United States v. Seeman

115 F.2d 371, 1940 U.S. App. LEXIS 2880
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Second Circuit
DecidedNovember 12, 1940
DocketNo. 102
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 115 F.2d 371 (United States v. Seeman) 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. Seeman, 115 F.2d 371, 1940 U.S. App. LEXIS 2880 (2d Cir. 1940).

Opinion

AUGUSTUS N. HAND, Circuit Judge.

The defendant Solly Seeman was convicted of conspiring with other defendants to violate Section 415 of Title 18 of U.S. C.A., which provides for the punishment of: “Whoever shall transport or cause to be transported in interstate or foreign commerce any goods, wares, or merchandise, securities, Or money, of the value of $5,000 or more theretofore stolen or taken feloniously by fraud or with intent to steal or purloin, knowing the same to have been so stolen or taken * *

Solly Seeman and Morris Pollock were found guilty after a trial by a jury, and six of the other defendants pleaded guilty. Solly Seeman alone has appealed.

The record amply established that $27,-500 worth of Consolidated Farm Loan Bonds were stolen from Union Trust Company t of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on March 22, 1938, and that $10,000 of these bonds were brought by Robert Singerman, one of the defendants, to W. Bansen & Co., a bond house in the Southern District of New York. On July 28, 1938, Singerman was given sterling currency and a check in payment for $2,000 of these bonds and on July 29, 1938, was given sterling currency and a check in payment for $3,000 of them. The remaining $5,000 of the bonds were sold in the same way on August 2, 1938.

It is argued on behalf of the appellant Solly Seeman that he had no knowledge that any of the bonds dealt with were stolen and particularly that he had no knowledge of or connection with a plan for their transportation in interstate commerce.

We think that the proof was sufficient to show an arrangement in which Solly Seeman was an active participant to have stolen bonds transported in interstate commerce and that the judgment of conviction ought therefore to be affirmed.

As evidence of Solly Seeman’s guilty knowledge it appears from the testimony of Singerman that in June 1938 he saw Solly in the room of Solly’s brother Jack; that later in July there was a discussion between the Seemans and the defendant Steinberg about disposing of Federal Farm Loan Bonds; that in that conversation it was questioned whether the bond house through which the bonds were to be sold by Singerman would not get suspicious of the Federal Loan bonds and fear was expressed as to having Singer-man handle them. After Singerman received the Federal Loan bond for $5,000 from Jack Seeman and disposed of it on August 2, Jack and Solly said they thought he had made a mistake in selling it, apparently because it was of such a large amount as to arouse suspicion. On an earlier occasion Singerman had a conversation with the Seemans in which they ask[373]*373ed him whether the proceeds of certain stolen securities had been “got away with” by two of the other defendants. There was evidence that Solly was to share in the proceeds of sale of these and other stolen securities. While it is argued that proof that Solly Seeman dealt with other stolen securities was incompetent because it did not tend to show that there was any knowledge on his part of a purpose to cause the securities covered by the indictment to be transported in interstate commerce, we can see no reason why proof of dealing in stolen goods was not competent to show a guilty knowledge in respect to the bonds in question even though proof of an intent to cause them to be transported in interstate commerce has to be supplied from other sources.

If other evidence was necessary to,establish an intent that the Farm Loan Bonds were to be transported in interstate commerce, nevertheless proof of the receipt of other stolen goods are thus transported would tend to support the government’s case pro tanto. A complete identity of all the factors in the case at bar and in the other cases was not necessary to render the proof competent. Nakutin v. United States, 7 Cir., 8 F.2d 491, certiorari denied, 269 U.S. 585, 46 S.Ct. 201, 70 L.Ed. 425. Accordingly Solly’s sales of the stolen certificate of 100 shares of Reynolds Tobacco B stock, and of the bonds stolen from the Surrogates Court, and of the stolen National Steel bonds were competent evidence of his guilty knowledge and intent to participate in the conspiracy alleged (pp. 502, 346).

But there was also proof of similar acts in which transportation in interstate commerce was involved. On July 19, 1938, Solly personally delivered to one Mahler a $5,000 United States Treasury Note that had been stolen in Nebraska on May 23, 1938, from the Omaha National Bank and was disposed of in Syracuse. Likewise about August 12, 1938, Solly delivered to Mahler a $5,000 Consolidated Federal Loan bond, which was other than the Consolidated Federal Loan bond heretofore mentioned. This bond was stolen from the Union Trust Company of Pittsburgh on May 22, 1938.

That similar acts may be proved in order to show guilty knowledge is settled in this circuit. United States v. Brand, 79 F.2d 605, 606; Workin v. United States, 260 F. 137; Sapir v. United States, 174 F. 219.

Solly threatened Steinberg for not giving him a proper share of the avails of stolen securities. He said at a meeting with Stein-berg and Jack Seeman in New York on July 14, 1938: “This is an affair we split, * * * I was not putting up money to make up shortages and running around and coming in on all the deals, and * * * on all these conversations, for the love of it.” After this conversation it was arranged to procure more stolen securities, and a few days later Jack and Solly See-man said to Steinberg that “the only thing they could get at the moment was some Federal Farm Loans.” Shortly afterwards Jack delivered to Singerman the Federal Farm Loan bonds referred to in the indictment which were sold under an agreement whereby Solly was to have a fourth share in the profits from the sales. Prior to this agreement Solly was only to receive a share of profits distributed to his brother Jack.

It is evident from the foregoing that the appellant was constantly engaged in dealing with stolen securities. In the case of the Treasury Note for $5,000, stolen from the Bank of Omaha and brought from Nebraska to New York, he personally delivered it to Mahler who sold it to a man named Crimmins in Syracuse. The Consolidated Federal Loan Bonds referred to in the indictment were delivered to the persons who were to market them by Solly’s brother Jack. One of the defendants, Blaser, testified that in July Steinberg or Weinman said that the “manager,” meaning Jack Seeman, had sent to Pittsburgh, Chicago, Detroit, to see what they could pick up there. He kept telling us “it looks like we were going to get some more merchandise” (p. 231).

The evidence we have mentioned, Stein-berg’s testimony that Solly “arranged calls and arranged to get merchandise,” and Weinman’s testimony that in July 1938 Solly said: “We have some wires out for merchandise,” all closely connect him with the conspiracy.

In view of Solly’s intimate contact with the enterprise of marketing stolen securities and the proof of his attempts to get them from other states, it is unreasonable to argue that a jury was not justified in finding that he participated in a conspiracy for the transportation in interstate com[374]*374merce of stolen securities knowing that they were stolen.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Commonwealth v. Sell
470 A.2d 457 (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 1983)
United States v. Dominick Santiago
528 F.2d 1130 (Second Circuit, 1976)
Manger v. State
133 A.2d 78 (Court of Appeals of Maryland, 1957)
United States v. Gris
146 F. Supp. 293 (S.D. New York, 1956)
United States v. Coplon
88 F. Supp. 921 (S.D. New York, 1950)
Bollenbach v. United States
326 U.S. 607 (Supreme Court, 1946)
Giardano v. United States
139 F.2d 198 (Ninth Circuit, 1943)
United States v. Feldman
136 F.2d 394 (Second Circuit, 1943)
United States v. Turley
135 F.2d 867 (Second Circuit, 1943)
Banning v. United States
130 F.2d 330 (Sixth Circuit, 1942)
United States v. Anderson
45 F. Supp. 943 (S.D. California, 1942)
United States v. Goldstein
120 F.2d 485 (Second Circuit, 1941)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
115 F.2d 371, 1940 U.S. App. LEXIS 2880, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-seeman-ca2-1940.