United States v. Arthur J. Cobb

446 F.2d 1174, 28 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 5462, 1971 U.S. App. LEXIS 8555
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Second Circuit
DecidedAugust 12, 1971
Docket1030, Docket 71-1391
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 446 F.2d 1174 (United States v. Arthur J. Cobb) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Arthur J. Cobb, 446 F.2d 1174, 28 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 5462, 1971 U.S. App. LEXIS 8555 (2d Cir. 1971).

Opinion

BARTELS, District Judge:

Under a fourteen-count indictment, Arthur J. Cobb was convicted together with his co-defendant, Abraham Gold-stein, of conspiracy to defraud the United States in the ascertainment and collection of certain information used by the Internal Revenue Service in determining tax liability of the defendants and others, and also of violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(2), in procuring and causing the preparation and presentation of fraudulent and false United States Information Returns (Form 1099). Count 1 charged both Cobb and Goldstein with conspiracy to defraud the United States and to violate 26 U.S.C. § 7206(2) from August 1, 1964 to October 16, 1970, and Counts 2 through 14 charged Cobb and Goldstein with the substantive offenses of advising and causing the preparation of false and fraudulent United States Information Returns (Form 1099) on thirteen occasions between August 21, 1965 and September 24, 1966, which misrepresented and concealed the names of the recipients of income from winning pari-mutuel twin double tickets at Yonkers Raceway. Cobb was convicted on Counts 1 and 4 and acquitted on Count 10, the jury disagreeing on the remaining counts, and Goldstein was convicted on all counts except Count 10. Cobb was sentenced to imprisonment for six months and to probation for five years on Count 1, and sentence was suspended on Count 4. Goldstein has not appealed.

At the outset it is instructive to describe the system devised by Cobb and Goldstein to avoid tax liability for the income received from cashing winning twin double tickets. 1 Upon redeeming a winning ticket in excess of $600, the ticketholder is required by the racetrack to complete a verification slip setting forth his name, address and Social Security number. The racetrack then files, in accordance with 26 U.S.C. § 6041(a), a United States Information Return (Form 1099) with the Internal Revenue Service, containing the same information as the verification slip. Thus the Internal Revenue Service is provided with a record of an individual’s twin double winnings and can verify whether a taxpayer has reported all of his income in a particular year. To conceal from the Internal Revenue Service the true owners of the tickets and the actual recipients of the proceeds, Cobb and Goldstein concocted a scheme of selecting and engaging certain persons who had a sufficient number of losing tickets as “eashers” who would cash these twin double tickets in their own names and thus save the defendants, their princi *1176 pals and others from imposition of taxes upon the twin double winnings.

Cobb claims as error (1) the admission of certain testimony against him which was applicable only to Goldstein; (2) the submission to the jury as against him of the twelve substantive counts, and (3) the court’s charge relative to confessed perjurers.

In order to determine the validity of Cobb’s contentions, we believe it is necessary to briefly review the testimony and evidence. The Government’s case rested essentially upon the testimony of three cashers, Lawrence Strauss, Lawrence Siovitz, and Irwin Steinberg, and also upon the testimony of an Internal Revenue Agent, Graham R. Schatz.

Strauss testified that he first met Cobb at Yonkers Raceway in the fall of 1964; that Cobb later told him that he was a partner of Goldstein and others dealing in twin doubles; that between the latter part of 1964 and the middle of 1965 he cashed tickets for them on approximately ten occasions; that without remembering the precise dates or amounts of the winning tickets, he received the tickets from Cobb, turned the proceeds over to Cobb and received a commission from Cobb; that on several occasions he saw Cobb deliver the proceeds to Goldstein. Strauss identified two checks, each bearing Goldstein’s signature, as representing the proceeds of winning tickets given him by Cobb, one of which was the subject of Count 4 of the indictment, and testified that in the course of both transactions he turned over the proceeds to Cobb and received a commission from Cobb.

Siovitz testified that after a conversation with Cobb on August 21, 1965, he cashed in 1965 and 1966 winning twin double tickets for two groups of people, one of which was Cobb and Goldstein. He then identified twelve separate cash-ings which formed the basis for the substantive counts 2, 3, and 5 through 14. He also stated that he received a check from the racetrack on each occasion and identified each such check at the trial. All the cheeks, except the one relating to Count 10, bore the endorsement of Gold-stein. He further testified that Gold-stein gave him the tickets and received the proceeds on some but not on all occasions; that he was uncertain whether Cobb gave him any of the tickets but that Cobb “probably” paid him a commission on some of the transactions, and that he cashed a ticket which he received from Cobb after he had seen Goldstein give the ticket to Cobb, identifying the check received, which bore Goldstein’s signature. He added that on November 8, 1967, he met with Gold-stein and Cobb at Madison Square Garden and was urged by Goldstein not to tell a grand jury before which Siovitz was scheduled to testify that he, Siovitz, had cashed the tickets for Goldstein.

Steinberg, the third casher-witness, testified that he saw Goldstein and Cobb together at Yonkers Racetrack and Roosevelt Raceway on numerous occasions during 1965 and 1966, and that on approximately thirteen occasions he cashed winning twin double tickets for Gold-stein. He gave no further testimony as to Cobb’s role, if any, in the transactions.

Agent Schatz testified that Cobb admitted to him that he had given winning twin double tickets to other persons to cash, although Cobb would not sign a written statement to that effect.

Steinberg’s Testimony

Cobb argues that the court erred in admitting Steinberg’s testimony without a curative instruction to the jury that such testimony was to be considered only as against Goldstein, and that the proof showed separate conspiracies with Goldstein as the “hub” and the three casher-witnesses and Cobb as individual “spokes” in the conspiratorial wheel. He maintains that he was in no way linked to the claimed Goldstein-Steinberg conspiracy and that Steinberg’s testimony was therefore prejudicial to him in convicting him of conspiracy, citing Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. *1177 750, 66 S.Ct. 1239, 90 L.Ed. 1557 (1946). We disagree.

The indictment charged and the proof showed a single conspiracy on the part of Goldstein and Cobb to hire various cashers to dispose of winning twin double tickets. The testimony of Strauss and Siovitz was more than ample to support a jury finding that in 1965 and 1966 Goldstein and Cobb were engaged in a single enterprise for the benefit of themselves and one or more unnamed principals.

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446 F.2d 1174, 28 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 5462, 1971 U.S. App. LEXIS 8555, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-arthur-j-cobb-ca2-1971.