Court Opinion

ID: 9462730
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:48:44.067393+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:44.983856
License: Public Domain

ANDERSON, Circuit Judge
(concurring in part and dissenting in part):
I concur in the majority opinion insofar as it affirms the conviction of Marion on count three of the indictment, but I respectfully dissent from the reversal of Marion’s convictions on counts one and two which charged him, respectively, with perjury because he gave such inconsistent answers to the grand jury, while testifying under a grant of use immunity, about his purpose in acquiring a pistol that one of the answers was manifestly false; and with obstructing justice by giving false and evasive testimony-
The essential part of the evidence upon which proof of these charges rested was obtained through warrants to tap telephone conversations of Marion and others, issued by a New York state court “judge of competent jurisdiction.” The evidence was presented to a federal grand jury pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 2517. The appellant claims that the use of this evidence by the federal prosecuting authorities was improper because the requisites of § 2517 had not been fully or correctly complied with. He, therefore, moved to dismiss the perjury and the obstructing and impeding of justice charges against him. The district court denied his motion. Marion was convicted and has appealed the judgments against him.
That portion of the majority opinion which deals with counts one and two above mentioned, completely reverses the interpretation and application of § 2517(5) as they have been enunciated by this court for the past several years. It does so without discussion of its intended effect upon recent decisions of the court, pending cases and presently sought indictments. Nor does it say what precedential value is left, if any, after its holding and discussion of counts one and two, to this Circuit’s decisions in the area although these former decisions form the basis for its holding on count three. Where there has been, close similari*709ty, identity and relationship between a state crime, for which a telephonic tap has been authorized and a warrant issued, and a federal crime of which evidence is necessarily disclosed during the state tap, the approval by “a judge of competent jurisdiction” for the use of such evidence by a federal prosecutor before a federal grand jury, has not been required because it was so nearly identical or akin to the related state offense that it actually was not an offense “other than that specified in the order” and it was not necessary under the applicable state law as it applied to state taps. In the present case the criminal conduct on which the state and federal charges were based was the same, and it was performed by the same individuals, one of whom was the appellant Marion.
The majority, with perhaps some justification, feels that this practice does not adhere with sufficient strictness to the protective purpose of § 2517(5) and might encourage a rather freewheeling means of bypassing judicial scrutiny and approval. On the other hand, there is an advantage, particularly in joint state and federal coordinated and cooperative efforts in pursuit of racketeering and organized crime, to retain the flexibility of the present procedure. Furthermore, a sufficiently stringent line can be drawn by the outer boundary of this court’s decisions, which can be constricted further in succeeding cases as the court may decide to be necessary.
On December 15, 1975, the Seventh Circuit decided United States v. Brodson, 528 F.2d 214 (7 Cir. 1975), which held that the approval of a “judge of competent jurisdiction” was absolutely necessary to authorize the Government to present to a federal grand jury, evidence of a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1084, for which no such approval had been obtained, even though exactly the same evidence had been gained from an authorized tap on an intercepted conversation which related to a Title 18, § 1955 violation. Both §§ 1084 and 1955 were overlapping statutes covering illegal gambling. The court held that the two offenses “were separate and distinct” and that evidence properly obtained and authorized through a tap which bears on a particular offense can only be used to indict for another offense where the essential elements of the latter are exactly the same as those of the former — which doesn’t occur very often.
The present majority opinion abolishes this Circuit’s adoption of the relatively broad definition of closely related state and federal offenses and like criminal conduct, as obviating the necessity for obtaining the approval of a “judge of competent jurisdiction” before presenting the state-tap acquired evidence to a federal grand jury. In its place it substitutes the test of exactly similar essential elements in both the state and federal crimes as the prerequisite to the authority of the United States attorney to present the evidence to the federal grand jury without the prior approval of a judge.
In the following discussion I shall take up the effect of the new, stricter standard set forth in the majority opinion, as it relates to counts one and two, upon several of the decisions of this court which have shaped the current rule of the Second Circuit.
