State v. Lindell
| Decision Date | 16 April 2020 |
| Docket Number | Docket: Pen-19-185 |
| Citation | 229 A.3d 791 |
| Parties | STATE of Maine v. Robert K. LINDELL Jr. |
| Court | Maine Supreme Court |
Marina L. Sideris, Esq. (orally), Camden, for appellant Robert K. Lindell Jr.
Aaron M. Frey, Attorney General, and Gregg D. Bernstein, Asst. Atty. Gen. (orally), Office of the Maine Attorney General, Augusta, for appellee State of Maine
Panel: GORMAN, JABAR, HUMPHREY, HORTON, and CONNORS, JJ.*
[¶1] Robert K. Lindell Jr. appeals from a judgment of conviction of theft by unauthorized taking, theft by deception, securities violations, tax evasion, and failure to pay state income tax entered by the trial court (Penobscot County, Anderson, J. ) following a jury trial. Lindell contends that the court abused its discretion by admitting in evidence certain checks with their memo lines unredacted and a manual of employment procedures. He also contends that the court erred by declining to instruct the jury on the definition of the word "conduct," by declining to instruct the jury on methods for calculating income taxes, and by failing to provide the jury with relevant statutes. Finally, Lindell argues that the court erred by admitting evidence regarding conduct that occurred while Lindell was allegedly in California. We affirm the judgment.
[¶2] Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the State, the jury could have found the following facts beyond a reasonable doubt. See State v. Nobles , 2018 ME 26, ¶ 2, 179 A.3d 910. Lindell was licensed in Maine as a securities broker-dealer agent from approximately 1997 to 2017. As part of his business, he arranged for his clients to purchase investments through affiliated broker-dealers. Between 2010 and 2017, he conducted his business under the auspices of a Maine limited liability company (LLC), RK Lindell & Co., LLC, affiliating himself with Revere Securities, LLC.
[¶3] Lindell met his first victim (Victim 1) in 1997, while soliciting clients in the Belfast area. Victim 1 was a seventy-seven-year-old widow. The two developed a business relationship, and by the early 2000s Lindell was meeting weekly with Victim 1 at her home to discuss her finances. In 2004, Victim 1 executed a power of attorney (POA), appointing Lindell and a close family friend of the victim as agents. At the same time, Victim 1 established a trust (2004 Trust) to provide for her adult son.1 The family friend was never made aware of either the POA or the 2004 Trust. Victim 1 executed a will in 2005, appointing the family friend and Lindell as co-personal representatives. Neither the family friend nor Lindell was a devisee named in the will.
[¶4] Beginning in 2010, Victim 1 wrote thirty-one checks, all payable to Lindell's company, for the purpose of purchasing various securities. These checks listed the name of the security in the memo line and the checks totaled approximately $595,000. Lindell deposited the checks into his business bank account, but did not use them to purchase the securities. In eleven instances, he used other funds from Victim 1's brokerage account, totaling $298,000, to buy the securities. In twenty of the thirty-one instances, Lindell did not buy the securities at all. In early 2012, Victim 1's health began to decline, such that she could no longer physically write checks. Lindell used the POA given to him by Victim 1 to write checks totaling $67,850 to himself or his business from Victim 1's personal checking account.
[¶5] Victim 1 died in June 2012. Her estate was valued at nearly $6.7 million, and the estate account was set up at a Maine bank. Her will set forth a testamentary plan by which one-third of her estate was to be placed in a second trust for her son's benefit (Supplemental Trust). Among Victim 1's assets that passed outside of probate were an annuity (the Midland Annuity) and a life insurance policy (the Hartford Policy), together worth more than $1.1 million. These two policies each named the 2004 Trust as the beneficiary.
[¶6] In his capacity as personal representative of the estate, Lindell wrote checks totaling more than $500,000 to himself and to his business. He also transferred approximately $268,000 from the estate to the 2004 Trust.
[¶7] Shortly after Victim 1 died, Lindell opened three bank accounts in the name of the 2004 Trust, including two at branches located in Maine. Lindell transferred into these accounts approximately $275,000 from the Hartford Policy, approximately $823,000 from the Midland Annuity,2 and approximately $167,000 from liquidated securities once held in the son's name. In total, Lindell directed more than $1.7 million to accounts held by the 2004 Trust, accounts over which he had sole control. Between 2012 and 2017, Lindell spent almost all of these funds. The bulk of the money, more than $900,000 total, was used to purchase and renovate a home in California for his family.3 The rest was largely used to pay Lindell's credit card bills and other personal expenses.
