Court Opinion

ID: 9629534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:44:17.726065+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:49.523408
License: Public Domain

FISHER, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I write separately to express disagreement with my colleagues’ conclusions regarding the sufficiency of the evidence to convict the Defendants on Count One, the conspiracy to violate the Animal Enterprise Protection Act (AEPA). Although I agree with most of the majority’s analysis as to why the AEPA is constitutional on its face and as applied to the Defendants, I part company with my colleagues in assessing whether the Government in fact proved that the Defendants committed a conspiracy to violate the AEPA. This issue, though narrow, is nonetheless significant for this case. In light of the statutory prohibitions of the AEPA and the evidence that the Government presented at trial, I cannot conclude that there was sufficient evidence, as a matter of law, to convict the Defendants of conspiring to violate the AEPA. Therefore, I would reverse the convictions as to all Defendants on this count.
The majority states that the issue in controversy on appeal is whether there was sufficient evidence that Defendants conspired to cause “physical disruption to the functioning of Huntingdon” and to “intentionally damage or cause the loss of property to Huntingdon.” Majority Op. at Part V.A. I would frame the central issue differently, instead asking whether there was sufficient evidence that the Defendants formed an agreement, the purpose of which would violate the AEPA, and had the specific intent to further this illegal goal. See Salinas v. United States, 522 U.S. 52, 65, 118 S.Ct. 469, 139 L.Ed.2d 352 (1997) (“A conspirator must intend to further an endeavor which, if completed, would satisfy all of the elements of a substantive criminal offense, but it suffices that he adopt the goal of furthering or facilitating the criminal endeavor.”). While this distinction is subtle, its effect on how one views the Government’s evidence is not.
In reviewing the Defendants’ challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence, we must view the evidence in the light most favor*166able to the Government and ask whether any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 318-19, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). Here, the version of the AEPA under which the Defendants were convicted prescribes punishment for anyone who
“(1) ... uses or causes to be used the mail or any facility in interstate or foreign commerce for the purpose of causing physical disruption to the functioning of an animal enterprise; and
(2) intentionally damages or causes the loss of any property (including animals or records) used by the animal enterprise, or conspires to do so.”
18 U.S.C. § 43(a) (2002). Accordingly, to prove a conspiracy to violate this statute, the Government needed to demonstrate that the Defendants formed an agreement to “cause[ ] physical disruption to the functioning of an animal enterprise” and to “damage[ ] or cause[ ] the loss of any property ... used by the animal enterprise,” and that each Defendant had the specific intent to further this agreement.18
I agree with the majority that proving a conspiracy, in general, requires the Government to establish an agreement among the group to accomplish unlawful goals and the specific intent on the part of each individual to further those illegal goals, see Majority Op. at Part V.A. (quoting United States v. McKee, 506 F.3d 225, 239 (3d Cir.2007)); nonetheless, to prove a particular type of conspiracy requires establishing that the goals were ones prohibited by a specific law. That is, a goal can only be considered unlawful in reference to a particular prohibition. Here, the prohibition at issue is physically disrupting an animal enterprise and intending to cause damage or loss to its property in violation of the AEPA.
In discussing the Defendants’ insufficiency of the evidence argument, the majority simply states: “[W]e find that the object of Defendants’ conspiracy was to cause a physical disruption to Huntingdon, an animal enterprise, and to intentionally damage or cause the loss of property.” Majority Op. at Part V.A. As support for this statement, the majority refers back to an earlier portion of the opinion, in which it addresses the Defendants’ argument that the District Court incorrectly instructed the jury on the elements of the conspiracy to violate the AEPA charge. However, the portion of the opinion to which the majority refers simply asserts, without any concrete examples or support from the record, that the “government’s evidence showed that the ultimate object of the conspiracy was to cause a physical disruption — which the jury instruction defined as ‘interference with the normal course of business or activity’ — at Hun-tingdon resulting in damage to Hunting-don.” Majority Op. at Part IV. I fail to see how the evidence relied upon by the Government and recounted by the majority establishes that the object of the conspiracy was to cause physical disruption at Huntingdon.
On the contrary, the evidence that the majority describes throughout its opinion consists primarily of either conduct that was directed at companies affiliated with Huntingdon — such as an investment banking company (Stephens, Inc.), a pharmaceutical client (Chiron), an insurance broker (Marsh, Inc.), and an auditor (Deloitte *167& Touche) — and the employees of fhose companies' — e.g., Sally Dillenback, Marion Harlos, and Robert Harper — or “illegal activity” in a very general sense. More specifically, to highlight a few examples, the majority discusses “a massive direct action campaign” targeted at Stephens, Inc., which involved a protest with “hundreds of activists attempting to access Stephens’s, website simultaneously and repeatedly in an effort to shut it down”; “a protest of approximately twenty people at a New York office of Deloitte and Touche,” during which “protestors threw flyers” and “chanted and plastered stickers”; the coordination of “Black Fax Mondays” targeted at “Stephens, Inc. and Bank of New York”; “the extensive use of various encryption devices and programs used to erase incriminating data from [certain Defendants’] computer hard drives”; and the publication of “the personal information of Huntingdon employees and companies associated with Huntingdon for the purpose of encouraging harassment, intimidation, and threats.” While I of course do not condone this type of conduct, and I do not dispute that this evidence sufficed to convict the various Defendants on the interstate stalking and the telecommunications harassment counts, I fail to see any evidence of an agreement to cause physical disruption to Huntingdon — -as opposed to other non-animal enterprise companies affiliated with Huntingdon — or to cause damage or loss to property used by Hun-tingdon.19