Section 2517(5) requires any federal or state agent, acting as a witness, in a federal court to obtain judicial approval before so testifying, e. g., in grand jury proceedings, about the contents of intercepted “communications relating to offenses other than those specified in the [initial] order of authorization or approval . . . ” (emphasis supplied). It is clear from numerous previous cases dealing with challenges to wiretap evidence under Title III that federal authorities have not believed it necessary to obtain such subsequent approval when seeking indictments for criminal conduct which is basically similar or closely related to that constituting the state crimes at which state-authorized wiretaps were directed or which have arisen out of substantially the same acts — despite the fact that the federally-defined offenses may involve certain additional elements, such as jurisdictional facts, or require some additional proofs. This court’s previous decisions *710have, generally speaking, enunciated that interpretation of § 2517(h).1
In United States v. Grant, 462 F.2d 28 (2 Cir. 1972), for instance, the court allowed the results of state wiretapping, which had been authorized for the obtaining of evidence relating to specified state crimes, to be used in the prosecution of the defendants for federal crimes including securities fraud, on the ground that the definition of “larceny,” a crime with respect to which the state wiretapping statute permitted interception, “is sufficiently broad to encompass the conduct involved in this case.” (Emphasis supplied.) 462 F.2d at 33. While § 2517(5) is not specifically mentioned in the Grant opinion, our later decision in United States v. Tortorello, 480 F.2d 764 (2 Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 414 U.S. 866, 94 S.Ct. 63, 38 L.Ed.2d 86 (1974), cites this holding directly on the question of when subsequent judicial approval is required by § 2517(5) (or by the New York statute which is “substantially identical” to it, id. at 782). Tortorello involved an appeal from convictions for federal offenses involving, inter alia, securities fraud, following a trial at which testimony of conversations, heard as a result of state-authorized wiretaps, had been admitted into evidence. The orders authorizing those wiretaps had been sought in the investigation of state crimes involving stolen property and forged instruments, including more particularly grand larceny, and the defendant argued that they had not been properly amended2 “to include reference to the securities fraud offenses for which he was indicted by a federal grand jury,” id. at 781. Although the court held that the procedures followed in the state court had in fact amounted to the requisite amendment, it also expressed agreement with the Government's contention that no amendment was needed because the crime of grand larceny encompassed stock fraud and the supporting affidavits made clear the specific crimes being investigated. Id. at 782-83. The court cited Grant on this specific point. Id. at 783 n. 17. Obviously, the strict interpretation of “other” offenses announced in the present majority opinion is at odds with these cases.
The majority opinion also calls into question another law enforcement practice which has been approved by this court on *711more than one occasion, namely the use of joint federal-state wiretap investigations pursuant to a state warrant. In United States v. Manfredi, 488 F.2d 588 (2 Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 417 U.S. 936, 94 S.Ct. 2651, 41 L.Ed.2d 240 (1974), to take one example, we affirmed the defendants’ convictions for federal narcotics offenses where evidence had been gathered through the use of state-authorized telephone interception in which a federal agent played a cooperative role from the outset.3 It is true that no claim was raised in Manfredi that § 2517(5) required subsequent judicial approval of the interception, but under the rules laid down in the present Marion majority opinion it does not appear that the evidence would have been admissible even if such approval had been sought. Both the majority opinion and the Seventh Circuit opinion which the majority cites with approval, United States v. Brodson, supra, state that the granting of subsequent approval to use the contents of communications relating to offenses other than those specified in the original authorization is conditioned on a finding that the interception of such communications was inadvertent Majority opinion at 700-701; Brodson, supra, 528 F.2d at 216. But clearly this condition cannot be met when a federal agent joins a state-authorized wiretapping investigation with the specific purpose of gathering evidence of federal crimes. Under the majority’s rule, subsequent approval must be obtained even if the communications and the conduct referred to therein simultaneously relate to or constitute both the specified state crimes and the (unspecified) federal crimes. Unless, therefore, inadvertence is stricken from the considerations which the subsequent-approving court must address in such circumstances, the state-federal cooperation approved by this court in such cases as Manfredi, will be impossible without securing both federal and state court authorizations in advance.
