Opinion ID: 486363
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: sufficiency of evidence to support perjury convictions

Text: 62 Individual appellants take exception on various grounds to their convictions under the different perjury counts. 21 These challenges include claims that, in some counts, a defendant's statement was literally true (whatever other implications it may have suggested), and hence nonperjurious. As to other counts, appellants claim that the supposed perjurious responses lacked materiality to the inquiry in which they were rendered. And as to still others, some appellants challenge outright the legal sufficiency of the prosecution's evidence. Other errors are also charged. 63 We now address these matters individually. We affirm all except the convictions of Colon Berrios under Counts 37 and 38. We discuss Colon Berrios's convictions first.
64 The indictment charged Colon Berrios with three counts of perjury allegedly committed during his January 16, 1980 deposition in the civil action brought by Rosado's and Soto Arrivi's survivors. At trial, following the government's case-in-chief, Colon Berrios moved for a judgment of acquittal pursuant to Fed.R.Crim.P. 29. The district court denied the motion, an action it repeated when Colon Berrios renewed his motion after defendants rested. After two days of deliberations, the jury acquitted Colon Berrios on Count 36, but returned verdicts of guilty on Counts 37 and 38. He asserts on appeal that the government produced insufficient evidence to support his convictions under the two counts. Because our analysis of Count 37 depends in part on whether the conviction under Count 38 stands, we shall begin with the latter.
65 In his deposition, after being asked who was your normal supervisor, Colon Berrios responded Lieutenant Gonzalez. (Emphasis added.) Colon Berrios then answered no when asked whether Gonzalez [had] anything to do with the operation at Cerro Maravilla, a contention the government alleges is perjurious. As stated in the indictment, Nelson Gonzalez Perez was present at Cerro Maravilla on July 25, 1978, when the shots were fired which killed Carlos Soto Arrivi and Arnaldo Dario Rosado. Although the indictment assumed that Lieutenant Gonzalez and Nelson Gonzalez Perez were the same person, an assumption shared by the government at trial, we are unable to draw such a conclusion in the absence of a sufficient evidentiary foundation. 66 The government's evidence clearly established that Nelson Gonzalez Perez was a member of the Police of Puerto Rico assigned, at the time of the Cerro Maravilla shootings, to the same section of the force as was Colon Berrios, the intelligence division. As did other government witnesses, Jose Montanez Ortiz, a police officer present when the independentistas were shot, testified that Nelson Gonzalez Perez was at Cerro Maravilla on July 25, 1978. Thus, Colon Berrios perjured himself in responding that Lieutenant Gonzalez did not have anything to do with the Cerro Maravilla operation provided the government proved that, by Lieutenant Gonzalez, Colon Berrios meant Nelson Gonzalez Perez and not someone else. 67 The record, however, does not afford such proof. The government has directed us to no document or witness which, when mentioning Nelson Gonzalez Perez's rank, calls him anything but sergeant. 22 By itself, this disparity would not be fatal, if the record as a whole permitted a fair inference that Nelson Gonzalez Perez was one and the same as Lieutenant Gonzalez. But the mystery of the true Lieutenant Gonzalez is deepened, and rendered in the end inexplicable, by evidence of another Lieutenant Gonzalez, different from Nelson Gonzalez Perez, who was also in the intelligence division. Antonio Mendez Rivera, a former Second Lieutenant in the intelligence division, testified as follows: 68 Q. Who were the other second Lieutenants, if you recall? 69 A. Lieutenant Sebastian Ortiz, Lieutenant Jaime Quiles, and I am not sure if by that time there was Lieutenant Francisco Gonzalez. 70 Given the above, the indication that Nelson Gonzalez Perez may have been a sergeant, and the government's total failure to present easily obtained clarifying evidence--for example, to show that Colon Berrios's supervisor was in fact Nelson Gonzalez Perez--the record lacks sufficient evidence, even when construed most favorably to the government, to allow a rational trier of fact to find Colon Berrios guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. See United States v. Drougas, 748 F.2d 8, 15 (1st Cir.1984); United States v. Marolda, 648 F.2d 623, 624 (9th Cir.1981).
