Opinion ID: 1212404
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Evidence of a RICO Pattern

Text: As indicated in Part II.D. above, the government was required to prove not only the existence of the enterprise, but also agreement to participate in a pattern of racketeering activity. To show such a pattern, the government was required to show that the racketeering predicates [we]re related, and that they amount[ed] to or pose[d] a threat of continued criminal activity. H.J. Inc., 492 U.S. at 239, 109 S.Ct. 2893 (emphasis omitted). To prove relatedness, the government may show either that the individual predicate acts were directly related to each other or that they were related to the enterprise in a way that made them  indirectly connected to each other. United States v. Locascio, 6 F.3d 924, 943 (2d Cir.1993) (emphasis in original), cert. denied, 511 U.S. 1070, 114 S.Ct. 1645, 1646, 128 L.Ed.2d 365 (1994); see, e.g., United States v. Indelicato, 865 F.2d 1370, 1383 (2d Cir.) (en banc) (two racketeering acts that are not directly related to each other may nevertheless be related indirectly because each is related to the RICO enterprise), cert. denied, 491 U.S. 907, 109 S.Ct. 3192, 105 L.Ed.2d 700 (1989). The H.J. Inc. Court inferred that Congress intended that the relatedness of RICO predicate acts could be shown by proof that they have the same or similar purposes, results, participants, victims, or methods of commission, or otherwise are interrelated by distinguishing characteristics and are not isolated events. 492 U.S. at 240, 109 S.Ct. 2893 (internal quotation marks omitted) (emphases added). Thus, the concept of a pattern of racketeering activity . . . is broad indeed: the list of specific possible similarities is illustrative rather than definitive; the examples are stated in the disjunctive; and the residual clauseotherwise . . . interrelated by distinguishing characteristicsis open to a. range of different ordering principles. Id. at 237, 238, 109 S.Ct. 2893. As the H.J. Inc. Court said, [t]here is no obviously 'correct' level of generality for courts to use in describing the criminal activity alleged in RICO litigation. Id. at 241 n. 3, 109 S.Ct. 2893. Variations in the types of acts performed could of course persuade a factfinder that the racketeering acts are not related. But where there are other similarities, such as in participants or purpose, variations in the nature of the racketeering acts do not mean that there is no RICO pattern as a matter of law. As the Seventh Circuit noted in United States v. Masters, 924 F.2d 1362 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 500 U.S. 919, 111 S.Ct. 2019, 114 L.Ed.2d 105 (1991), [a] criminal enterprise is more, not less, dangerous if it is versatile, flexible, diverse in its objectives and capabilities. Versatility, flexibility, and diversity are not inconsistent with pattern. Id. at 1367. Where the government presents evidence from which it could permissibly be inferred that the criminal acts have some rational common denominator or fit into a particular order or arrangement, the question of whether the acts are related is one of fact for the jury. In the present case, the evidence was ample to allow the jury to find that the persons offering or performing the racketeering acts always included Eppolito and usually included both Eppolito and Caracappa; that the recipients of these services were members or associates of organized crime; and that the principal purpose of the enterprise was to earn money for Eppolito and Caracappa through providing those services. Although the nature of the services that were performed or attempted varied widely, that was simply because a broad array was offered. For example, the very first proffer to Kaplan of the services of Eppolito and Caracappa was (a) for the furnishing of confidential law enforcement information, and (b) for the commission of murders. ( See Tr. 426-27, 515-16.) Plainly, these two are disparate types of services. In addition, as discussed in the preceding section, Eppolito and Caracappa repeatedly offered to provide Kaplan with, inter alia, security services for his narcotics trafficking business i.e., yet a third type of assistance and they offered to help him in that business in any[ ]way that they could (Tr. 783), a broad offer indeed. The jury was entitled to view the offers of Eppolito and Caracappa to provide assistance to members and associates of organized crime as general and open-endedas was alleged in the Indictmentand thus as encompassing defendants' conduct in Las Vegas, which included Eppolito's offers and attempts to launder the proceeds of narcotics trafficking and other organized crime activities, and Eppolito's and Caracappa's involvement in narcotics trafficking in order to induce would-be investors to give them money for a film in whose funding members of organized crime were integrally involved. The district court's narrow focus on the agreement of Eppolito and Caracappa to provide confidential law enforcement information as the be-all and end-all of the enterprise and of the conspiratorial agreement was thus inconsistent with the allegations of the Indictment and disregarded or discounted the above evidence. The weighing of the evidence, however, was within the province of the jury as finder of fact. Where a given partnership has offered a variety of services to a defined category of customers, it is not entitled to a ruling that as a matter of law its services do not constitute a pattern simply because the offered services were varied. Finally, as to the need to prove continuity or the threat of continuity, the H.J. Inc. Court noted that the government may meet that burden in a variety of ways, thus making it difficult to formulate in the abstract any general test for continuity. 492 U.S. at 241, 109 S.Ct. 2893 (emphasis added). The Court also noted, however, that proof of continuity and relatedness will often overlap, id. at 239, 109 S.Ct. 2893, and that the threat of continuity is sufficiently established where the predicates can be attributed to a defendant operating as part of a long-term association that exists for criminal purposes, id. at 242-43, 109 S.Ct. 2893 (emphasis added). Plainly, the evidence described above was sufficient to permit the jury to find that Eppolito and Caracappa operated as part of just such an association. The fact that there was a gap of some eight years between proven racketeering acts did not as a matter of law preclude a finding of pattern or continuity, for Congress expressly defined pattern to include two or more acts of racketeering activity within a period (excluding any period of imprisonment) of 10 years. See 18 U.S.C. § 1961(5). In sum, we conclude that Eppolito and Caracappa were not entitled to acquittal on the RICO conspiracy count on the theory that either their services enterprise or their conspiracy to conduct that enterprise through a pattern of racketeering activity had ended before March 9, 2000.