United States v. Gillespie

773 F. Supp. 1154, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 5921, 1991 WL 170015
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Indiana
DecidedApril 25, 1991
DocketHCR 90-89
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 773 F. Supp. 1154 (United States v. Gillespie) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Indiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Gillespie, 773 F. Supp. 1154, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 5921, 1991 WL 170015 (N.D. Ind. 1991).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

MOODY, District Judge.

This matter is before the court on the defendant’s (1) “Joint Motion to Dismiss Indictment,” 1 filed December 24, 1990, and (2) “Motion to Suppress and Reject Evidence,” filed April 5, 1991. On April 16, 1991, the court entered a summary order denying both motions and deferring its opinion so that trial might proceed as scheduled on April 18, 1991. The court now addresses the merits of the defendant’s motions in detail.

I. BACKGROUND

On October 14, 1988, the defendant honored a government subpoena by appearing to testify and present documents to a federal grand jury. The grand jury was investigating certain contracts involving the City of Gary, Indiana. The investigation focused especially on the municipality’s relationship with Inner City Leasing and Trucking Company through the defendant’s business, Gillespie Ford, Incorporated. At some time during the defendant’s testimony to the grand jury, the government came to suspect that he had derived unreported taxable income from his participation in municipal contracts on behalf of Inner City. Thus, during the defendant’s testimony, he became a likely defendant (a “target”) in the government’s eyes.

When the defendant appeared before the grand jury, he was not orally warned of his constitutional right against self-incrimination. Nor was the defendant advised at any time that he had become a target of the grand jury.

The government has asserted, however, that the defendant did receive an effective written warning of his rights, which was *1156 attached to the grand jury subpoena. The court devoted its evidentiary hearing of April 15, 1991, to the factual question of whether the defendant was effectively advised of his rights in writing. The evidence at the hearing was inconclusive. 2

The defendant now stands charged with two counts of underreporting income on his federal tax return, 26 U.S.C. § 7206(1), and one count of obstructing justice by misleading the grand jury about his income, 18 U.S.C. § 1503. The motions before the court seek dismissal of the two tax counts and suppression of the defendant’s October 14, 1988, testimony before the grand jury.

II. ANALYSIS

The defendant relies on a constitutional theory. Specifically, the defendant claims that he had a constitutional right to receive both a Miranda-type advice of rights and a warning that he was a target of the grand jury’s investigation. 3 The defendant’s Miranda argument is rooted in the fifth amendment, and the defendant does not claim that the government violated his sixth amendment rights.

Initially, the court must settle the factual record. As the court has previously noted, it is a venerable principle of constitutional law that a court should not pass on an unsettled constitutional issue unless absolutely necessary in the case before it. E.g. Burton v. United States, 196 U.S. 283, 295, 25 S.Ct. 243, 245, 49 L.Ed. 482 (1905) (“It is not the habit’ of the Court to decide questions of a constitutional nature unless absolutely necessary to a decision of the case.”) In this case, the court need not pass on the defendant’s Miranda theory if the government actually provided the advice of rights he propounds. However, if the advice of rights was not given, then the court has no alternative but to rule on the constitutional issue.

As noted above, the evidence at the court’s hearing was inconclusive on the factual issue of whether the government provided an effective advice of rights. The court reasons that if there is a constitutional right to Miranda warnings in the grand jury context, then the government would bear the burden of showing that it gave the warnings. See United States v. Yong Bing-Gong, 594 F.Supp. 248, 256 (N.D.N.Y.1984), aff'd 788 F.2d 4 (2d Cir. 1986), cert. denied 479 U.S. 818, 107 S.Ct. 78, 93 L.Ed.2d 33 (1986). On this record, the government has not carried its hypothetical burden. The court FINDS, for present purposes, that the defendant was not effectively warned of his rights. Ac *1157 cordingly, the court must reach the issue of Miranda warnings in the grand jury context.

The court will address the defendant’s constitutional theory in two stages corresponding to the relief requested by the two motions. The court first addresses the motion for dismissal of the tax counts of the indictment. Here the court assumes, arguendo, that the defendant was constitutionally entitled to warnings, but concludes that dismissal is not necessary even under that assumption. The court then addresses the motion for suppression of evidence, examining the government’s conduct under the fifth amendment, and concluding that there is no constitutional right to Miranda warnings in the grand jury context.

A. Motion to Dismiss Indictment

The defendant’s motion to dismiss has requested only that the court dismiss the tax counts of his indictment. The well settled point of law controlling such motions states: “An indictment returned by a legally constituted and unbiased grand jury, like an information by the prosecutor, if valid on its face, is enough to call for a trial of the charge on the merits.” Costello v. United States, 350 U.S. 359, 363, 76 S.Ct. 406, 409,100 L.Ed. 397 (1956) (holding that an indictment may properly arise from hearsay evidence alone). As a corollary to Costello, the Supreme Court has made it clear that even illegally obtained evidence may support an indictment and call for a trial on the merits. United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 94 S.Ct. 613, 38 L.Ed.2d 561 (1974) (grand jury may consider testimonial fruit of unconstitutional search).

Applying Costello, which neither the defendant nor the government briefed or argued, the court cannot grant the requested relief. The indictment is plainly valid on its face. Further, this is not a case such as that presented in Vasquez v. Hillery, 474 U.S. 254, 106 S.Ct. 617, 88 L.Ed.2d 598 (1986), where a convicted black murderer contested the exclusion of blacks from the grand jury that indicted him. The Supreme Court overturned Hillery’s murder conviction because of this illegal flaw in the state grand jury’s composition. Nothing in the current defendant’s motion, supporting brief, or oral argument, however, supports any inference that his grand jury was illegally constituted or biased in this manner.

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Related

Commonwealth v. Dovale
7 Mass. L. Rptr. 603 (Massachusetts Superior Court, 1997)
United States v. Thomas P. Gillespie, Jr.
974 F.2d 796 (Seventh Circuit, 1992)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
773 F. Supp. 1154, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 5921, 1991 WL 170015, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-gillespie-innd-1991.