71 In his January 16, 1980 deposition, Colon Berrios was asked if he had discussed the Cerro Maravilla incident with fellow officers Bruno Gonzalez or Reveron Martinez since the time it happened. Colon Berrios replied, in part, I have not made any comments like that. When examined on whether he had discussed the incident with any of the other defendants in the civil suit, Colon Berrios once again said no. The government alleges that these are perjurious statements in that Colon Berrios met with Juan Bruno, Luis Reveron, Jose Rios Polanco, Rafael Torres and others at Cerro Maravilla on August 2, 1978, and discussed the events of July 25, 1978. 72 The most damaging evidence against Colon Berrios was offered by Modesto Delgado Garcia, an employee of the corporation that owned the Channel 7 tower that Rosado and Soto Arrivi were allegedly intending to sabotage. He testified that on August 2, 1978, Colon Berrios came to Cerro Maravilla along with Rios Polanco, Reveron Martinez, Rafael Torres, and a number of district attorneys. 23 Although the evidence indicates that the district attorneys discussed the shootings with each of the defendants present, and that the defendants may have talked among themselves, the government offered no evidence that Colon Berrios, although present, participated in the discussions. 73 The government, moreover, produced no evidence, with the exception of the August 2 episode, showing that Colon Berrios talked at any other time with any of the defendants. Although such a meeting could perhaps be inferred if Colon Berrios had engaged in perjury closely related to that of other defendants, the jury convicted Colon Berrios of only one other count of perjury, a verdict we found to be unsupported by sufficient evidence. Given this inadequate record, we reverse the conviction under Count 37.
74 In Bronston v. United States, 409 U.S. 352, 93 S.Ct. 595, 34 L.Ed.2d 568 (1973), the Supreme Court held that 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1621 (1982), the general perjury statute, did not extend to answers unresponsive on their face but untrue only by 'negative implication.'... [A]ny special problems arising from the literally true but unresponsive answer are to be remedied through the 'questioner's acuity' and not by a federal perjury prosecution. Id. at 361, 362, 93 S.Ct. at 601, 602; see also id. at 357-58, 93 S.Ct. at 599-600 (false negative implication not sufficient for perjury); United States v. Finucan, 708 F.2d 838, 847-48 (1st Cir.1983) (statement must be literally false). Different appellants make claims of literal truth as to Counts 3, 5, 23, 29, and 44, which we now consider seriatim.
75 Count 3 charges appellant Perez Casillas with perjury for testifying in a March 10 deposition, in substance, that on the morning of the shootings, Lieutenant Quiles sent Agent Montanez to Rio Piedras (a section of the city of San Juan far removed from Cerro Maravilla) to observe whether Soto Arrivi and Rosado boarded a bus leaving for Guanica. 24 Perez Casillas argues on appeal that his testimony was literally true although it conveyed false information by implication. 76 We think that the government adduced sufficient proof to support the jury's finding that Perez Casillas perjured himself under Count 3. Carmelo Cruz Arroyo, a member of the Intelligence Division, testified that on July 25, 1978, between 7:00 and 7:30 in the morning, Captain Jaime Quiles instructed [him] to report to the Rio Piedras area where supposedly [Soto Arrivi and Rosado] were leaving from. He claimed that the only person who accompanied him was then-Lieutenant Antonio Mendez. Cruz further testified that after the independentistas secured a publico car (i.e., cab), he and Mendez followed them from San Juan to the base of Cerro Maravilla. According to Cruz, shortly after he and Mendez arrived at Cerro Maravilla, he talked with Perez Casillas, telling the Colonel that the car in which the terrorists were driving had just past [sic] by.Montanez's own testimony at trial, if believed also directly contradicted the version of events claimed by Perez Casillas. Montanez stated that on July 24, 1978, pursuant to instructions given him by Perez Casillas, he had personally set up surveillance at Toro Negro (Cerro Maravilla is a mountain in the Toro Negro area of Puerto Rico). Montanez testified that nothing unusual happened that day. 77 According to Montanez's continued testimony, the next day, July 25, 1978, he reported to work between 7:00 and 8:00 a.m. at the intelligence division's headquarters in Hato Rey. He then received instructions from Perez Casillas to accompany him to the Isla Grande airport along with Jaime Quiles and Nelson Gonzalez. 25 Montanez did so, and once at the airport, he and Perez Casillas separated and in two flights departed for Mercedita Airport in Ponce. Upon arriving at Ponce, all the officers, including Montanez and Perez Casillas, boarded some vehicles and went to Cerro Maravilla, where the shootings later took place. 78 From the testimony given by Cruz and Montanez, the jury could have reasonably concluded that Montanez did not go to Rio Piedras the day of the shootings, including during the early morning hour when Perez Casillas claimed Quiles dispatched Montanez to watch the bus terminal. More importantly, the evidence indicates that Perez Casillas knew that Montanez was not at Rio Piedras. From the time Montanez reported to work on July 25 until the shootings took place, he was with or near Perez Casillas either at or en route to Cerro Maravilla. We conclude that the jury had sufficient evidence on which to return a conviction under Count 3.
