Opinion ID: 6500514
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Denial of Scarfo’s Request to File a Motion

Text: for a New Trial Pursuant to Rule 33(b)108 Scarfo challenges the District Court’s denial of his posttrial request for leave to file a motion for a new trial pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 33. His request explained that his proposed motion was based on purported Brady violations and new information that only surfaced after trial. The “new information” consisted of certain witness statements taken prior to the trial and pursuant to an unrelated investigation of human-trafficking activity, an investigation that was ultimately prosecuted in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (the “Botsvynyuk case”).109 See generally United States v. Churuk, 797 F. App’x 680, 682 (3d Cir. 2020) (summarizing that prosecution). Scarfo and his codefendants wanted access to those witness statements, memorialized on FBI forms known as 302s, because they might mention Pelullo. 110 And, because of 108 The standard of review associated with this motion is discussed herein. 109 The government, for its part, first learned about the witness statements when Pelullo’s attorney notified the government that he had received the documents from a defense attorney in the Botsvynyuk case. Prosecutors then obtained copies of the statements from their counterparts in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania before furnishing them to the District Court here for in camera review. 110 “The FD-302, commonly referred to simply as a ‘302’, is the form … used by FBI agents to summarize 156 Pelullo’s involvement in the human trafficking, the Defendants thought the documents might in turn show criminal conduct by Cory Leshner – Pelullo’s “right hand man” and later a key government witness – and therefore provide helpful impeachment evidence. (D.I. 1237 at 12-13.) Pelullo thus filed a sealed motion to compel disclosure of the 302s, and Scarfo filed a motion to subpoena the documents pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 17.111 After reviewing the 302s in camera – and entertaining witnesses’ statements and interviews.” United States v. Lacerda, 958 F.3d 196, 218 n.7 (3d Cir. 2020). Apparently Pelullo was involved with one of the companies that hired the human-trafficking victims in the Botsvynyuk case, but the investigation there did not uncover any evidence that Pelullo was complicit in the violations. When trial in that case was approaching, a defense attorney – Mark Cedrone, who had represented Pelullo in earlier stages of this case – may have intended to allege that Pelullo was responsible for employing the victims, so, for purposes of discovery, government attorneys put together a file of all documents containing Pelullo’s name. Pelullo’s attorney here “had the opportunity to review a portion of the 302 reports [produced by the government] and take notes on relevant details set forth therein” (D.I. 1237 at 5), but the Defendants wanted to have their own copies of the entire file. 111 As the government points out, a subpoena pursuant to Rule 17 was likely an improper mechanism for obtaining the sought-after information. That rule provides, in relevant part, “The court may direct the witness to produce [books, papers, 157 multiple rounds of briefing plus a hearing – the District Court denied the motions as seeking irrelevant and non-exculpatory information and because the 302s never mentioned Leshner. The Court also made clear that it would not entertain any more motions from the Defendants before sentencing. Scarfo then requested leave to move for a new trial.112 The District Court denied the request as “probably untimely” and because the 302s simply did not contain the information claimed by Scarfo. (D.I. 1281.) It is that decision – not the previous decision denying Scarfo’s Rule 17 motion to documents, data, or other objects the subpoena designates] in court before trial or before they are to be offered in evidence.” Fed. R. Crim. P. 17(c)(1). It is “not intended to provide a means of discovery for criminal cases” but rather “was designed to expedite a trial by providing a time and place before trial for the inspection of the subpoenaed materials.” United States v. Amirnazmi, 645 F.3d 564, 595 (3d Cir. 2011) (citations, internal quotation marks, and alterations omitted). 112 Scarfo claimed that his motion was based upon new information that surfaced post- trial, related to the (1) the investigation in United States v. Botsvynyuk, (2) the Pelullos, (3) the Leshners, (4) Frank McGonigal, (5) Ken Stein, (6) Gary McCarthy, and (7) Howard Drossner, and all mentioned parties’ ties to use of indentured servitude by and through various related cleaning companies. (D.I. 1280 at 2 (footnotes omitted).) 158 subpoena the 302s – that Scarfo now challenges on appeal.113 He concedes that he has “struggled to identify applicable precedent related to a court’s failure to consider a motion for new trial[,]” but he still believes that the District Court’s denial of leave to file the new-trial motion violated his constitutional rights. (NS Opening Br. at 176.) In many contexts, we have adhered to an abuse-of- discretion standard of review when evaluating a challenge to a district court’s denial of a request for leave to take some step in litigation. See, e.g., Talley v. Wetzel, 15 F.4th 275, 285 n.6 (3d Cir. 2021) (leave to amend complaint); Jones v. Zimmerman, 752 F.2d 76, 78 (3d Cir. 1985) (leave to proceed in forma pauperis); In re United Corp., 283 F.2d 593, 594-96 (3d Cir. 1960) (leave to file untimely statement of objections to an agency decision). The same deference should be afforded to district courts that find it necessary to prohibit further motion practice when issues have been aired and the time has come to move on. Cf. Pierce v. Underwood, 487 U.S. 552, 558 n.1 (1988) (“It is especially common for issues involving what can broadly be labeled ‘supervision of litigation,’ … to be given abuse-of-discretion review.”); United States v. Sheppard, 17 F.4th 449, 454 (3d Cir. 2021) (“Underlying our review for abuse of discretion are the principles that: 1) a district court may have a better vantage point than we on the Court of Appeals to assess the matter, and 2) courts of appeals apply the abuse-of-discretion standard to fact-bound issues that are ill-suited for appellate rule-making[.]” (citations and internal quotation marks omitted)). 113 The government’s arguments on the merits of Scarfo’s Rule 17 motion are therefore irrelevant. 159 Scarfo does not raise any basis for concluding that the District Court abused its discretion in denying his request, nor do we detect any. He does not dispute the District Court’s conclusions that a motion for a new trial would likely be untimely and that the 302s did not contain the information he claimed they did. Nor does he dispute that the Court had already entertained “an extraordinary number of written motions” (D.I. 1281 at 1) – including more than a half-dozen after trial. Instead, he simply summarizes his attempts in the District Court to procure the 302s, then concludes that he “seeks remand for consideration of his motion for new trial under Rule 33(b), given the facts set forth herein[.]”114 (NS Opening Br. at 181.) Because he fails to demonstrate that the District Court’s denial of leave was “arbitrary or irrational” or rested upon “a clearly erroneous finding of fact, an errant conclusion of law or an improper application of law to fact[,]” Scarfo has not shown an abuse of discretion. United States v. 114 The one case Scarfo does cite, Ogden v. United States, 112 F. 523 (3d Cir. 1902), predates the adoption of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which impose a “rigid” time limit on motions for new trials. Eberhart v. United States, 546 U.S. 12, 13 (2005). It is also factually distinguishable: the defendant there moved for a new trial immediately following the verdict based on undisputed evidence of extraneous influences on the jury, while Scarfo joined in three prior newtrial motions and does not dispute that the documents he sought would not have given him the information he wanted. Ogden, 112 F. at 524-25. 160 Gonzalez, 905 F.3d 165, 195 (3d Cir. 2018) (citation omitted).115