In view of the extensive changes which the majority decision will bring about in the application of § 2517(5) and the problems which will arise in connection with past decisions of this court and with pending indictments, as mentioned above, I have elected to consider the appeal from the denial of Marion’s motion to dismiss as it relates to § 2517(5) in the light of the past decisions of this court.
The state offense described in the original warrant was unlawful possession of dangerous weapons (firearms) and the federal offense on which Marion was interrogated before the grand jury, was unlawful transportation of a firearm in interstate commerce. It is my opinion that these offenses were closely enough related to consider them as the same for the purpose of § 2517(5), so that the federal crime was not required to be treated as one of “[the] offenses other than those specified in the order of authorization or approval.” The state and federal charges, arising out of the Delmonieo order, both rested upon exactly the same body of evidence and the crimes were perpetrated by exactly the same individuals. But it makes no difference whatever, in the present posture of this case, whether the state and federal offenses were the same, or that they were unrelated because the Delmonieo order was “reviewed,” “extended” and approved, within the standard set out in Tortorello, by Justice Birns of the Supreme Court of New York, the justice who issued the Delmonieo warrant in the first place. I, therefore, disagree with the majority’s conclusion that:
“Because the conversation here in question clearly did relate to offenses ‘other than those specified’ in the state court’s March 15, 1972 order of authorization, and since the Government failed to obtain the subsequent judicial approval required by § 2517(5) for that interception, Marion’s conviction for perjury and the first count of obstruction of justice must be reversed.” (Footnotes omitted.)
It has failed to give consideration to the fact that the federal investigation which *712provided the evidence used at the subsequent grand jury proceedings, brought into question by the appellant, was a cooperative effort between federal and state authorities to bring to book an organized group of criminals who had been carrying on illicit activities in the New York area, reaching out to the far-western states. These efforts were directed at the same suspected individuals and concerned the same kinds of offenses, including the crimes of extortion and transportation of firearms in interstate commerce, which were specifically under investigation in the prelude to this case. It was an on-going investigation which continued over a period of several months. This required repeated applications for consecutive warrants to comply with Title 18 U.S.C. § 2518(5). The Delmonico order was issued on March 15, 1972, on Goldstock’s affidavit, to tap telephone 355-2500, Exts. 706 and 707 at Delmonico’s Hotel to seek evidence of several crimes including possession of dangerous weapons. The named principals were Rizzo, Tortora and Marion.
On April 7, 1972 Justice Birns issued a warrant on the affidavit of Goldstock, which .recited the history of the first warrant of February 3, 1972 authorizing the tap on “Jimmy’s Lounge” (the Lounge Order); the consecutive order issued on March 8, 1972 by Justice Birns; and the supplemental and amending Lounge warrant issued March 18, 1972 by Justice Murtagh, allowing, inter alia, bugging the back room at Jimmy’s Lounge. The supporting affidavit recites the past Lounge orders and the Demonico order which was issued by Justice Birns on March 15,1972. It also tells of the result of the Delmonico tap, effected on March 16, 1972, and the conversation disclosing the transportation by air, New York to Las Vegas, of the unregistered firearm. It mentioned the necessity for continued electronic surveillance and the cooperative efforts in the investigation by the New York County District Attorney’s office and the F.B.I.
While Marion was not mentioned as a principal in the first Lounge order (February 3,1972) he was mentioned in the second (March 8, 1972) in connection with the extortion and other charges, including possession of dangerous weapons. In the third Lounge order, dated March 18, 1972 (an amendment to the order of March 8 1972), reference was made to the “Delmonico” or “Hotel order” and Marion was named as a person whose communications were to be intercepted. The fourth Lounge order, issued April 5, 1972, names Rizzo, Tortora and Marion as the principals in that warrant, and one of the offenses listed was (as in Delmonico), the possession of a dangerous weapon. The fourth Lounge warrant allowed the tapping of telephone numbers 228-9834 and 475-9818 at Jimmy’s Lounge, which differed from the Delmonico Hotel numbers, made available under the Delmonico order.
