a check with a forged indorsement. As already set forth, the proof that these things must have happened was circumstantial. It has not been demonstrated that there was any surprise on her part at the evidence during the course of trial nor other prejudice as a result of the denial of the requested particulars. 4
53 During the course of testimony by the postal inspector relating successive interviews with defendants Collins, Evans and Wilson, the court inadvertently named Evans rather than Wilson as the person to whose case certain testimony should be limited. The misunderstanding and misstatement were corrected. We consider frivolous the claim that the jury was misled. 54 On the appeal of defendant Collins, the judgment of conviction and sentence are affirmed. On the appeals of defendants Wilson, Evans, and Patton, the judgments of conviction are affirmed, but the sentences are vacated and the causes remanded for resentencing after investigations and reports under Rule 32, F.R.Cr.P. 55