79 In Count 5, Perez Casillas is charged with perjury for stating during a March 10, 1980 deposition essentially that when he arrived at the area where the shootings had taken place, 26 between two and five minutes after they occurred, one person was dead and a second was being placed into a car. Despite Perez Casillas' apparent claim of error, we believe that the government presented sufficient evidence of falsity to support the conviction. 80 Officer Montanez testified that after the first volley of shots was fired, the two independentistas were still alive: 81 Q. Mr. Montanez, after Gonzalez Malave [an undercover police officer who was injured during the initial volley of shots] was taken away to the hospital, 27 what if anything happened to Dario and Soto? 82 A. They stayed at the place where they were arrested. 83 .... 84 Q. [W]ere they alive at the time, or dead at the time you saw these assaults taking place? 85 A. They were alive. 86 Q. Did you stay in the area where these assaults were taking place?A. Uh, I believe not, I was driving Don Julio Ortiz Molina to the location of the police tower. 87 Q. Did you return to the scene where the assaults were taking place? 88 A. Yes, sir. 89 Q. What happened when you returned? 90 A. After I came back the atmosphere was fully charged where anything could happen, then I became aware that Colonel Perez was leaving the place and I noticed, or maybe by intuition that something maybe not good was going to happen, and I didn't want to stay there, so I left. 91 .... 92 Q. What happened next ...? 93 A. Well, what I remember is not very, very clear, but I believe that a detonation was heard. 94 Q. What kind of a detonation, if you know? 95 A. It was a detonation like the shooting of a shotgun. 96 Montanez's testimony indicates that after the initial volley of shots, the two independentistas were both alive and that they remained so until after Perez Casillas left the area. This and similar testimony 28 was sufficient to allow the jury to conclude that Perez Casillas knew they were alive and had perjured himself as charged in Count 5 when he spoke of one being dead.
97 Count 23 alleges that on March 6, 1980, Rafael Torres Marrero committed perjury before a grand jury when he asserted that by the time the wounded undercover agent was leaving, when the car was already leaving, they were putting the other injured man inside the car. Because the evidence establishes that the only other people allegedly injured were the independentistas, and that neither victim had been shot until after the undercover agent had been taken to the hospital, see evidence discussed in conjunction with Count 5, supra, the record contains sufficient evidence to support this conviction.
98 Count 29 charges Bruno Gonzalez with perjury for stating before a grand jury, among other things, that by the time he arrived at the area of the shootings, Soto Arrivi's body had already been removed. Appellants' assert that [t]his answer was literally true although it conveyed false information by implication. 99 The government produced sufficient evidence to support a conviction under Count 29. Montanez testified that Bruno Gonzalez was present when the exchange of shots between the independentistas and the officers occurred. Montanez claims that after the initial volley of shots, the independentistas gave up their arms. At that point, they were put in Bruno Gonzalez's control while the other officers conducted a brief examination of the area. Thus, if Montanez is believed, Bruno was at the scene well before Soto Arrivi was killed and carried away. 100 Similarly, Cartagena Flores testified that after their capture, the independentistas were kneeling together. Four agents, Reveron, Bruno, Moreno, and Torres, surrounded them. Shortly thereafter, the independentistas were shot. The jury could certainly infer from this testimony that Bruno Gonzalez was present at the time the independentistas were shot, and thus before Soto Arrivi's body had been carried away.
101 Count 44 charges Mateo Espada with perjury for stating before a grand jury that after July 25, 1978, he never discussed the shootings with Perez Casillas. Given Miguel Cartagena Flores' testimony that he, Perez Casillas, and Mateo Espada met and talked about the shootings on September 12, 1983, 29 we find appellants' claim that the government presented insufficient evidence of literal falsity to be without merit.