The April 7, 1972 order, which covered, inter alia, the same offense of possession of dangerous weapons as did the Lounge and Delmonico orders and which named exactly the same three principals, was clearly “an extension and approval” of the Delmonico order which became merged into the April 7th order, and which was made to apply to the telephone numbers at Jimmy’s Lounge. This April 7th warrant was “renewed,” “extended” and thereby approved by Justice Birns when he issued the consecutive Lounge order on May 5, 1972. The Gold-stock affidavit in support of this succeeding warrant again recited the histories of the Lounge and Delmonico orders and named the same three principals.
There can be no doubt that these progressive steps in the history of this investigation with warrants issued at least every 30 days, by statutory mandate, twice “renewed”, “extended” and approved the Delmonico order, as specified in Tortorello and Rizzo.
It is apparent that the investigators had concluded, around the middle of March, 1972, that either the suspects (Rizzo, Tortora and Marion) were using the tap-authorized telephones at Jimmy’s Lounge less, or were using a telephone elsewhere. At any rate, the tap warrant for the Delmonico Hotel, issued on March 15, was for tele*713phone 355-2500, Exts. 706 and 707, and it terminated on March 29, 1972. It was used on March 16th and conversations in which Marion participated were heard. On March 18th the warrant to bug the back room of Jimmy’s Lounge was issued by Justice Murtagh. By April 7, 1972 the investigators procured an order from Justice Birns authorizing the interception of conversations on the regular telephones at the Lounge, previously tapped. The main line of wiretap interceptions in this investigation involved the Lounge telephones numbers 228-9834 and 457-9818, both before and after the Delmonico order. The Delmonico order means no more than that for a short period the suspects were found to be using telephones 355-2500, Exts. 706 and 707 at the Delmonico Hotel. The warrants authorized taps on the conversations of the same three principals, concerning exactly the same crimes, in Delmonico as in the Lounge taps preceding and following Delmonico. The consecutive, integrated orders form an unmistakably clear pattern covering a single investigation of the same criminal activities of the same three suspects. The Delmonico order was part and parcel of it and was in no sense a completely detached episode having no relationship to the Lounge orders. The sole reason for it was that a new non-renewal order had to issue to cover the newly discovered telephone numbers. It plainly merged with the Lounge line of authorized interception orders and was reviewed and approved by the Lounge orders of April 7th and May 8, 1972, by Justice Birns, as the supporting affidavits for these two orders show.
The Delmonico tap was necessitated by the fact that the suspects were discovered using a telephone different from the telephones previously used by them, which were tapped several times in the course of the investigation of these same individuals relative to the same offenses. To hold that such a tap order cannot be reviewed and approved by the same judge in the course of issuing a subsequent order for interception of conversations, of the same suspects for the same offenses, over the telephone more customarily used by them and that, therefore, all evidence procured from the special tap order is unlawful, and that its use before the indicting grand jury calls for the dismissal of the indictment and the release of the accused, is somewhat bizarre, to say the least. Inasmuch as a wire tap warrant can remain operative for only 30 days, it was necessary in this case to apply, at succeeding times for a total of 29 warrants. For this reason also the investigation could not be completed through amendments to the original warrants. But this fact in no way detracts from the issuing judge’s ability to review and approve the evidence received under a just expired warrant.
