U.S. v. Bibby

Citation752 F.2d 1116
Decision Date14 January 1985
Docket Number82-5717 and 82-5723,Nos. 82-5705,s. 82-5705
PartiesUNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Allan Harvey BIBBY (82-5705), Edgar Hardin Gillock (82-5717), A. Arthur Ayers (82-5723), Defendants-Appellants.
CourtUnited States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)

Andrew J. Ekonomou, Kirby Atkinson, Ekonomou & Atkinson, Atlanta, Ga., Harold L. Klein (argued), James D. Causey, Jay Fred Friedman (argued), Memphis, Tenn., for defendants-appellants.

W. Hickman Ewing (argued), U.S. Atty., Michael C. Speros, Asst. U.S. Atty., Memphis, Tenn., for plaintiff-appellee.

Before MARTIN, CONTIE and WELLFORD, Circuit Judges.

BOYCE F. MARTIN, Jr., Circuit Judge.

Defendants Edgar Gillock, a former Tennessee state senator, and Arthur Ayers and Allan Bibby, former executives for Honeywell Information Systems, Inc., appeal their jury convictions for conspiracy, mail and wire fraud, extortion, and income tax fraud.

The charges against the defendants stem from their involvement in the sale of Honeywell computer systems. According to the indictment, the defendants were involved in a conspiracy to defraud Honeywell of both the honest and faithful service of its employees and substantial sums of money. The illegal activity began sometime in the fall of 1975 when Oliver Drew and Jack Owen, two other Honeywell employees, first contacted Mr. Gillock. Drew and Owen needed Gillock's assistance to help them sell a new Honeywell computer to Tennessee's Department of Employment Security. According to Owen, Gillock was valuable because he introduced Honeywell officials to influential people in the Tennessee legislature and helped "get the paperwork to flow." According to Drew, Gillock was important because of his "political influence."

After the Department of Employment Security announced plans to purchase a Honeywell computer, Gillock approached Owen and suggested that he be compensated for his efforts on behalf of Honeywell. Owen told Gillock that there was no "vehicle" available through which to pay Gillock directly. The company had a policy prohibiting monetary payments to public officials. Nevertheless, Owen devised a scheme to pay Gillock indirectly through a Louisiana consulting firm, Public Systems, Inc. Public Systems was controlled by Robert Grapp, a former Honeywell employee. Owen paid Public Systems $4,045 in two installments for non-existent services provided by Grapp. Grapp, in turn, sent the money to Gillock. The whole transaction took place with the knowledge and approval of Allan Bibby.

In the fall of 1976, the criminal enterprise entered a new stage. Bibby, Ayers, and Jack Camarda, another former employee who left Honeywell to start Financial Marketing Services, Inc., a company specializing in financing computer systems, concocted a plan to defraud Honeywell in transactions involving the sale of Honeywell computers financed by Camarda's company. The three agreed to a three-way split of profits realized on all sales financed by FMS in which Bibby and Ayers were involved in bringing Honeywell and FMS together. Because this arrangement was against Honeywell's conflict of interests policy, the three decided to conceal their profits by funneling them through cattle ranching operations which each owned. As a result of this scheme, Camarda paid Bibby and Ayers approximately $600,000 each from twelve computer sales financed by FMS between 1976 and 1980.

One of the transactions that Bibby and Ayers received a kickback on involved a computer sale to Shelby County, Tennessee. Throughout the first quarter of 1978, Honeywell had attempted to sell Shelby County new computer equipment to upgrade a system originally purchased from Honeywell in 1975. After encountering little initial success, Honeywell officials decided to call on their government contact from the past, Mr. Gillock. Oliver Drew made the initial contact. At their meeting, Gillock assured Drew that he had "influence in Shelby County" and said he would be happy to offer his assistance. However, Gillock also said he would have to be paid for his troubles. Drew subsequently informed his superiors that Gillock wanted money.

On April 11, 1978, a meeting was held in Atlanta, Georgia, attended by Drew, Ayers, Gillock, possibly Bibby, and others, to discuss payment for Gillock. At that meeting, it was tentatively decided that Gillock would be paid ten percent of the contract price to Shelby County if and when the deal ever went through. Later, Bibby, Ayers, and Camarda had their own meeting and agreed that Gillock would be paid $150,000 out of their collective profit on the sale.

