Opinion ID: 590217
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Mulnick Case--Racketeering Act Three

Text: 44 The jury found Eisen guilty of witness bribery and found Eisen and Napoli guilty of mail fraud in connection with the Mulnick case. Both Eisen and Napoli contend that the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they committed mail fraud in connection with the Mulnick case. Both defendants also contend that invalidation of the Mulnick predicate would undermine their RICO substantive and conspiracy convictions. Relying on the standard recently employed by this Court in United States v. Paccione, 949 F.2d 1183, 1198 (2d Cir.1991), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 3029, 120 L.Ed.2d 900 (1992), defendants argue that in a RICO case, where one or more predicates is held invalid on appeal, the RICO conviction cannot stand unless the error in submitting the invalid predicate to the jury is demonstrated to be harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. 4 Upon careful review of the record, we conclude that the defendants' sufficiency arguments are unavailing. 45 The Mulnick case arose out of injuries suffered by Beth Mulnick in 1979 when she was struck by a car as she was crossing a Manhattan street with her friend Patti Kibel. The Eisen firm sued the car's driver on Mulnick's behalf. Napoli was the attorney assigned to the case, which settled for $1 million after the trial testimony of Patti Kibel. At the Mulnick trial, Kibel had testified that Mulnick was crossing the street with the light and within the crosswalk, dropped her glove, and returned several paces to retrieve it, and that the car then ran into her while she was in the crosswalk with the light still in her favor. 46 At the Eisen trial, Kibel testified that her testimony at the Mulnick trial had been false and that various Eisen firm lawyers, including Eisen and Napoli, caused, or acquiesced in, her false testimony that Mulnick had been crossing with the light. Eisen and Napoli contend that Kibel's testimony at the Eisen trial was too equivocal to support a jury finding that Eisen or Napoli either prepared or caused Kibel to testify falsely at the Mulnick trial. 47 With respect to Napoli, Kibel testified at the Eisen trial that, prior to her testimony at the Mulnick trial, she told the man who prepared her that her anticipated testimony about the accident was false. Although Kibel could not recall the identity or appearance of the lawyer who conducted this trial, it was established through the testimony of other witnesses and documentary evidence that Napoli was the Eisen firm trial attorney who questioned witnesses at the Mulnick trial. Contrary to Napoli's suggestion, the Government was not required to prove that he specifically formulated the lie to which Kibel was to testify. Instead, as the indictment charged, the Government needed to establish that Napoli had either prepared or caused Kibel to testify falsely. To prove this, it was plainly sufficient to establish that Kibel told Napoli the truth about the Mulnick accident but that Napoli did nothing to dissuade her from testifying to the false version conjured by the Eisen firm and that he caused her to testify falsely by putting her on the stand and eliciting the perjurious testimony from her. 48 With respect to Eisen, Kibel's testimony is even more indefinite. Eisen claims that Kibel's wavering testimony at the Eisen trial is insufficient proof that he was the person who instructed Kibel to provide false testimony in connection with the Mulnick case. Kibel's recollection was vague as to the details of her conversations with Eisen, but on direct examination she stated that she told Eisen the truth about Beth Mulnick's accident and that he instructed her to give a false account of how the accident occurred. However, when questioned on cross-examination as to any particular element of the fabricated story offered by her at the Mulnick trial, Kibel could not recall whether Eisen or someone else in the Eisen firm had suggested the alteration. The Government argues that Kibel's assertion on direct that Eisen instructed her how to testify is not invalidated by her inability to remember on cross-examination what Eisen had said to her on specific topics and who precisely had caused her to testify as she did to particular aspects of her testimony. The Government argues that the weakness of Kibel's testimony was a matter for cross-examination, and that any apparent tension in her testimony was a matter of credibility to be resolved by the jury. 49 We need not decide whether Kibel's equivocal testimony constituted sufficient evidence to support the jury's finding with respect to the mail fraud allegation against Eisen specified in the Mulnick predicate act, racketeering act 3. That act (one of three charged against Eisen) alleged that Eisen engaged in criminal activity in connection with the Mulnick case in two distinct ways: (1) that he committed mail fraud for the purpose of executing a scheme to prepare and cause Patti Kibel to testify falsely at trial, and (2) that he caused another person to bribe a New York City Police Officer who was about to be called as a witness in connection with the case. The jury indicated on the verdict form that it found Eisen had committed racketeering act 3 both by committing witness bribery and mail fraud. Eisen does not allege any infirmity with the jury's finding on the witness bribery aspect of the Mulnick predicate. 5 50 A finding either of mail fraud or of witness bribery would have been sufficient to support the Mulnick racketeering act. Thus the invalidation of one of two sufficient bases specifically found by the jury to support this predicate would not undermine the jury's finding that Eisen committed a racketeering act with respect to the Mulnick case. Cf. Griffin v. United States, --- U.S. ----, ---- - ----, 112 S.Ct. 466, 469-74, 116 L.Ed.2d 371 (1991) (even a general verdict in a criminal case is to be upheld on appeal against a claim of insufficient evidence to support one of alternative bases for conviction whenever the evidence suffices for at least one basis). In light of the fact that Eisen's challenge does not compromise the validity of the Mulnick predicate, and the ample evidence that the Mulnick case was fraudulent and that Eisen participated in the fraud, we have no doubt that the jury would have convicted Eisen on the RICO substantive and conspiracy charges even if it had found that the Mulnick racketeering act rested only on bribery. Cf. Paccione, 949 F.2d at 1198 (jury would have convicted defendant of a RICO violation even in the absence of an invalid predicate). 51