Court Opinion

ID: 9465515
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 00:48:23.693379+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:13.021136
License: Public Domain

MANSFIELD, Circuit Judge
(concurring):
I concur in Judge Timbers’ carefully considered opinion.
I would only add that in my view the conduct of the SEC representatives (Tucker and Perlmutter) in continuing to negotiate a civil settlement after appellants’ counsel had repeatedly stated that they were negotiating on the basis that there would not be any criminal reference was deceitful and duplicitous.
Judge Haight found that at the very first meeting between defense counsel and Messrs. Tucker and Perlmutter, which took place on January 14, 1975, Tucker was advised that defense counsel’s objective was “the avoidance of a criminal reference” and this was made clear to the same SEC counsel at a meeting on February 28, 1975. Moreover, after rejecting Tucker’s testimony to the effect that he had in September 1975 told defense counsel that there was “no deal on criminal” Judge Haight further found that on September 30, 1975, former Judge Streit, who was substituting for Mr. Gould as chief defense counsel, advised that “in light of the fact that there [was] to be no criminal prosecution,” he would endeav- or to obtain the amount of the repayment demanded by the SEC, to which Tucker and Perlmutter made no response even though Perlmutter had in the interim been in communication with the U.S. Attorney about the case. In October 1975 Perlmutter confirmed to a lawyer representing a prospective outside director of TDA that there would be no criminal reference, and an attorney for appellant Sandberg told Tucker and Perlmutter that he would advise his client to settle, since settlement was “better than going over to the golden dome [U.S. Courthouse],” to which the SEC counsel made no response.
Once they were advised by appellants’ counsel of the basis on which the latter were proceeding, SEC counsel surely owed an ethical obligation immediately to correct the record by advising counsel that they had already initiated an informal criminal reference or at least that they felt free to do so. However, since appellants’ counsel, with no viable alternative, faced the prospect that the incriminating evidence would in any event be forwarded by the New York County District Attorney to the SEC without restrictions on its use no prejudice warranting dismissal of the indictment is shown.