United States v. Percy Rochon, United States of America v. Edward Cabbell, United States of America v. Bonnie Marie Johnson

575 F.2d 191
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
DecidedMay 6, 1978
Docket77-1759, 77-1816 and 77-1817
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 575 F.2d 191 (United States v. Percy Rochon, United States of America v. Edward Cabbell, United States of America v. Bonnie Marie Johnson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Eighth 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. Percy Rochon, United States of America v. Edward Cabbell, United States of America v. Bonnie Marie Johnson, 575 F.2d 191 (8th Cir. 1978).

Opinion

HENLEY, Circuit Judge.

In early June, 1977 the federal grand jury for the Northern District of Iowa returned a forty-two count indictment charging Bonnie Marie Johnson, Edward Cabbell, Beverly New and Percy Rochon with violations of a number of the criminal laws of *193 the United States relating to the interstate transportation of falsely made or forged securities, 18 U.S.C. § 2314, receiving and concealing falsely made or forged securities in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2315, willful perjury before federal grand juries, 18 U.S.C. § 1623(a), and conspiracy to commit offenses against the United States, 18 U.S.C. § 371.

The defendants with whom we are directly concerned, Johnson, Cabbell and Rochon, pleaded not guilty to the charges against them and were tried before a jury in August, 1977 with Chief District Judge Edward J. McManus presiding. They were all found guilty on all of the counts in which they were named as defendants, and in September, 1977 the district court imposed severe sentences of imprisonment on all three of them. They have appealed. 1

In seeking reversals the defendants do not attack the sufficiency of the indictment or the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the verdicts.

Rochon contends simply that the district court erred in refusing to grant him a trial separate from that of Cabbell and Johnson.

Cabbell and Johnson contend that the government did not timely furnish them with exculpatory material as required by Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963). They also claim that they were deprived of the adequate assistance of counsel because counsel did not have sufficient time to familiarize themselves with the case and prepare a defense.

We find no merit in the contentions of the defendants, and we affirm all three convictions.

Facts and Procedural History.

In view of the narrow positions taken by the defendants, we feel justified in stating the facts of the case as the jury would have been justified in finding them, and probably did find them under the evidence when viewed in the light most favorable to the government and giving the government the benefit of all reasonable inferences favorable to it.

Basically, the charges against the defendants grow out of the fact that in June, 1976 thirty falsely made and forged commercial money orders issued by American Express Company and drawn on the First National Bank of Denver, Colorado were caused to be transported from points in Iowa to the Bank just mentioned in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2314.

Those thirty money orders were completed on blanks which, with numerous others, had been consigned and mailed by American Express Company to a drugstore in Omaha, Nebraska, which was a distributing agent for money orders issued by the Company. 2 The blanks were mailed to the drugstore in February, 1976. In March, 1976 the drugstore was the subject of an armed robbery by two men, and in the course of the robbery the pharmacist in charge of the establishment was shot and critically wounded. It appears that as a result of his wound he has been rendered totally and permanently disabled.

The robbers stole from the drugstore a total of 320 blanks involving a potential loss of $64,000.00. 3 The girl friend of one of the *194 robbers came into possession of a number of blanks and passed some of them herself. She sold one book of twenty blanks to Cab-bell in Omaha for $100.00 or 2.5% of the maximum value of the blanks. She gave another book of blanks to Leon Jenkins, an acquaintance of Cabbell, and the blanks in that book or some of them appear to have come into Cabbell’s possession. 4

Those blanks were transported from Nebraska to Iowa and were completed in the latter state. Upon their completion they unquestionably became “securities” as defined in 18 U.S.C. § 2311 and were covered by § 2314. Cf. United States v. Jackson, 576 F.2d 749 (8th Cir. 1978).

Cabbell obtained at least twenty-five of the blanks in question, and we will refer to them as the “Cabbell blanks.” Those blanks were filled out in sums from $190.00 to $198.23, and on each blank “Mary A. Straight” was identified as the payee.

The remaining five blanks may have come into the possession of the defendant, Rochon; certainly, at least four of them were handled by him at some stage because his latent fingerprints appeared on them when they were examined by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the course of its investigation of the interstate transportation of this group of securities. And the fifth blank was closely connected with the other four when the five blanks are considered from the standpoint of serial numbers. Those five blanks, which we will call the “Rochon blanks,” were filled out to show “Lita L. Church” or “Lori M. Evans” as payee. Two of the blanks were filled out in the sum of $185.00 each, and the other three were filled out for $175.00 each.

The Cabbell blanks were negotiated on June 9 and June 10, 1976 by Bonnie Johnson, apparently at the instance and to some extent with the assistance of Cabbell, at four banks in the small cities of Algona, Eagle Grove, Humboldt and Webster City, Iowa, all of which are located in the vicinity of the larger city of Fort Dodge. 5 The modus operandi may be described as follows.

Shortly before negotiating the money orders Johnson appeared at each of the target banks and established a false identity for herself as “Mary A. Straight,” or as “Mary Straight,” and opened a small checking account in that name. With that foundation laid, negotiation of the securities could begin. 6

On June 9, 1976 Johnson appeared at the Iowa State Bank at Algona where she endorsed and deposited five money orders, each in the sum of $190.00, and each made payable to Mary A. Straight. Johnson’s account in that name was credited with the full amount of the deposit. Those five money orders became the subject of Counts 1-5 of the indictment, and Bonnie Marie Johnson was the only defendant named in those counts.

On the same day Johnson, posing as Mary A.

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Bluebook (online)
575 F.2d 191, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-percy-rochon-united-states-of-america-v-edward-cabbell-ca8-1978.