[¶8] Lindell also managed the finances for a second woman (Victim 2), who was a longtime family friend of Lindell. Lindell managed several Maine bank accounts held in the name of a trust (GLQD Trust). Victim 2, who lived in France, was the beneficiary of the trust, and had very limited control and oversight of the accounts. Between 2010 and 2017, without Victim 2's knowledge or permission, Lindell used more than $300,000 from GLQD Trust bank accounts to pay personal expenses, to pay his company, and to fund Victim 1's 2004 Trust.4 In total, Lindell misappropriated more than $3.5 million from his two victims.
[¶9] Lindell was indicted by a grand jury on March 1, 2017, and charged with one count of theft by unauthorized taking (Class B), 17-A M.R.S. § 353 (2018), and one count of knowing or intentional securities violation (Class C), 32 M.R.S. § 16508 (2018). Two superseding indictments were returned on July 26, 2017, and April 25, 2018, adding an additional count of theft by unauthorized taking (Class B), two counts of theft by deception (Class C), 17-A M.R.S. § 354 (2018), five counts of intentional evasion of income tax (Class C), 36 M.R.S. § 184-A (2018), and five counts of failure to pay Maine state income tax (Class D), 36 M.R.S. § 5332(1)(A) (2018). Lindell pleaded not guilty to all counts.
[¶10] On October 23, 2018, Lindell moved in limine for the court to exclude from evidence the memo lines on the checks that Victim 1 wrote to him, arguing that they were inadmissible hearsay. He also argued that all evidence of his use and control of money located in Maine that occurred after he moved to California was outside the jurisdiction of the court, and thus inadmissible, either to prove a theft or for any other reason. The court denied Lindell's motion as to the hearsay issue and held that Lindell's conduct while in California was admissible to show "intent, state of mind, scheme, and plan." The court deferred its ruling regarding whether Lindell's California conduct was admissible as substantive evidence of theft, but ultimately declined to give such a limiting instruction to the jury.
[¶11] Following a seven-day trial in October and November 2018, the jury found Lindell guilty on all counts. The court entered a judgment of conviction and sentenced Lindell to seventeen years’ imprisonment with all but ten years suspended, and three years’ probation.5 Lindell timely appealed the judgment of conviction. See M.R. App. P. 2B(b)(1).
[¶12] Lindell argues on appeal that the trial court erred or abused its discretion in several ways. First, he contends that the court abused its discretion by admitting in evidence a manual of employee procedures published by Revere and certain checks with their memo lines unredacted. Second, he argues that the trial court erred by declining to instruct the jury on the definition of the word "conduct," by declining to instruct the jury on methods for calculating income taxes, and by failing to provide the jury with relevant statutes. Finally, he contends that the court erred by admitting evidence of his conduct that occurred while Lindell was allegedly in California.
[¶13] Lindell contends that the trial court abused its discretion by admitting in evidence checks issued by Victim 1 to Lindell without redacting information contained on the memo lines of the checks. Lindell argues that the memo lines contained inadmissible hearsay. See M.R. Evid. 802. "We review a trial court's ruling to admit or exclude alleged hearsay evidence for an abuse of discretion," and "will find an abuse of discretion if a party can demonstrate that the trial court exceeded the bounds of the reasonable choices available to it." State v. Fox , 2017 ME 52, ¶ 29, 157 A.3d 778 (quotation marks omitted). "The trial court has broad discretion in determining the admissibility of evidence ...." Id. (quotation marks omitted).
[¶14] Contrary to Lindell's arguments, the words in the check memos had independent significance as terms of an agreement or contract between Victim 1 and Lindell to purchase securities and as evidence of Lindell's knowledge of those terms, and thus were offered for a purpose other than the truth of the matter asserted. See M.R. Evid. 801(c)(2). Lindell concedes that the checks themselves are not hearsay, as they are documents of independent legal significance.6 See Williams v. United States , 458 U.S. 279, 284, 102 S.Ct. 3088, 73 L.Ed.2d 767 (1982) (); M.R. Evid. 801. Lindell fails to explain how information contained in the memos is conceptually distinct from the other information contained in the check—amount to be drawn, payor, payee, financial institution—that he concedes has...
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