Opinion ID: 751779
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Were the instructions erroneous?

Text: 58 Having surveyed the district court's perjury instructions, we now turn to consider whether the errors in the instructions alleged by Conk warrant reversal of his perjury conviction pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52(b). 59
60 We have no trouble in concluding that the district court erroneously instructed the jury with respect to Count 24 to the extent that the district court substituted the elements of the crime of Perjury generally, 18 U.S.C. § 1621, for the elements of the crime of False declarations before a grand jury or court, 18 U.S.C. § 1623. As previously stated, to convict Conk of perjury under § 1623 as alleged in Count 24, the government had to prove that Conk (1) knowingly made a(2) false (3) material declaration (4) under oath (5) in a proceeding before or ancillary to any court or grand jury of the United States. See 18 U.S.C. § 1623(a). The district court's substitute instruction covered all of these elements except for the last one. On that element, the district court instructed that, in order to convict Conk of perjury, he must have made the allegedly false statement in a proceeding for which a law of the United States authorizes the administration of an oath rather than in a proceeding ancillary to any court or grand jury of the United States. Thus, the district court failed to instruct on an essential element of § 1623(a). This was error, and the error was plain. Thus, the first and second prongs of Olano are satisfied. 61 Again, unless we conclude that the jury necessarily made the required finding despite the failure to instruct, see, e.g., Forbes, 64 F.3d at 935, then we must conclude that the failure to instruct affected Conk's substantial rights, see David, 83 F.3d at 647. The record before us gives no indication that, despite the district court's failure to instruct, the jury necessarily found that Conk made the allegedly false statement at issue in a proceeding before or ancillary to any court or grand jury of the United States. No other instruction encompassed the missing instruction. Moreover, any chance at inquiring whether the jury necessarily found that Conk made the allegedly false statement in a proceeding ancillary to any court or grand jury of the United States by finding that he made the allegedly false statement in a proceeding for which a law of the United States authorizes the administration of an oath is foreclosed by the district court's conclusive instruction on the latter issue. Accordingly, Olano's third prong is satisfied. See David, 83 F.3d at 647. 62 We now must consider whether the forfeited error seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. See Olano, 507 U.S. at 732, 113 S.Ct. at 1776 (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted). We conclude that it does not, because overwhelming evidence establishes that Conk made the declaration at issue during a proceeding ancillary to a court of the United States, specifically a civil deposition; such evidence stands uncontradicted in the record; Conk did not dispute this element below and does not do so on appeal; and finally, Conk fails to set forth a plausible argument that he did not make the declaration at issue during a proceeding ancillary to a court of the United States. Under these circumstances, the fourth prong of Olano is not satisfied, see Johnson, 520 U.S. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 1550, and thus, we will not reverse Conk's perjury conviction on this basis. 63
64 Alleged False Statement Under Oath. 65 We have no trouble in concluding that the district court's conclusive instruction that the false declaration at issue in Count 24 was made under oath satisfies the first three prongs of Olano. There is no doubt that an essential element of a § 1623(a) prosecution is that the defendant has made the false declaration under oath. See Friedhaber, 856 F.2d at 642. The statutory text of § 1623(a) expressly requires that the false declaration have been made under oath. 18 U.S.C. § 1623(a). Thus, the district court violated Conk's Sixth Amendment right to have a jury make every factual finding essential to his convictions when it instructed the jury that the government had conclusively established this element of the offense. See United States v. Johnson, 71 F.3d 139, 142-43 (4th Cir.1995) (holding the district court's instruction to the jury that deprived the jury of the opportunity to make a factual finding on an essential element of the offense constituted Sixth Amendment violation). The error was plain, and because no other instruction appears to have neutralized the error, we conclude that the error affected Conk's substantial rights. See David, 83 F.3d at 647. 66 Again, however, we cannot conclude that the error seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. See Olano, 507 U.S. at 732, 113 S.Ct. at 1776 (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted). First, the evidence on this issue is overwhelming in that Conk admitted at trial that he testified under oath at the civil deposition on July 10, 1991 as alleged in Count 24. Second, he does not argue the invalidity of this admission on appeal. Third and finally, we fail to conceive of a plausible argument that Conk did not make the declaration at issue under oath. Under these circumstances, we cannot say that Olano's fourth prong is satisfied. Accordingly, we will not reverse Conk's conviction on Count 24 on the basis of the district court's conclusive instruction that the alleged false declaration was made under oath. See Johnson, 520 U.S. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 1550.3. Conclusive Instruction on Materiality. 