Court Opinion

ID: 9484009
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:37:43.386723+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:57.607618
License: Public Domain

BATCHELDER, Circuit Judge,,
concurring.
I concur in this case, but I write separately because my analysis of the issue in regard to the motion for acquittal differs from that of the majority.
The majority has accurately set forth what the indictment did and did not charge in this case, and what the evidence did and did not demonstrate. It is undisputed that the defendant was an officer of his corporation, Woods and Water. It is undisputed that the law applicable to this defendant’s employment status is Georgia law, and that under Georgia law an officer of a corporation is an employee of that corporation. Accordingly, it seems to me that because this defendant was an employee of the corporation, he was not, as a matter of law, self-employed. Thus his statement that he was not self-employed was not, as a matter of law, false, and therefore he was entitled to a judgment of acquittal unless the evidence permitted a finding that the corporate veil could be pierced. Here, as the majority opinion makes clear, the government simply did not present any evidence that the defendant had done any of the things with regard to the corporation which would permit such a finding. Because the actual falsity of the statement is an element of the offense, a failure of proof on that issue is fatal to a conviction. Therefore, since the evidence presented did not warrant an instruction to the jury on piercing the corporate veil, even if the instruction which the district court gave the jury had been adequate to explain what the jury must consider in determining whether to disregard the existence of the corporation, the district court erred in sending this matter to the jury at all.
It is clear that this defendant intended to make and indeed, did make a false statement to the government. However, he was not indicted for the false statement which he actually made, but for the statement which could only have been false if the government adequately established the identity between the defendant and his corporation. This the government did not do.