Notably, at the time the Defendants were prosecuted, the AEPA did not criminalize harassment of employees of an animal enterprise or employees of companies affiliated with an animal enterprise. Rather, in 2006 Congress amended the statute to authorize punishment for anyone who:
“uses ... any facility of interstate or foreign commerce—
(1) for the purpose of damaging or interfering with the operations of an animal enterprise; and
(2) in connection with such purpose—
(A) intentionally damages or causes the loss of any real or personal property (including animals or records) used by an animal enterprise, or any real or personal property of a person or entity having a connection to, relationship with, or transactions with an animal enterprise;
(B) intentionally places a person in reasonable fear of the death of, or serious bodily injury to that person, a member of the immediate family ... of that person, or a spouse or intimate partner of that person by a course of conduct involving threats, acts of vandalism, property damage, criminal trespass, harassment, or intimidation; or
(C) conspires or attempts to do so.”
*16818 U.S.C. § 43(a) (2006) (emphasis added). Significantly, the amended act allows liability to be premised upon causing damage to the property of any person, or entity, having a connection with an animal enterprise and threatening, harassing, or intimidating any such person. Additionally, the amended act does not require that the defendant cause “physical disruption” and instead prohibits “interfering” with the operations of an animal enterprise. Thus I acknowledge that the Government’s case against these Defendants would be much stronger if they were prosecuted under the current version of the AEPA. However, the version of the AEPA that the Defendants were charged with violating did not prohibit mere interference with the operations of an animal enterprise nor did it proscribe targeting companies and employees that were affiliated with an animal enterprise and, therefore, proof that the Defendants engaged in this type of conduct was not a sufficient basis for convicting them under the AEPA.
As the majority discusses in the context of the void for vagueness arguments, “Defendants were charged with intending to cause physical disruption to the functioning of an animal enterprise and to cause economic damages exceeding $10,000.” Majority Op. at Part III.A.1. While I would add, to be precise, that the AEPA requires an intent to cause both physical disruption to the animal enterprise and damage or loss of property of the animal enterprise (amounting to at least $10,000), a finding of specific intent is clearly required to convict the Defendants of violating this statute.20 Therefore, it is not enough to show intent to engage in illegal actions; rather, the Government needed to prove specific intent to further a goal that, if accomplished, would violate the AEPA in order to convict for the conspiracy charged in Count One. But, due to the lack of evidence demonstrating the Defendants’ specific intent to facilitate the physical disruption of and damage to or loss of property used by Huntingdon, the majority relies on only general statements about the Defendants’ illegal activity. For example, the majority states that Kjonaas violated the AEPA through his “involvement in and coordination of [more instances] of illegal activity than we could possibly recount here”; Gazzola was “instrumental in the planning and execution of SHAC’s illegal activities,” having “repeatedly employed illegal tactics” as part of the strategy to close down Huntingdon; Conroy “instigated imminent, illegal activity” by posting information regarding civil electronic disobedience on SHAC’s website; Stepanian “provided strong circumstantial evidence of his planning and execution of illegal protest activity” based on a conversation during which Stepanian told Kjonaas he could not share information over the phone; Harper “coordinated a SHAC campaign in Seattle,” indicated his “pleasure with SHAC’s successes,” “gave speeches” on how to send “black faxes” and “wrote an editorial in which he endorsed militant action”21; and Fullmer “coordinated illegal *169protest activity on behalf of SHAC via a Yahoo message board,” which provided information about transmitting black faxes to Stephens, Inc. and Bank of New York. Majority Op. at Part III.A.2. Of course, the Government, and not the majority, is at fault for this lack of evidence of the Defendants’ specific intent to violate the AEPA because it failed to adduce the necessary evidence of this purpose and intent at trial.
In sum, even when the evidence is viewed in the light most favorable to the Government, it simply does not establish that the Defendants entered into an agreement, the purpose of which, if accomplished, would violate the statutory provisions of the AEPA, and that they likewise had the specific intent to further this particular goal. While the Government’s evidence tended to prove that the Defendants conspired together to put economic pressure on Huntingdon to close its facilities by targeting companies that did business with Huntingdon, as well as their employees, and furthered this goal through a campaign of intimidation and harassment, the Government’s evidence did not prove an agreement to cause physical disruption to Huntingdon and damage to property it used. For this reason, I would reverse each Defendant’s conviction on Count One, because no rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime of conspiracy to violate the AEPA beyond a reasonable doubt.