There are advantages and disadvantages to each of the strict and broad interpretations of § 2517(5). The former are well set out in the majority opinion. The strict approach is more definite and precise, and, by making mandatory a judicial review and approval of practically every tap and its actual operation and resulting fruits it may forfend against claims of error in the process itself. On the other hand, as in most cases where strict adherence to a mandatory course of conduct is required, a minor lapse or slightly inadequate fulfillment of the prescribed routine or a technical error may serve to invalidate a conviction based otherwise on overwhelming evidence of guilt. It will, however, probably enlarge the scope of the suppression hearings, now sought in nearly all wiretap cases, by affording defense counsel an opportunity to probe into the actions of the state or federal judges at every occasion of review and approval pursuant to § 2517(5), and will thereby increase the burden of the already over-burdened trial judges. There are ancillary problems which may arise in authorized taps which produce less than all of the required building blocks (essential elements) of an offense, for example, whether or not the state or federal agent has been in pursuit of the correct elements or irrelevant elements. The agent, state or federal, at the same time may have to discontinue the tap every so often, after chalking up only one or two essential elements out of five or *714six, in obedience to the minimization mandate, Title 18 U.S.C. § 2518(5).
The broader interpretation of this Circuit is, of course, less automatic and precise and leaves much to the judgment of the trier of the case. It is more flexible and, in my opinion, much better adapted to federal-state cooperation and joint action. It requires care and restraint in finding close relationship and similarity between like state and federal offenses. The broad concept should not be so liberally exercised that the close relationship of the relevant state and federal statutes is not plainly apparent on their faces, and the initial warrant, pursuant to which the tap is made, should be sufficient to include criminal conduct described in both the state and federal statutes. If there is doubt as to the similarity or close relationship, further review and approval by “a judge of competent jurisdiction” should be obtained.
The district court applied the law of this Circuit, as stated in Tortorello, supra, and Rizzo, supra, at the time it entered the judgments of conviction. There is much that can be said in favor of some modification of the applicable law in the direction indicated by the majority opinion but it should be applied prospectively only; and the change should be considered by the active members of the court.
Judge Conner was, in my opinion, correct in denying the motion to suppress the evidence on all counts and all of the judgments of conviction should be affirmed.

. See also United States v. Moore, 168 U.S. App.D.C. 227, 513 F.2d 485, 500-503 (1975), which involves the application of a District of Columbia Code provision governing wiretaps whose relevant language is identical to that of 18 U.S.C. § 2517(5). In that case, evidence obtained from wiretaps which had been authorized for the interception of evidence relating to District of Columbia gambling offenses had been disclosed to federal agents and used to provide “a foundation for prosecution” of federal gambling offenses which involved additional essential elements. (As distinct from § 2517(5), which requires judicial approval only where the intercepted evidence is to be presented in testimony under oath, the stricter D. C. provision requires approval even where, as in Moore, the evidence is merely disclosed to federal agents who in turn use it to obtain search and arrest warrants. 513 F.2d at 501 n. 48.) The Court of Appeals rejected the defendant’s contention that judicial approval was required in order to use the wiretap results in aid of the federal prosecution, because it did not “believe that there was any interception ‘relating * * * to offenses other than those specified in the order of authorization’ within the meaning of [the D. C. wiretap law].” 513 F.2d at 501 (ellipsis in original). In the court’s view, since the intercepted communications did relate to the specified D. C. gambling offenses, it was immaterial that they also “constituted evidence of federal offenses.” Id. at 502.
The court went on to state that even if it were to hold otherwise on the issue of whether the interception related “to offenses other than those specified in the order of authorization,” it would nonetheless hold that the requirement of judicial approval had been met, because in the original orders themselves the issuing judge had authorized disclosure of the intercepted evidence to federal agents. While the majority in the present case would doubtless be inclined to seize on this alternative ground of decision in order to dismiss the former ground as “mere dictum,” I believe Moore must be viewed as directly in conflict with the rule laid down by the majority today.

. Where unanticipated evidence of crimes different from those specified in the original order authorizing electronic interception is overheard, amendment of the order to include the unanticipated crimes is the procedural mechanism established by New York statute for effectuating the subsequent judicial approval required by § 2517(5). N.Y.Crim.Proc.Law § 700.65.

. The state warrant authorized interception of conversations concerning various enumerated state drug offenses, and indeed under the applicable New York statute a state court may authorize wiretapping only with respect to state offenses. See N.Y.Crim.Proc.Law § 700.05(8).