Bibby and Ayers also agreed that Gillock should be paid either a retainer fee or expense money while he worked on getting Shelby County to agree to upgrade its computer system. On April 26, 1978, Ayers called Jan Tyler, president and sole stockholder of Manmark, Inc., a Texas corporation, and asked him to mail Gillock $3,000 every month for six months. Because Tyler held the shares of Manmark in trust for Ayers, he did as Ayers requested. These six checks formed the basis of the mail fraud charges against Bibby, Ayers, and Gillock and all but one of the extortion charges against Gillock. Manmark was later reimbursed for the $18,000 by Financial Marketing Services, which was later reimbursed by Honeywell.

Shelby County finally bought the new computer equipment in October, 1978. On October 19, Camarda paid $130,365.61 to Gillock as his commission on the sale. This was less than the $150,000 originally agreed upon only because Camarda had decided he did not want to pay the full amount. Gillock was dissatisfied, but he had no recourse. He did express his dissatisfaction to both Camarda and, at a later date, Ayers. The money was not paid directly to Gillock but rather, at his request, to the Forsythe Vending Company. The president of Forsythe Vending, William Forsythe, was a close friend of Gillock. Gillock characterized the payment to Forsythe as a loan. Over the next three years, Forsythe gradually repaid Gillock the debt. He paid no money directly to Gillock. Instead, he paid some of Gillock's bills--attorney's fees, car payments, mortgage payments, and the like. Gillock never reported the $130,000 on his 1978 income tax returns.

This $130,000 commission, and a telephone call between Drew and Gillock arranging delivery of the check, later formed the basis for one of the two wire fraud counts against the defendants, one of the extortion counts against Gillock, and one of the tax counts against Gillock.

After paying Gillock his fee, Camarda still had $59,000 remaining. This amount he split with Bibby and Ayers pursuant to their ongoing agreement.

On June 14, 1982, a federal grand jury returned a twenty-count indictment against Gillock, Ayers, and Bibby. The indictment charged all three defendants with one conspiracy count, six mail fraud counts, and two wire fraud counts. The indictment also charged Gillock alone with seven Hobbs Act violations and four counts of tax fraud. One of the tax counts resulted from the above-mentioned failure to report as income the $130,365.31 fee from the Shelby County computer sale. The other three counts charged Gillock with making impermissible deductions for attorney's fees in calendar years 1977, 1979 and 1980. The trial began on October 12, 1982. The jury found all three defendants guilty on the nine counts common to each of them. The jury acquitted Gillock on the attorney's fee deduction counts but convicted him on the failure-to-report count. It also convicted him on the Hobbs Act charge stemming from the receipt of the $130,000 in the Shelby County deal. Because it could not reach a verdict on the other Hobbs Act counts, the trial judge declared a mistrial with respect to them. Bibby and Ayers were sentenced to three-and-one-half year concurrent sentences for each of their convictions and fined $10,000. Gillock was sentenced to four-year concurrent sentences for all but the tax conviction, for which he was given a three-year consecutive sentence. He was also fined $10,000.

On appeal, the defendants raise a number of issues. The first we must consider are defendants' allegations of misjoinder. Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure establishes limits for joinder of both defendants and offenses in the same trial:

(a) Joinder of Offenses. Two or more offenses may be charged in the same indictment or information in a separate count for each offense if the offenses charged, whether felonies or misdemeanors or both, are of the same or similar character or are based on the same act or transaction or on two or more acts or transactions connected together or constituting parts of a common scheme or plan.

(b) Joinder of Defendants. Two or more defendants may be charged in the same indictment or information if they are alleged to have participated in the same act or transaction or in the same series of acts or transactions constituting an offense or offenses. Such defendants may be charged in one or more counts together or separately and all of the defendants need not be charged in each count.

Bibby and Ayers argue that joinder of the tax counts against Gillock with the fraud and conspiracy counts against them is a violation of Rule 8(b) because the tax counts are not part of the "same act or transaction or in the same series of acts or transactions" as the fraud counts. They are at least partially correct. It is appropriate to combine tax charges against one defendant with fraud charges against that same defendant and other codefendants if the tax evasion charges arise directly out of the common illicit enterprise. See United States v. Kopituk, 690 F.2d 1289, 1313 (11th Cir.1982); United States v. Kenny, 645 F.2d 1323, 1344 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 828, 102 S.Ct. 121, 70 L.Ed.2d 104 (1981). Failure to report the income from an illegal activity is an act which does arise directly out of the...

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