Justia U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Defendant, a former New York State senator, pleaded guilty to two counts of fraud and two conspiracy counts. At issue on appeal was an unsettled question regarding restitution orders and the one‐year limitations period for a 28 U.S.C. 2255 motion: Does the limitations period begin to run with an order affirming a conviction and sentence but remanding for recalculation of restitution, or does it begin to run only after the district court enters a revised restitution order on remand? The court held that the limitations period begins to run only when the revised restitution order becomes final. Accordingly, the May 2014 district court order is vacated and the court remanded for further proceedings. View "Gonzalez v. United States" on Justia Law

Defendant, while in Venezuela, was convicted in absentia in Colombia of drug manufacturing and trafficking. Defendant was later extradited from Venezuela to Colombia and then the United States later transmitted a formal request to Colombia for the arrest and extradition of defendant to face the charge of conspiracy to manufacture and import five kilograms or more of cocaine into the United States. Defendant subsequently pled guilty to the conspiracy count and was sentenced to 648 months imprisonment, as well as fined $1 million. Defendant, currently 46 years old, challenged his sentence on the ground that it violates the United States government’s assurance that “a sentence of life imprisonment will not be sought or imposed” because the sentence exceeds defendant's life expectancy. The court concluded that any individual right that defendant may have under the terms of his extradition is only derivative through the state. Therefore, defendant would only have prudential standing to raise the claim that his sentence violated the terms of his extradition if Colombia first makes an official protest. Because defendant lacked prudential standing in this case, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Suarez" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed from his conviction of enticement and coercion of others to travel in interstate and foreign commerce to engage in sexual activity, forced labor and attempted forced labor, fraud in foreign labor contracting, importation of aliens for immoral purposes, inducement of an alien to illegally enter and reside in the United States, and unlawful employment of aliens. On appeal, defendant principally argued that his right to be present at trial was violated by the district court's refusals to adjourn the trial for more than one day or to grant him a mistrial or a new trial, based on its finding that he had waived that right because he intentionally overdosed on prescription medication and was hospitalized, and that his absence was voluntary. The court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in deciding to proceed with the trial in defendant's absence where the district court weighed defendant's "right to be here if he wanted to be here" and the fact that the proceedings had been completed through the presentation of evidence, closing arguments, and the finalization of the instructions to be given to the jury, as well as the district court's assessment that defendant would have nothing to contribute for the final stages of the district court's delivery of instructions and jury deliberations. The district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the motion for mistrial. Further, the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying a motion for a new trial. The court rejected defendant's claim of prejudicial publicity. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Yannai" on Justia Law

Defendant, the former CEO and chairman of the board of directors at CUC and former chairman of CUC's successor, was convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and two counts of making false statements in SEC filings. On appeal, defendant challenged the denial of his motion for a new trial under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 33. Applying United States v. Owen, the court concluded that the former CUC chief financial officer's testimony did not constitute newly discovered evidence. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Forbes" on Justia Law

Defendants appealed their convictions for conspiracy to commit mail fraud, wire fraud, and health care fraud, as well as substantive counts of these offenses, and one count of making false statements. Defendants' convictions stemmed from their roles in a decades-long scheme to defraud the United States Railroad Retirement Board into awarding fraudulent disability annuity payments to Long Island Railroad retirees. The court concluded that the government presented sufficient evidence as to venue, that defendants cannot succeed on a theory that venue was improperly manufactured, and that no “substantial contacts” inquiry is required where (as here) the defendants did not argue to the district court that prosecution in the Southern District of New York caused them hardship, prejudice, or otherwise undermined the fairness of their trial. The court applied the ordinary rule that the receipt of profits from an economically motivated conspiracy (here, disability pension payments) constitutes an overt act in furtherance thereof, and rejected application to this case of the limited exception, articulated in United States v. Grimm. The court rejected defendants’ challenges to the jury instructions and defendants remaining challenges. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Rutigliano" on Justia Law

Petitioner, convicted of first degree robbery, appealed the denial of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus, alleging that he received ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. Petitioner alleged that counsel's failure to raise the trial court's refusal to give a requested charge to the jury - that to find petitioner guilty of first-degree robbery by using or threatening the immediate use of a dangerous instrument, it had to find that petitioner actually possessed a dangerous instrument at the time of the crime - was error. The court concluded that counsel's failure to raise that issue and her decision instead to raise weaker issues that were unlikely to succeed fell below prevailing norms of professional conduct; given the weakness of the evidence that petitioner in fact possessed a weapon during the robbery, the instructional error was not harmless, and there is a reasonable probability that, had counsel raised the issue, the state appellate court would have reversed the conviction on the most serious count; and, applying the correct standard, and in light of the evidence at trial and the pattern of the jury’s verdicts, the court concluded that the state courts’ dismissal of petitioner’s claim was an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law, and that his appellate counsel provided constitutionally ineffective assistance. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded. View "Lynch v. Superintendent Dolce" on Justia Law

Defendant pleaded guilty to the production of child pornography. On appeal, defendant challenged the denial of his motions to suppress the searches of his residence and his computer. At issue was whether a search warrant affidavit that relied upon evidence generated by an automated software program provided a substantial basis for a magistrate judge’s conclusion that there was probable cause that child pornography would be found on defendant’s computer. The court held that the affidavit at issue sufficiently established probable cause and that defendant’s motions to suppress were properly denied. Based upon an examination of the totality of the circumstances, there existed sufficient “indicia of reliability” to permit a reasonable person to conclude that probable cause existed in these circumstances. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Thomas" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of mail fraud and of corruptly endeavoring to obstruct and impede the administration of the internal revenue laws. On appeal, defendant argued that he should have been granted a new trial on the ground of newly discovered evidence of juror bias. The court reversed the district court's denial of the motion where, in this case, the juror at issue aligned herself with the government, lied pervasively in voir dire for the purpose of avoiding dismissal for cause, believed prior to the presentation of any evidence that the defendants were "'crooks,'" and expressly mentioned defendant as a target of her efforts to persuade the other jurors to convict. The court rejected defendant's remaining contentions, concluding that the evidence was sufficient to convict him and that the jury instructions were not erroneous. The remaining claims are moot or without merit. The court reversed and remanded. View "United States v. Parse" on Justia Law

Defendant and others were charged with narcotics conspiracy. After the unsealing of the indictment, the others were promptly arrested but federal agents were unable to find defendant until his arrest during a traffic stop 27 months later. Defendant moved to dismiss the indictment with prejudice because the pre‐arrest delay violated his Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial. The district court granted defendant's motion and the government appealed. The court concluded that the entire pre‐arrest delay cannot be attributed to the government’s negligence, and defendant did not adequately show prejudice. In this case, the court concluded that the district court misapplied the second and fourth Barker v. Wingo factors, and thereby abused its discretion in dismissing the indictment. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for reinstatement of the indictment. View "United States v. Moreno" on Justia Law

Defendant was charged with one count of possessing child pornography. On appeal, the government challenged the district court's grant of defendant's motion to suppress evidence on the grounds that law enforcement agents exceeded the scope of the warrant when they searched an apartment other than the one approved by the magistrate judge. The court affirmed, concluding that the search of defendant's apartment was not objectively reasonable and that the agents could not have relied on the warrant in good faith. Further, the court held that the benefits of deterring the agentsʹ unlawful conduct outweigh the costs of suppressing the evidence obtained. View "United States v. Bershchansky" on Justia Law