. The parties do not dispute that the Internet qualifies as a facility in interstate commerce and that Huntingdon meets the definition of an animal enterprise. See 18 U.S.C. § 43(d)(1)(A) (2002) (defining "animal enterprise” as a "commercial ... enterprise that uses animals for ... research!] or testing”).

. Perhaps the best evidence of an agreement to violate the AEPA that the majority cites is its reference to "posts coordinating electronic civil disobedience with the goal of flooding the Huntingdon servers, fax machines, and phones, as well as those of companies affiliated with Huntingdon.” Majority Op. at Part III.A.2. This evidence is stronger than the rest because it involves conduct actually directed at Huntingdon as opposed to only third parties. But without any cite to the record or specific examples of the Defendants targeting Huntingdon, this reference is nothing more than an unsupported characterization of the evidence that the Government now offers of what it presented at trial. Moreover, even if record support for targeting Huntingdon’s servers, fax machines, and phones existed, this conduct is hard to fit within the language of the AEPA, which prohibits causing a physical disruption not an electronic disruption.

. Specific intent is necessary to demonstrate a substantive violation of the AEPA and is required to prove a conspiracy of any sort. See Salinas, 522 U.S. at 65, 118 S.Ct. 469; United States v. Wexler, 838 F.2d 88, 90-91 (3d Cir.1988).

. The majority concedes that “Harper’s personal conduct does not cross the line of illegality; [and] to punish him simply on the basis of his political speeches would run afoul of the constitution.” Majority Op. at Part III.A.2. Nonetheless, the majority finds that Harper’s conduct "does provide circumstantial evidence from which a jury could have reasonably inferred that Harper was involved in a conspiracy to violate the AEPA.” Id. In my view the majority’s statement that “Harper’s personal conduct does not cross the line of illegality” does not distinguish him from the other Defendants because there is likewise *169no direct evidence that the other Defendants "expressly agreed to participate in the conspiracy and further its unlawful goals." Majority Op. at Part V.A. I disagree that there is sufficient circumstantial evidence to allow a jury to infer a conspiracy to violate the AEPA on the part of Harper or the other Defendants.