67 Conk also complains that the district court committed plain error by removing the element of materiality from the jury. He points to the district court's instruction during final instructions that [t]he Court will determine the second element, that is materiality, as a matter of law. (J.A. 254). The government argues that this instruction does not constitute error because the district court subsequently instructed the jury that it had to make a finding on the issue of materiality and gave the jury the standard to apply in deciding the issue. 68 Again, we have no trouble in concluding that the conclusive instruction at issue satisfies the first three prongs of Olano. The law is settled that in a § 1623 prosecution, the issue of materiality must be decided by the jury, not the court. Johnson, 520 U.S. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 1548. Accordingly, the district court's instruction to the jury that the court was responsible for deciding the issue of materiality with respect to Count 24 was error. Furthermore, we conclude the error is clear, and thus plain. See id. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 1549. Finally, we conclude the error affected Conk's substantial rights, because we cannot conclude that the jury made the constitutionally required finding of materiality. See David, 83 F.3d at 647. Despite the district court's subsequent instruction to the jury that it should decide the issue of materiality, without an instruction telling the jury to disregard the previous erroneous instruction, we cannot conclude that the jury failed to follow the previous erroneous instruction. See United States v. Varner, 748 F.2d 925, 927 (4th Cir.1984); United States v. Walker, 677 F.2d 1014, 1016-17 n. 3 (4th Cir.1982) (stating that, with respect to directly conflicting final jury instructions, where one is clearly prejudicial and the other not, reversal is warranted, because the jury might have followed the erroneous instruction). 69 Yet again, we are left to consider whether the last prong of Olano is met, and again, we conclude that it is not. On this record, there is simply no basis for concluding that the error seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings. Olano, 507 U.S. at 732, 113 S.Ct. at 1776 (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted). As set forth above, the standard of materiality in the context of a civil deposition has not been finally determined in our circuit. However, we need not decide which among the differing standards we would adopt, because overwhelming evidence establishes that the nature of Conk's false declaration unquestionably meets the more stringent standard adopted by the Sixth and Ninth Circuits requiring that the topic of the declaration at issue be discoverable and have the tendency to affect the outcome of the civil suit involved. See Clark, 918 F.2d at 847; Adams, 870 F.2d at 1147. Here, the topic of Conk's false declaration was unquestionably discoverable and the false declaration itself undeniably had the tendency to affect the outcome of HLI's civil suit against MPS, Conk, and Wilkinson for breach of contract and fraud. Specifically, the evidence firmly establishes that HLI's civil suit was prompted in part by its discovery through an investigative audit that many of the health care companies listed on MPS's books were fictitious. Thus, it is beyond cavil that information regarding whether Conk had any knowledge of the fictitious name American Surgical as listed on MPS's books appear[ed] reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence in HLI's civil suit. Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(b)(1). Furthermore, Conk's false denial of knowledge of American Surgical irrefutably had the tendency to affect the outcome of the civil suit in that, at a minimum, it had the tendency to exculpate him with respect to HLI's claims of fraud and breach of contract. Indeed, we would characterize the evidence of materiality in this case as overwhelming. A further factor weighing in favor of not recognizing the district court's erroneous mandatory instruction on materiality is that the evidence of materiality is uncontradicted. Beyond that, Conk did not dispute the materiality of the declaration at issue below, and he has failed to present a plausible argument of immateriality before this court. Again, we are faced with circumstances nearly identical to those found in Johnson, 520 U.S. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 1544, where the Supreme Court refused to recognize a district court's error in removing the element of materiality from the jury, and again, we conclude that Olano 's fourth prong is not satisfied. 70 We note that our conclusion is in accord with three of our sister circuits that have considered the satisfaction of Olano's fourth prong post-Johnson under essentially the same circumstances. See United States v. West Indies Transp., Inc., 127 F.3d 299, 306 (3d Cir.1997), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 118 S.Ct. 700, 139 L.Ed.2d 644 (1997); United States v. Sassanelli, 118 F.3d 495, 499-500 (6th Cir.1997); United States v. Knoll, 116 F.3d 994, 1001 (2d Cir.1997). For example, the Third Circuit refused to correct an erroneous conclusive instruction on the element of materiality in a prosecution under 18 U.S.C. § 1546 for making a false statement on a visa. See West Indies Transp., 127 F.3d at 306. Analogizing to Johnson, the court concluded that Olano's fourth prong was not satisfied where the evidence of materiality was overwhelming and uncontroverted, and the defendants failed to present a plausible argument that their statements were not material. See id. 71 In conclusion, while the district court erred with respect to portions of its perjury instructions, none of its errors warrant reversal of Conk's perjury conviction under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52(b). Accordingly, we affirm Conk's conviction on Count 24 for perjury in violation of § 1623(a). 4