U.S. v. Bentley, s. 86-1858

• Decision Date: 03 August 1987
• Docket Number: 86-1907 and 86-2626,Nos. 86-1858,86-1873,s. 86-1858
• Citation: 825 F.2d 1104
• Parties: 23 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 212 UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. David BENTLEY, Richard Degen, Allen Yung, and Walter Josten, Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 1104

825 F.2d 1104

23 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 212

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. David BENTLEY, Richard Degen, Allen Yung, and Walter Josten,

Defendants-Appellants.

Nos. 86-1858, 86-1873, 86-1907 and 86-2626.

United States Court of Appeals,

Seventh Circuit.

Argued May 20, 1987.

Decided June 24, 1987.

Rehearing Denied Aug. 3, 1987.

Martin S. Agran, Agran & Agran, Ltd., Terence F. MacCarthy, Federal Defender Program, David P. Schippers, Davis P. Schippers & Assoc., Chtd., Chicago, Ill., for defendants-appellants.

Pierre Talbert, Asst. U.S. Atty., Anton Valukas, U.S. Atty., Chicago, Ill., for plaintiff-appellee.

Before FLAUM, EASTERBROOK, and MANION, Circuit Judges.

EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge.

Universal Precious Metals, Inc., was a bucket shop. It "sold" metals, principally copper and silver, for future delivery. It used the mails and phones extensively. Salesmen represented that Universal had the metals in vaults or that the firm would hedge the customers' positions through futures contracts. But Universal had no significant inventories of the metals. When it purchased futures contracts it was more likely to be short (i.e., promising to deliver metals it did not have, which magnified the risk of customers who wanted to buy the metals) than to be long. To protect its customers completely by hedging, Universal had to take a 100% net long position. (Because the business may have other assets to secure customers' positions, the industry standard is 90% net long.) When a firm is properly hedged and the price of the metal rises, the value of the futures contract rises too; the firm may pay this profit to its customer or stand for delivery on the contract, obtaining the metal for the customer's account. If the price of the metal falls, Universal loses on the futures contract, but this matches the customer's loss, and the firm (which writes down its debts to customers) is no worse off. If the firm is short and the market falls, it gains while reducing its debts to customers; when it is short and the market rises, customers' portfolios show "profits" but Universal has no way to pay its customers (unless it has other sources of wealth), having just lost in the market as much money as the customers gained. In other words, by going short, Universal exposed its customers to the risk of calamitous loss with no corresponding prospect of gain for their accounts. Sooner or later, the loss was bound to occur.

Universal had a net long position less than half of the time, and it never covered more than 32% of the customers' positions in silver or 41% in copper. Universal also did not return customers' money when there were paper profits. People who wanted to sell their positions were termed "problem accounts" and turned over to especially high-powered salesmen. When this did not work, the firm promised to send money but often did not; salesmen then claimed to be baffled by the failure of the mails. Universal raked in almost $15 million during its short life (April 1981 to December 1982) and returned about $3 million to customers.

The scheme could not last. Customers frustrated by inability to withdraw their money tend to complain--first within the firm, then to the press and the government. The FBI obtained a search warrant for Universal's premises in September 1982 and carted away most of its records. This did not prevent the firm from carrying on for another ten weeks. The inevitable criminal prosecution did not commence until 1985, in Chicago rather than Ft. Lauderdale, Universal's headquarters. Stranger still, the case was prosecuted under the mail and wire fraud statutes, 18 U.S.C. Secs. 1341 and 1343, rather than the commodities and securities statutes designed for frauds of the type. Counsel for the government could not explain at oral argument the venue or the selection of the charges; as the defendants have not complained about either, we do not pursue the matter.

The indictment charged seven out of the more than 25 people who worked at Universal. Jack Rose, the chief of the sales staff, and one other participant pleaded guilty and testified for the prosecution at trial. A third defendant is a fugitive. This left four for trial. David Bentley, who made Universal's investments, was convicted on 22 counts and sentenced to 12 years' imprisonment to be followed by five years' probation; he was ordered to pay $75,000 as restitution. Richard Degen, Walter Josten, and Allen Yung were salesmen from Universal's boiler room. Yung, convicted on 13 counts, received two years' imprisonment, five years' probation, and an order to pay $30,000 of restitution. Josten, convicted on a single count, was sentenced to three months' imprisonment and required to pay, as restitution, one-third of his earnings while at Universal. Degen was convicted on 13 counts and sentenced to five years' probation on condition that he spend 90 days of that time in prison, perform 1,000 hours of community service, and make restitution of $50,000.

