United States v. Jonnet

597 F. Supp. 999, 1984 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 22515
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedOctober 24, 1984
DocketCrim. No. 84-19
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 597 F. Supp. 999 (United States v. Jonnet) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Jonnet, 597 F. Supp. 999, 1984 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 22515 (W.D. Pa. 1984).

Opinion

Memorandum opinion

TEITELBAUM, Chief Judge.

I. Subsequent to his conviction on three counts of making false declarations in a proceeding ancillary to a court of the United States in Violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1623, defendant filed a host of motions and served a number of subpoenas duces tecum. The Court ruled on these matters prior to sentencing of defendant on October 12, 1984. The purpose of this memorandum opinion is to provide the grounds on which the Court relied in making those rulings.

II. Motion for an Evidentiary Hearing

Defendant presented two grounds in support of this motion:

First, defendant alleged that during trial Assistant United States Attorney James Y. Garrett, who represented the United States at trial, sought the admission into evidence of all three volumes of deposition testimony of the defendant in Jonnet Development Corp. v. Caliguiri, et al., 558 F.Supp. 962 (1983). The Court deferred ruling on whether the jurors should have the complete deposition until the close of trial. Immediately after the jurors left the courtroom to begin deliberating, but before any exhibits had been delivered to them, the Court ruled that only certain excerpts from the deposition would be made available to the jurors.

According to the defendant, the exhibits shortly thereafter were delivered to the jurors by Richard Grainer, Administrative Aide. The three complete volumes of deposition testimony were not included among those items. Approximately one and one-half hours later, however, Mr. Grainer allegedly delivered all three volumes to the jurors without any request by the jury or notice to counsel.

Defendant claimed that the three volumes contained highly prejudicial material. One of the passages (which was not among these excerpted portions given to the jurors) contained an allegedly crucial typographical error. It incorrectly stated that the defendant had typed out the agreement of July 1, 1980 between Jonnet Development Corp. and Conrail. According to defendant, this particular passage was a “major factor” in the jurors convicting him.

Defendant further maintained that the Government made no attempt to correct [1001]*1001the typographical error even though it knew of the error through an interview conducted by an F.B.I. agent of Deborah Ascheom, the reporter who recorded the three volumes of deposition testimony in question.

As a second ground in support of his motion for an evidentiary hearing, defendant alleged that Bonita Lundquist, a juror, was incompetent to serve as a juror because of a hearing impairment.

Defendant’s motion for an evidentiary hearing was granted. Two jurors testified as to the delivery by Richard Grainer to the jury room of the three complete volumes of deposition testimony. They further testified that they had not, however, read the three volumes of the deposition and knew of no other juror who did so. An alternate juror, Angeline Chieffo, testified that Bonita Lundquist had difficulty hearing normal conversation outside the courtroom. Finally, Richard Grainer testified that he had no recollection of delivering all three volumes of the deposition and indicated that it was not his customary practice to deliver additional exhibits at a later time.

The two jurors who testified as to the delivery of all three volumes of the deposition were not permitted, however, to testify as to whether the contents of those volumes in any way affected their verdict. Although jurors may testify as to the presence of so-called “extraneous” material in the jury room they may not testify as to its effect on their deliberations. Fed.R.Evid. 606(b); also Government of Virgin Islands v. Gereau, 523 F.2d 140, 148-149 (3d Cir.1975).1

III. Motion for a New Trial.

Defendant alleged that he was entitled to a new trial for a variety of reasons.

First, defendant argued that he was deprived of a fair trial because the jury was “swayed” by “highly prejudicial” material contained in the three complete volumes of deposition testimony.

This ground for a new trial was rejected for the following reasons.

When exhibits not in evidence reach the jury, a new trial should not be ordered unless the evidence was so prejudicial as to deny the defendant a fair trial. U.S. v. Friedland, 660 F.2d 919, 928 (3d Cir.1981).

To begin with, the passage in question was not prejudicial. Defendant argues that this typographical error was construed by the jury as an “admission” that he had typed the agreement. The claim that this would be a source of prejudice, however, is contrary to reality because the deposition testimony concerned only the events of July 1, 1980. The Government presented a wealth of testimony at trial concerning those events, and presented evidence that the agreement prepared on that date was handwritten by John Hindman. At no point was it any part of the Government’s case that the defendant performed any physical role whatsoever in the act of drafting the agreement on that date, beyond affixing his signature. It defies logic to suggest that a statement so directly contradictory of the Government’s case could be prejudicial to the defendant.

Even more important, regardless of who drafted the agreement on July 1, or how it was done, the crux of the case concerned what happened thereafter to account for the subsequently discovered difference between the Conrail and Jonnet versions of the agreement. Whether or not Jonnet “admitted” to typing an agreement on July 1 would have absolutely no bearing on what happened thereafter and could not help the Government prove that Jonnet had made alterations in his copy after the agreement was signed on July 1. In fact, not only would the statement cause no harm to Jonnet, it is far more likely that it would actually have helped him show his innocence. Evidence from any source that a typewriter was used to prepare the agreement on July 1 could only tend to show that the defendant’s version of his [1002]*1002agreement with Conrail was authentic rather than the Conrail version, which was handwritten rather than typewritten.

Since the Government had to disprove the authenticity of Jonnet’s version in order to convict, it is clear that the deposition is entirely exculpatory with or without the typographical error. Defendant’s claim of prejudice pays absolutely no regard to the evidence, the contentions of the parties, or the issues in the case. It is totally fallacious.

More importantly, even if the material were prejudicial, defendant was not deprived of a fair trial. There was overwhelming evidence to support the conviction, such as the testimony of others present at the drafting of the agreement of July 1, 1980 and of expert witnesses called by the Government.

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Bluebook (online)
597 F. Supp. 999, 1984 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 22515, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-jonnet-pawd-1984.