102 To convict a person of perjury, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1621 (1982) requires that the allegedly perjurious statement pertain to a material matter. See United States v. Goguen, 723 F.2d 1012, 1019 (1st Cir.1983); United States v. Indorato, 628 F.2d 711, 717 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 1016, 101 S.Ct. 578, 66 L.Ed.2d 476 (1980). Recently, in United States v. Scivola, 766 F.2d 37 (1st Cir.1985), we elaborated on the meaning of materiality, stating that the test for materiality is a broad one. A statement is material if it is 'capable of influencing the tribunal on the issue before it.' The statement need not be material to any particular issue in the case, but rather may be material to any proper matter of the jury's inquiry, including the issue of credibility. Id. at 44 (citations omitted). 103 Here, appellants claim that Counts 10, 11, 12, and 28 should have been dismissed for lack of materiality. 30 The government disagrees, arguing that all four counts point to the same scheme--the attempt by appellants to conceal the presence of Jose Montanez Ortiz at the shootings. Thus, the government contends, defendants devised the story that Cruz, not Montanez, took the second flight from San Juan to Ponce on July 25, 1978 (Counts 10 and 11). Similarly, Bruno Gonzalez's statement that Colon Berrios was in charge of the agents near the tower (Count 28) allegedly hid the fact that Montanez Ortiz was at Cerro Maravilla and in command of those agents. 104 Although the government produced no direct evidence proving that the perjurious statements about Cruz's activities were designed to hide Montanez's role, 31 the record contained enough circumstantial evidence to allow such a conclusion to be drawn. The government established that Montanez was in command of the agents operating around the television tower and that he flew with Nelson Gonzalez Perez from the Isla Grande Airport in San Juan to the Mercedita Airport in Ponce. Moreover, Cruz testified that he did not fly to Cerro Maravilla on July 25. Indeed, Cruz asserted that for his benefit, months after the shootings, Perez Casillas and other officers retraced the route they had taken to Cerro Maravilla on July 25. They did so to allow Cruz to testify falsely before the senate that he had accompanied Perez Casillas and others to Cerro Maravilla on the day of the shootings. 105 We believe that this evidence is sufficient to allow a reasonable jury to infer that defendants attempted to conceal Montanez' involvement by substituting Cruz in his place. 106 We are also satisfied that the concealment of Montanez's role falls within the materiality requirement of section 1621. The perjury charges before us arose out of three cases: two involved federal grand juries investigating the killings and the third pertained to a civil action alleging violations of Rosado's and Soto Arrivi's federally protected rights. In each case, knowledge of the precise people involved in the shootings and the role each person played was capable of influencing the tribunal on the issue before it. Scivola, 766 F.2d at 44. For example, in assessing liability, the jury trying the civil case would certainly be interested in knowing whether Montanez was at the shootings. Accordingly, we affirm appellants' convictions on Counts 10-12 and 28. 107
108 Appellants next attack the convictions returned under Counts 21, 22, 30 and 40, claiming that the government produced insufficient evidence. We find these arguments to be without merit.
109 Count 21 charges Torres Marrero with perjury for the following testimony before a grand jury: 110 Q. With respect to the man who was taken to the hospital who had been shooting at the police, did you see anyone strike or hit that person at any time? 111 A. No. 112 Q. Referring to the one who was just wounded? 113 A. No. Nobody was hit. 114 Torres Marrero asserts that because no evidence established that he actually saw an independentista being struck, his conviction under Count 21 cannot stand. The government does not respond to Torres Marrero's claim, but argues that the jury properly concluded that Torres' unqualified statement that [n]obody was hit was knowingly false. 115 We believe the government presented sufficient evidence to support the conviction. A number of witnesses testified that Torres Marrero was one of the four agents who surrounded the independentistas immediately after their capture. See, e.g., testimony of Miguel Cartagena Flores (Q. And who were these agents that were around these two individuals [Soto and Rosado]? A. Agent Reveron, Bruno, Moreno, and Torres ) (emphasis added); testimony of Antonio Mendez Rivera (Q. Who was present, to your knowledge, in the immediate area where the shots that you have described, were fired ...? A. Rafael Moreno, Rafael Torres, and Luis Reveron) (emphasis added). 116 The government also demonstrated that immediately prior to the fatal shootings, the two independentistas were repeatedly assaulted. Montanez testified [a]fter the shooting event ... the atmosphere was very hot because believing that the [undercover] agent, the fellow worker that was hurt was such a damaging hurt that it could cause his death and there was a collective hysteria going on by which the arrested persons were beaten. Similarly, Julio Ortiz Molina (the publico, i.e., cab, driver) stated that [t]hey [the independentistas] were being kicked and hit with the butt of rifles. 117 This evidence was sufficient to allow the jury to conclude either that (1) Torres Marrero must have seen the beatings going on or (2) even if he did not actually see the beatings, his presence in the immediate area made it inevitable that he knew of them and thus lied by stating that nobody was hit.
