Court Opinion

ID: 9644375
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 20:54:34.938599+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:12.463367
License: Public Domain

CLARK, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
The present is one of those disturbing cases where the conduct of the defendant is most unattractive, to put it mildly; and yet there was real doubt whether he had defrauded his friends or merely imposed upon their good nature and willingness to help him as he wished. I feel I must say that, in my judgment, not only was guilt not overwhelming, but it was so doubtful that *400extreme care was needed to insure a fair trial, particularly in view of the natural prejudice which defendant’s conduct tended to inspire. But that care was not exercised.
The defense centered on the point that the various persons who cashed the checks for defendant knew what he was, up to and assisted him knowingly. Although I agree that even on this issue there was sufficient evidence to take the case to the jury, my view as to the substantial character of the trial court’s errors is necessarily influenced by my own conclusion that the affirmative evidence of knowledge was strong. Certainly agents of the Essex House had it, and the only question here is how far the higher-ups in that organization remained in ignorance notwithstanding the sizable amounts of these daily transactions. Again there can be no question but that Goetz and Miller had knowledge at some time while the practice continued; the only question is whether for a period one of them at least lacked it. Hence cross-examination of these witnesses as to their prior statements, declarations, and conduct was highly important and significant. Refusal to permit such examination was, therefore, clearly erroneous, as the opinion points out. In view of'the importance of this evidence on the most vital issue of the case, I think this ruling alone would require reversal.
As to Reynolds, defendant appealed to him for checks signed in blank, in order to get out of the jam he was in, and Reynolds naively complied. What would he have sent the checks for except that they might be used to bolster defendant’s shaky financial condition? Perhaps here, too, there was evidence for the jury, although it points more in the direction of a violation of agency instructions than an intent to defraud by mail. At any rate, the evidence being thus equivocal, errors in the trial become the more important.
Under all the circumstances, I would find error not only in the limitation of cross-examination of Goetz and Miller already referred to, but also in the action taken with respect to the other two matters particularly considered in the opinion, as well as in the conduct of the trial generally. The question of use in the federal courts of defendant’s examination in the state supplementary proceedings, absolutely privileged on a state prosecution, is, as the opinion shows, not settled. I believe, however, that Clark v. State, supra, states the better rule, unless we definitely wish to trap persons between the interstices of the overlapping state and federal sovereignties. Cases such as United States v. Murdock, supra, show merely that defendant could not have refused to answer in the state proceedings; they do not hold that the immunity promised him can be substantially nullified by the wide scope of the federal mail fraud and conspiracy statutes. In plain fact he was required to incriminate himself. And the justification thought to be obtained by delaying prosecution until the statute of limitations had run as to matter covered by a part of his examination seems to me beneath the dignity of a great government, indeed, not the maintaining of those “civilized standards of procedure and evidence” required by McNabb v. United States, 63 S.Ct. 608, 613, 87 L.Ed.-.
As to the proof of the similar Emanuel transactions many years earlier, of course the admissibility of such evidence should generally be within the discretion of the trial court; but if I am correct that the case was so close on the showing of both an intent to defraud and a defrauding, then this long outdated evidence might well have been enough to turn the scales against defendant.
There were other details of the trial which I find disturbing, in view of this condition of the evidence. These included such matters as the different treatment of defense and prosecution counsel, the former being required to state his proposed testimony at length in chambers, to be there ruled out for the most part, while the latter was allowed to present his claims as usual in the courtroom before the jury; or the allowing of an inference against defendant for not calling Mrs. Reynolds’ Florida lawyer to rebut a self-serving reference by her on the witness stand; or as to errors in the charge clearly made, though possibly corrected before the jury retired. Without rehearsing these in detail, I must express my fear that defendant was tried and convicted of general amoral conduct, rather than of specific intent to defraud by mail.