United States of America v. Michael J. Wagner

2022 DNH 106
CourtDistrict Court, D. New Hampshire
DecidedAugust 30, 2022
Docket20-cr-105-PB
StatusPublished

This text of 2022 DNH 106 (United States of America v. Michael J. Wagner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. New Hampshire primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States of America v. Michael J. Wagner, 2022 DNH 106 (D.N.H. 2022).

Opinion

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW HAMPSHIRE

United States of America

v. Case No. 20-cr-105-PB Opinion No. 2022 DNH 106 Michael J. Wagner

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

Michael Wagner, a former Captain with the Salem Police Department

(SPD), has been indicted for making a false statement in his 2013 income tax

return. The government alleges that Wagner inflated his work-related tax

deductions and underreported more than $30,000 he earned by reselling

firearms he purchased from Sig Sauer (a firearms manufacturer) using a law

enforcement discount. Before becoming a target of a criminal investigation,

Wagner was interviewed as part of an internal affairs investigation of the

SPD initiated by the Town of Salem. In a recorded interview, Wagner made

some limited statements concerning his firearm purchases. I previously

determined that those statements were made under the threat of losing

employment and were thus immunized under Garrity v. New Jersey, 385

U.S. 493 (1967), which held that Fifth Amendment protections apply to public employees who, under the threat of job loss, are required to make

incriminating statements.

Wagner’s Garrity immunity now precludes the government from using

his statements or any evidence derived from them when seeking an

indictment or a conviction. The government did not use Wagner’s statements

in securing a superseding indictment and will not use them at trial. Having

settled the immunity question, I must now decide whether the government

has met its “heavy burden” of proof under Kastigar v. United States, 406 U.S.

441 (1972), to show that the evidence it proposes to use is derived from a

legitimate source entirely independent of Wagner’s compelled statements.

I. BACKGROUND 1

The superseding indictment charges Wagner with one count of

submitting a false and fraudulent tax return in violation of 26 U.S.C.

§ 7206(1). The government intends to prove at trial that Wagner purchased

thirty-six assault rifles from Sig Sauer between December 2012 and January

2013, typically using a twenty-five percent discount offered to law

enforcement officers. He allegedly resold thirty-three of those rifles over the

internet, earning more than $33,000 in profit. When Wagner later filed his

2013 tax return, he allegedly omitted the income from his online firearm

1 These findings of facts are based on the evidence I received at the Kastigar hearing on June 21, 2022. 2 sales and falsely claimed more than $10,000 in unreimbursed business

expenses for firearm and ammunition purchases. As a result, the government

claims he avoided paying about $11,000 in income taxes.

Wagner’s firearms dealings were no secret at the SPD. Some of his

fellow officers complained repeatedly about those dealings to the Salem

Manager Christopher Dillon. Sergeant Chad Clark and two other SPD

officers approached Dillon individually to raise concerns about Wagner

purchasing guns at Sig Sauer and reselling them. Dillon was aware of this

complaint before he hired a risk management firm, Kroll Inc., in late

February 2018 to audit the SPD’s internal affairs process, which for years

had been seen as irredeemably flawed by various Town stakeholders.

As part of the audit, Daniel Linskey, Kroll’s primary investigator,

interviewed SPD command staff, including Wagner, in May 2018. Before the

interviews, Linskey received a private Twitter message from a law

enforcement contact informing him that Sergeant Clark had complained

during a union meeting that Wagner had bought numerous firearms at Sig

Sauer with a police discount and made $32,000 in one month from reselling

them. 2 The same source told Linskey of a rumor that Wagner had purchased

2 The name of the complaining sergeant is redacted in the Twitter message in the record. See Doc. No. 47–2. The government has represented, without objection from Wagner, that the person identified in the message is Sergeant Clark. 3 a retired SPD cruiser through an intermediary and later resold it for a

significant profit.

Linskey first asked SPD Chief Paul Donovan about the rumors during

his audit interview. When asked about his officers reselling discounted

firearms from Sig Sauer, Donovan responded that he knew Wagner had

bought some at one point. Donovan was not aware of Wagner’s cruiser

purchase.

Linskey then asked Wagner about the cruiser and the firearm sales at

the end of his interview. Wagner confirmed that he had bought an SPD

cruiser in a private sale, but he would not discuss its resale. In response to

questions about his gun purchases, Wagner stated that he had bought

firearms from Sig Sauer but insisted that it was his “private business” that

he did not want to discuss. Wagner also confirmed that he did not have a

federal firearms license (FFL) to deal in firearms, but he volunteered that a

“close friend” had an FFL.

The Kroll report was published in November 2018. The report focused

on the SPD’s internal affairs, time and attendance practices, and overall

culture. It made no reference to Wagner’s firearm or cruiser purchases. Chief

Donovan left shortly after the report came out, and the Town engaged Brian

Pattullo to oversee the SPD as Civilian Administrator in early December.

4 Pattullo learned about Wagner’s profiteering from firearm sales from

Sergeant Clark during a “ride along” in mid-December. One of the issues

Clark asked Pattullo to investigate was Wagner’s purchase of guns from Sig

Sauer with a police discount. At some later point, Wagner himself

volunteered during a casual conversation with Pattullo that he had bought

firearms from Sig Sauer and insisted that he had done nothing wrong. Dillon,

the Town Manager, later shared the same information with Pattullo.

When Pattullo did not take immediate action to address Clark’s

complaints, Clark went to the Town HR Director Anne Fogarty in late

December. Among several concerns Clark aired was that Wagner had bought

firearms with a law enforcement discount and earned about $40,000 in profit

when he resold them. Clark later repeated his allegation during a January 2,

2019 meeting with Fogarty and Dillon and at a January 9, 2019 meeting with

SPD Sergeants and Lieutenants.

Meanwhile, the Office of the New Hampshire Attorney General

(NHAG) had begun to investigate the SPD after the American Civil Liberties

Union flagged issues identified in the Kroll report. Pattullo and Dillon first

met with NHAG investigators and prosecutors, including Investigator Scott

Gilbert, on January 14, 2019. Dillon had a written list of topics to cover that

Fogarty had prepared for him, which included Wagner’s firearm sales.

During the meeting, Pattullo and Dillon discussed various allegations about

5 potential criminal activity by SPD officers, including Clark’s allegation that

Wagner had resold firearms purchased from Sig Sauer with a police discount.

This was when Gilbert first learned about the firearms complaint. Other

allegations about Wagner that were discussed during the meeting included

his purchase and resale of a retired SPD cruiser and his role in the removal

of internal affairs files.

The attorneys spearheading the SPD investigation informed Gilbert

that every allegation brought up at the meeting needed to be investigated.

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Related

Garrity v. New Jersey
385 U.S. 493 (Supreme Court, 1967)
Kastigar v. United States
406 U.S. 441 (Supreme Court, 1972)
Sher v. U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
488 F.3d 489 (First Circuit, 2007)
United States v. Slough
641 F.3d 544 (D.C. Circuit, 2011)
United States v. Thomas E. Byrd
765 F.2d 1524 (Eleventh Circuit, 1985)
United States v. Carl Nanni
59 F.3d 1425 (Second Circuit, 1995)
United States v. Palmquist
712 F.3d 640 (First Circuit, 2013)
United States v. Serrano
870 F.2d 1 (First Circuit, 1989)

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