118 In Count 22, Torres Marrero was charged with perjury for the following testimony before the grand jury: 119 Q. After the initial shooting did you hear any shots fired later?A. No, no fires--nothing was shot. 120 On appeal, he claims that the government presented no evidence that he actually heard the shots. 121 As shown in the discussion of Count 21, Torres Marrero was one of the four agents surrounding the independentistas after their capture. The testimony of Miguel Cartagena Flores, among other people, demonstrated that Torres Marrero was still nearby when Rosado and Soto Arrivi were killed. Indeed, Antonio Mendez Rivera, a police officer present at Cerro Maravilla, testified that Mr. Moreno grabs the weapon that Rafael Torres [Marrero] was using, and fired at the one who turned out to be Soto Arrivi. See also the testimony of Montanez Ortiz (Moreno Morales told Montanez that someone had not wanted or had not dared to shoot at Soto Arrivi and that [Moreno Morales] took away his weapon and shot him). 122 In light of this evidence, the jury was certainly entitled to conclude that Torres Marrero was lying when he stated that no, no fires--nothing was shot. Because people far away from the shootings heard the gun fire, it is reasonable to infer that Torres Marrero, who was within six feet of the independentistas, must have heard the shots.
123 Count 30 alleges that Bruno Gonzalez perjured himself before a grand jury by responding no when asked After the first shooting was over, did you hear throughout the rest of the next hour any other shot fired?. Because the evidence demonstrated that Bruno Gonzalez was one of the four agents surrounding the independentistas before their death, see discussion of Count 21, the jury could have reasonably inferred that he must have heard the shots.
124 Count 40 claims that Rios Polanco committed perjury before a grand jury when he stated that he did not hear any shots after the initial volley. Although Rios Polanco does not appear to have been as close to the independentistas as were Bruno Gonzalez and Torres Marrero, a number of witnesses testified that he was in the general vicinity of the Channel 7 facility. Given this evidence, it was the jury's responsibility to evaluate whether Rios Polanco, like others not in the immediate area, heard the shootings. 125
126 Nelson Gonzalez Perez claims that his convictions under Counts 32, 33, 34, and 35 must be reversed. While before the grand jury, Gonzalez Perez stated that he did not remember seeing Jose Montanez Ortiz (Count 32), Luis Reveron Martinez (Count 33), Rafael Moreno Morales (Count 34), or Rosado and Soto Arrivi (Count 35) between the hours of 7:30 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. on July 25, 1978. The government, however, produced evidence showing that he was present at Cerro Maravilla at those times and that those individuals were likewise there, permitting the jury to infer, given the enormity of the events and his association with Montanez, Reveron and Moreno, that he was lying when he said he did not remember. 127 Gonzalez now argues that, 128 It is the responsibility of the lawyer to probe.... If a witness evades, it is the lawyer's responsibility to recognize the evation [sic] and to bring the witness back to the mark, to flush out the whole truth with the tools of adversary examination.... [Here,] the prosecutor took his [Gonzalez Perez's] answers and failed to follow them up. 129 Brief at 53. 130 We assume that Gonzalez Perez is arguing that his answers were too vague to support a perjury conviction. We disagree. Gonzalez clearly stated that he did not remember and the jury was entitled to conclude that, under these circumstances, he did remember, and was perjuring himself when he declared otherwise. 32 United States v. Ponticelli, 622 F.2d 985, 989 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 1016, 101 S.Ct. 578, 66 L.Ed.2d 476 (1980).
131 Appellants contend that Counts 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 42, and 44 should have been dismissed because they pertain to declarations made before a grand jury whose investigation was already complete. Appellants present no evidence indicating that the grand jury's investigation had concluded by the time the perjurious statements charged in Counts 31-35, 41-42 were made. Accordingly, we affirm the convictions returned under the counts.