Court Opinion

ID: 9481521
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 08:21:44.060198+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:48:22.633860
License: Public Domain

MINER, Circuit Judge,
dissenting in part:
Because I would affirm the appellant’s convictions on the counts charging him with depriving the United States of lawful duty payments under 18 U.S.C. § 542, as well as on the counts charging him with mail fraud in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1341, I respectfully dissent in part.
As recognized by my brethren, Maj. op. at 147, two distinct offenses are defined by the provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 542: the entry of imported merchandise by means of a false statement, “whether or not the United States shall or may be deprived of any lawful duties”; and any willful act or omission “whereby the United States shall or may be deprived of lawful duties.” We deal here with the second offense, for which appellant was convicted upon uncon-troverted evidence that he converted to his personal use substantial sums of money furnished to him as a customs broker by Samsung for the payment of custom duties on electronic equipment imported into this country. My brethren “hold that the government must prove that the link between the act and the deprivation was so direct that defendant knew or should have known his actions would deprive the government of lawful duties.” Id. at 153. The conviction is reversed and a new trial ordered because “the government never attempted to prove Yip’s scienter, and the trial court did not instruct the jury on this issue.” Id. I am unable to agree with the holding or its consequences.
The district court instructed the jury using the precise statutory language defining the second offense set out in § 542. The *154court further instructed that “the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt ... that the defendant acted knowingly and willfully.” The very next instruction included the standard definitions of “knowingly” and “willfully.” I think that these instructions are all that appellant was entitled to on the issue of scienter and that the evidence fully justified his conviction. I do not know what deficiencies my brethren refer to when they describe the absence of a “link” between act and deprivation so direct as to demonstrate that defendant knew or should have known that he would be depriving the government of customs duties. What could be more direct than the theft of monies known to be due and payable to the United States?
Of course, it could be said that appellant could not know that the government would be deprived of its duties if he believed that Samsung eventually would pay. But that type of knowledge is not what the statute requires. What is required is a knowing act which “shall or may” deprive the government of monies due it. The jury certainly was free to find that appellant’s act of stealing was knowing as well as willful. As far as the deprivation, the act of stealing itself demonstrated that the customs duties stolen might never find their way into the government’s coffers. It seems ludicrous for appellant to be exonerated from liability merely because someone else would make good on his obligation. Samsung eventually did make good, despite having given appellant the same amount previously for the same purpose. The government did in fact lose money here, however, because it agreed to waive penalties and interest for late payment.
In any event, I think that it reads too much into the statute to impose a specific scienter requirement with regard to the government’s loss of money, as the majority holds. The statute requires only that the government shall or may be deprived. Whether the government is or is not ultimately deprived really is of no moment. The historical background discussed in the majority opinion relates to statutes worded much differently from the one with which we are concerned. Likewise, the cases cited in the majority opinion provide no direct support for a requirement of knowledge of actual deprivation. There simply is no basis to say, in view of the plain language of the statute, that “Congress must have planned that ... the willfulness of a person’s acts must not only extend to their voluntariness and the person’s competency, but also to the defendant’s ability to foresee the act’s effect on the government’s loss of customs duties.” Id. at 153. If Congress wanted to include the element of forseeability in section 542, it certainly knew how to do so.
Finally, I do not agree that the government’s interpretation of the statute is so “all encompassing” as to sweep within it the “indirect acts” of “an ordinary citizen going about his business.” Only those who willfully act or fail to act in such a way as to cause the government to lose, or to stand in jeopardy of losing, customs duties, are covered. Not every fraud perpetrated by a customs broker upon a customer will give rise to a successful prosecution, as my brethren fear. Only those frauds that jeopardize the collection of customs duties, whether the duties ultimately are lost or not, were the concern of Congress in enacting this statute. The failure of the majority to recognize the fact that Congress has exercised its power to criminalize this sort of conduct compels my dissent.