United States v. Wac

498 F.2d 1227
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
DecidedJune 20, 1974
DocketNos. 73-1588 to 73-1593
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 498 F.2d 1227 (United States v. Wac) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Sixth 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. Wac, 498 F.2d 1227 (6th Cir. 1974).

Opinion

LIVELY, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal from convictions under a single count indictment charging violations of 18 U.S.C. § 1955 and 18 U. S.C. § 2. Eighteen persons were named in the original indictment, and four were found not guilty. Four of the remaining fourteen who were convicted have not appealed. The appeals of the ten remaining defendants have been consolidated and were heard together. The case concerns the handling of bets by persons in the Toledo area and involves athletic and sports events which took place throughout the country. The court tried the case without a jury. No purpose would be served by a detailed recitation of the evidence contained in the transcript. The questions presented on appeal were first raised by way of preliminary motions in the trial court and were properly preserved for consideration here.

The Constitutionality of 18 U.S.C. § 1955

The defendants maintain that the statute under which they were convicted is unconstitutional as applied to them because the evidence does not show that their gambling operation had any effect on interstate commerce. The statute reads in part as follows:

§ 1955. Prohibition of illegal gambling businesses
(a) Whoever conducts, finances, manages, supervises, directs, or owns all or part of an illegal gambling business shall be fined not more than $20,000 or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
(b) As used in this section—
(1) “illegal gambling business” means a gambling business which—
(i) is a violation of the law of a [1229]*1229State or political subdivison in which it is conducted;
(ii) involves five or more persons who conduct, finance, manage, supervise, direct, or own all or part of such business; and
(iii) has been or remains in substantially continuous operation for a period in excess of thirty days or has a gross revenue of $2,000 in any single day.
(2) “gambling” includes but is not limited to pool-selling, bookmaking, maintaining slot machines, roulette wheels or dice tables, and conducting lotteries, policy, bolita or numbers games, or selling chances therein.
(3) “State” means any State of the United States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and any territory or possession of the United States.
(c) If five or more persons conduct, finance, manage, supervise, direct, or own all or part of a gambling business and such business operates for two or more successive days, then, for the purpose of obtaining warrants for arrests, interceptions, and other searches and seizures, probable cause that the business receives gross revenue in excess of $2,000 in any single day shall be deemed to have been established.

Although this court has not been called upon to decide the constitutionality of § 1955 on this particular ground, the same challenge was made in United States v. Aquino, 336 F.Supp. 737 (E.D.Mich. 1973). There Judge Kennedy concluded that the statute is constitutional in that it deals with a class of activities which affects interstate commerce and it is not essential that any particular intrastate activities of a particular person or group of persons within the prohibited class of activities actually be shown to have an effect on commerce. Judge Kennedy reached this conclusion on the basis of an analysis of the Supreme Court decisions in Perez v. United States, 402 U.S. 146, 91 S.Ct. 1357, 28 L.Ed.2d 686 (1971), and United States v. Darby, 312 U.S. 100, 61 S.Ct. 451, 85 L.Ed. 609 (1941). We are in agreement with the result and reasoning of United States v. Aquino, supra, and hold that § 1955 is not an unconstitutional attempt at federal regulation of purely intrastate activities.

It is contended that § 1955(c) is unconstitutional in that the presumption created therein is without a rational basis. This court has dealt with this argument in two recent cases and has rejected the contention of the defendants herein. We adhere to our decisions in United States v. Palmer, 465 F.2d 697 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 874, 93 S.Ct. 119, 34 L.Ed.2d 126 (1972); and United States v. DiMario, 473 F.2d 1046 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 412 U.S.907, 93 S.Ct. 2298, 36 L.Ed.2d 972 (1973).

It is also claimed that § 1955(c) is unconstitutional in that the presumption contained in it is a “watering down” of the Fourth Amendment requirements of probable cause. This argument assumes that probable cause to issue a warrant or interception authorization may be based on the presumption of § 1955(c) alone. This is not correct. Upon a showing that five or more persons conduct a gambling business for two or more successive days a presumption arises that the “take” is in excess of $2,000 in any single day. Nevertheless, the magistrate or district judge from whom the warrant or interception order is sought must still find probable cause to issue the warrant or order. United States v. Politi, 334 F.Supp. 1318, 1323 (S.D.N.Y.1971). It should be noted that the district judge who issued the two wiretap orders in this case had before him detailed affidavits of F.B.I. agents based on observations and information received from reliable confidential sources and that this information was sufficient to establish probable cause without reference to the statutory presumption. We hold that 18 U.S.C. § 1955(c) does not violate the Fourth Amendment by permitting the issuance [1230]*1230of warrants where probable cause has not been established.

The Wiretap Evidence

Much of the evidence in this case consisted of conversations overheard by government agents as the result of two wiretap orders issued by the district court. In addition, gambling paraphernalia which was seized pursuant to a search warrant was introduced. The affidavit upon which the search warrant was based contained a great deal of information which flowed from the wiretaps. The first wiretap order was issued along with a “pen register”

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Bluebook (online)
498 F.2d 1227, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-wac-ca6-1974.