United States v. RW Professional Leasing Services Corp.

317 F. Supp. 2d 167, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7693, 2004 WL 944845
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedMay 4, 2004
Docket02 CV 767(ADS)(MLO)
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 317 F. Supp. 2d 167 (United States v. RW Professional Leasing Services Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. RW Professional Leasing Services Corp., 317 F. Supp. 2d 167, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7693, 2004 WL 944845 (E.D.N.Y. 2004).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OF DECISION AND ORDER

SPATT, District Judge.

This case involves charges of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and wire fraud and money laundering. Presently before the Court are the following motions by RW Professional Leasing Services, Corp. (“PLS”), Rochelle Besser, Barry Drayer, Roger Drayer, Adam Drayer, Susan Cott-rell, and Stephen Barker (collectively, the “defendants”): (1) to suppress documents obtained directly by a confidential source referred to as “CS-1” in the Government’s search warrant application, and any evidence seized by the Government from PLS’s office; (2) to suppress Roger Dray-er’s post-arrest statements; (3) to preclude evidence concerning the alleged fraudulent loans obtained by PLS on behalf of Hospitality Services of Middle Tennessee (“HSMT”); (4) to dismiss the indictment with respect to defendant Adam Drayer, or alternatively, to sever his trial; (5) for the production of all Brady and Giglio materials; (6) for an order directing *171 the Government to provide a bill of particulars; and (7) for an order directing the Government to provide statements and the grand jury testimony of PLS employees.

I. BACKGROUND

On or about April 2, 2003, along with Payaddi Shivashankar, the defendants were indicted and charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and wire fraud, 18 U.S.C. § 371, five counts of bank fraud, 18 U.S.C. § 1344, and one count of money laundering, 18 U.S.C. § 1986(h). The following facts are taken from the superceding indictment (“indictment”). PLS maintained business locations in Island Park, New York, and Wellesley, Massachusetts. The indictment charges, in relevant part, that Rochelle Besser, Barry Drayer, Susan Cottrell, Roger Drayer, and Roger Drayer’s son Adam Drayer (collectively, the “PLS defendants”) operated a medical equipment financing company, in which they arranged financing for the leasing of medical equipment by medical providers and supplied medical providers with working capital loans. PLS obtained loans from financial institutions for the purported purpose of purchasing medical equipment that would be leased to medical providers. In many instances, the leases and the medical equipment served as collateral for the loans.

The indictment charges that PLS devised a scheme to provide the financial institutions with sham documentation creating the false impression that the medical providers were leasing equipment from PLS and that PLS issued phony equipment invoices directly to the medical providers for payments due under the lease. The indictment further charges that the PLS defendants, among other things: (1) intentionally retained lease prepayments, rather than remitting them to the financial institutions; (2) concealed prepayments and defaults by medical providers by creating false checks that were designed to make it appear as though the medical providers were continuing to make payments under the leases; (3) fraudulently induced lenders to fund multiple loans on the basis of a single lease; (4) obtained loans from lenders on the basis of leases that had been cancelled by medical providers; (5) presented escrow agreements to banks to induce them to fund loans, knowing that escrow accounts would not be established and no funds would be held in escrow for the banks; and (6) converted loan proceeds to PLS’s own use.

The indictment provides that, instead of establishing escrow accounts for the leases being financed by the financial institutions as required by the escrow agreements, PLS maintained one bank account that received approximately $92 million in loan proceeds wired by the lending institutions, and a second bank account known as the “E-Account,” which was used by PLS as an operating account to receive lease payments and lease prepayments from the medical providers and for other purposes. The bank account and the E-Account were maintained by PLS at the same financial institution.

After the loan proceeds were wired into the first account, they were transferred by PLS into the E-Account, where they were commingled with lease payments and lease prepayments. Instead of using the loan proceeds for the purchase of medical equipment, as PLS had promised to do, the PLS defendants converted a substantial portion of the loan proceeds to their own uses. In particular, the commingled funds were transferred by check or wire, from the E-Account to (1) pay financial obligations of PLS; (2) make lease payments in order to conceal the medical providers’ default status from lenders; and (3) another account maintained by PLS in order to disguise the proceeds and facilitate *172 their conversions. The indictment states that the PLS defendants fraudulently converted at least the sum of $28 million.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Motion to Suppress all Evidence obtained by “CS-1”

The defendants identify a confidential source (“CS-1”) as former PLS employee Frank Zambaras. They argue that Zam-baras acted as a de facto Government agent and that, therefore, all items seized by him and all evidence derived from those items, including items seized pursuant to the search warrant, should be suppressed. Alternatively, the defendants request an evidentiary hearing to determine whether Zambaras acted as a Government instrument or agent.

The Fourth Amendment provides that “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated.... ” U.S. Const, amend. TV. It is well-settled that the “surreptitious search of premises by a private party does not violate the Fourth Amendment” unless such individual is acting as an instrument or agent of the government in obtaining evidence. United States v. Bennett, 709 F.2d 803, 805 (2d Cir.1983). The Supreme Court has made clear that it is “ ‘immaterial’ whether the government originated the idea for a search or joined it while it was in progress.” United States v. Knoll, 16 F.3d 1313, 1320 (2d Cir.1994) (quoting Lustig v. United States, 338 U.S. 74, 78-79, 69 S.Ct. 1372, 93 L.Ed. 1819 (1949)). If the government ‘“was in it before the object of the search was completely accomplished [by the private party, it] must be deemed to have participated in it.’ ” Id. (quoting Lustig, 338 U.S. at 78-79, 69 S.Ct. 1372). Thus, the critical issue is “the point in time when the object of the search has been completed. If the object has been realized, the government cannot later become a party to it. By the same token, it may not expand the scope of an ongoing private search unless it has an independent right to do so.” Id.

An evidentiary hearing on a motion to suppress “ordinarily is required if the moving papers are sufficiently definite, specific, and nonconjectural to enable the court to conclude that contested issues of fact going to the validity of the search are in question.” United States v. Pena,

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Bluebook (online)
317 F. Supp. 2d 167, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7693, 2004 WL 944845, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-rw-professional-leasing-services-corp-nyed-2004.