All four maintain that the evidence is insufficient to show that they participated in a "scheme" to defraud. Bentley says he had no idea that Rose and his staff were telling customers that their positions would be covered; the salesmen say that they had no idea that Bentley was not covering the customers' positions. The jury was entitled to disagree. It could conclude that Bentley saw sales literature that touted the security of the firm's investment and hedging practices. Bentley also had been in the metals business before, indeed had run a bucket shop before. After a court issued an injunction against Bentley's fraudulent business practices at First Guaranty Metals, Bentley changed his name (it had been David Smith) and went back into business at Universal. After the collapse of Universal, Bentley went to the well a third time, leading to a citation for contempt of court. The district court kept from the jury most of the history of Bentley's encounters with the law but allowed the jury to learn that Bentley had experience in the metals business. The jury also learned that when the FBI conducted the search in September 1982, it found in Bentley's office many newspaper articles describing bucket shops in metals. The jury could infer that Bentley knew that a business like Universal attracts money on promises of security that he was dishonoring.

The salesmen have a better claim of ignorance, but we must now take all the evidence and permissible inferences in the light most favorable to the prosecution. The evidence permitted the jury to conclude that the salesmen were in on the scheme. (The court gave an ostrich instruction, see United States v. Ramsey, 785 F.2d 184, 188-91 (7th Cir.1986).) The salesmen told tales they knew were false--about their background (exaggerating their credentials and experience), about the success of their other customers (making investments in metals sound profitable for everyone, although they knew that such investments are risky even when the positions are hedged and that most of Universal's customers lost money), about the standing and expertise of the firm (saying that it had representation on the floor of the commodities exchanges and telling customers that the salesmen personally had talked to the phantom representative). No legitimate metals business tags an investor who wants to draw on his account as a "problem account" to be turned over to a different salesman, yet Universal did this. Yung and Degen were among the specialists in "problem" customers. No legitimate commodities business offers to disregard the losses in an investor's account if the investor will send more money rather than asking for his balance to be returned; yet Universal did this too, in an effort to ensure that cash flowed in one direction only. Rose told the sales staff that its function was to separate the public from its money. The jury was entitled to infer that salesmen who listened to Rose and then told lies, "negated" losses on condition of further investment, and identified ordinary investment transactions as "problems", knew enough about the character of Universal's business to be participants in its scheme to defraud. The evidence here was smashing compared to that in United States v. Pearlstein, 576 F.2d 531 (3d Cir.1978), on which the salesmen rely.

There is also enough evidence to permit the jury to infer that there was a single scheme, that the salesmen acted with the necessary intent, and that their activities facilitated the success of the scheme. The participation of the defendants in a common endeavor made joinder appropriate under Fed.R.Crim.P. 8. United States v. Wozniak, 781 F.2d 95 (7th Cir.1985). The defenses were not mutually inconsistent, so severance was unnecessary. See United States v. Buljubasic, 808 F.2d 1260, 1263 (7th Cir.1987). And although the defendants complain about some of the district court's evidentiary decisions, none was erroneous or need be discussed in detail. Only two require comment.

The evidence about Bentley's involvement at First Guaranty Metals showed that he understood the operation of a metals merchant and the importance of adequately hedging customers' positions. It was not admitted to show propensity, the district court considered its potential to support such a forbidden inference, and the court's decision therefore did not offend Fed.R.Evid. 404(b). See United States v. Beasley, 809 F.2d 1273 (7th Cir.1987). The district court excluded, as unduly prejudicial under Fed.R.Evid. 403, evidence of Bentley's escapades after Universal's collapse; this was all he had a right to expect.

The court admitted charts showing Universal's net position in silver and copper futures (both absolute and as a percentage of customers' open positions) every 20 calendar days from May 1981 through September 1982. The defendants grouse that this chart did not show whether Universal was properly hedged on other days, but charts need not be...