U.S. v. Grugette

• Decision Date: 17 June 1982
• Docket Number: No. 81-2273,81-2273
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Louie R. GRUGETTE, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

Page 600

678 F.2d 600

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Louie R. GRUGETTE, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 81-2273.

United States Court of Appeals,

Fifth Circuit.

June 17, 1982.

Douglas Tinker, Corpus Christi, Tex., for defendant-appellant.

Carl Walker, Jr., U. S. Atty., James R. Gough, Asst. U. S. Atty., Houston, Tex., for plaintiff-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas.

Before RUBIN, REAVLEY and TATE, Circuit Judges.

TATE, Circuit Judge:

The defendant Grugette was convicted after a jury trial of violating 18 U.S.C § 1001 by falsely representing in an application for a Small Business Administration ("SBA") guaranteed loan that he had authority to pledge the assets of a corporation of which he was part owner. Grugette was sentenced to five years' imprisonment, to be suspended with five years' supervised probation imposed. He was required to make restitution to the SBA in the amount of $50,000. On appeal, Grugette alleges a number of defects in the indictment, trial, and sentencing phases of the proceedings. Finding no reversible merit to Grugette's contentions, we affirm.

The basic offense charged results from the execution of a security agreement pledging the assets of Craine's Boutique, Inc. ("Boutique"), a requirement for the approval of an SBA-guaranteed loan. ¹ After negotiation questioning the SBA's requirement ² that the Boutique assets be pledged in connection with an SBA-guaranteed $200,000 loan sought for a sister corporation (Craine's Lexington Corporation d/b/a Craine's Furniture Co.-"Furniture"), ³ Grugette executed the pledge agreement on behalf of Craine's Boutique, Inc. Grugette, who did not hold a majority interest in Boutique and who did not call a meeting of Boutique's board of directors to authorize the pledge, nevertheless executed the instrument under circumstances that a jury could reasonably believe constituted a false representation that he had authority to do so. ⁴

After Furniture defaulted on the loan, the SBA discovered that Grugette had not been authorized to pledge Boutique's assets. The SBA lost approximately $102,000 on the defaulted Furniture loan.

Grugette was charged with violating 18 U.S.C. § 1001 ⁵ by falsely representing in an application for an SBA guaranteed loan that he had the authority to pledge all of the assets of the Boutique. ⁶ Grugette was found guilty after a jury trial, and sentenced to five years' imprisonment, to be suspended with five years' probation. Grugette was also required to make restitution to the SBA in the amount of $50,000, a condition of his probation and suspension of sentence.

Grugette raises several issues on appeal. His claims of insufficiency of the evidence (that he "knowingly and willfully" made the false representation) and of prosecutorial misconduct (side bar remarks, an alleged misstatement, etc.) do not present reversible error on the record and under established jurisprudence of this court. We will discuss below the remaining issues, which relate to: (1) whether the conduct of making a false representation as to the Boutique pledge agreement issued in connection with the loan was included within the conduct described by the indictment that charged that the false representation occurred in an "application " for an SBA guaranteed loan; (2) whether Grugette's restitution condition in his suspended sentence violated his equal protection rights; and (3) whether the trial court exceeded its statutory authority to require restitution only of "actual damages or loss caused by the offense," 18 U.S.C. § 3651.

1. The Indictment "Application" Issue

The indictment charged that Grugette willfully and knowingly made the false representation "in an application for a business loan submitted to" the SBA (emphasis supplied). Grugette argues that the evidence was insufficient to sustain his conviction because, according to him, the only time that he pledged the Boutique assets was after the application was made and the loan was authorized, and hence not in the application.

Grugette's contention that the fraudulent pledge did not occur in his "application " is also the basis of three other contentions made by him: (1) that there was a fatal variance between the indictment (which charged Grugette with making a false statement only in the loan "application"), and the proof adduced at trial (which showed that the allegedly false statement was made after the loan was approved); (2) that the indictment (false statement in an "application") should have been quashed for vagueness, in that it did not adequately inform Grugette of the offense charged; and (3) that the trial court erred in instructing the jury that Grugette could be found to violate the relevant statute by using a false "document", when the indictment referred specifically only to an application.

We find no merit to Grugette's pervasive technical claim that the allegedly false statement did not occur in an "application." The meaning of the term "application" may reasonably include any document used in connection with the application to obtain approval of the loan, not just the initial document requesting its approval. The pledge of the Boutique assets occurred as a result of the requirement of such a pledge by the SBA as a precondition of its guaranty of the loan, and it could reasonably be considered a part of the application. ⁷ No issue of surprise is involved, if only because from the time of the indictment (as re-enforced when the issue was raised pretrial by an overruled motion to dismiss it), Grugette was fully aware that the conduct charged consisted of his false representation that he had authority to pledge the assets of Boutique, as required for approval of the loan.

Accordingly, we find no merit to Grugette's arguments under the present circumstances, insofar as they depend on some technical distinction between Grugette's initial "application" for an SBA-guaranteed loan, and the documents submitted to fulfill a precondition imposed by the SBA before its final approval of the application.

2. Restitution and Equal Protection

Grugette next argues that the sentence imposed by the trial court violated equal protection guarantees, since restitution was required in lieu of imprisonment regardless of Grugette's ability to pay. Grugette relies on United States v. Jimenez, 600 F.2d 1172 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 903, 100 S.Ct. 216, 62 L.Ed.2d 140 (1979). This decision held to be unconstitutional the requirement that the defendant Jiminez repay interpreter's and appointed counsel's costs to the government as a condition of his probation, in part because the repayment condition "does not provide that repayment will be excused if Jiminez is unable to pay." 600 F.2d at 1175.

Jimenez was in this respect based upon this court's holding in Barnett v. Hopper, 548 F.2d 550 (5th Cir. 1977), vacated as moot, 439 U.S. 1041, 99 S.Ct. 714, 58 L.Ed.2d 701 (1978). Barnett held that a ten-year probated sentence conditioned on the payment of a $2,000 fine and court costs, was a denial of equal protection, when Barnett was in fact imprisoned because he could not find the funds to pay the fine: "(T)o imprison an individual when in the same circumstances an individual of financial means would remain free constitutes a denial of equal protection of the laws." 548 F.2d at 554. Barnett was itself based on the Supreme Court's decisions in Tate v. Short, 401 U.S. 395, 91 S.Ct. 668, 28 L.Ed.2d 130 (1971) and Williams v. Illinois, 399 U.S. 235, 90 S.Ct. 2018, 26 L.Ed.2d 586 (1970). These decisions literally held only that an indigent defendant was denied equal protection where, beyond any statutory provision or limit for imprisonment for the offense, he was required to be jailed solely because he could not find the funds to pay the fine or costs. Barnett viewed their rationale as implicating a denial of equal protection whenever an indigent was imprisoned because he was unable to pay a fine or costs imposed by the sentence, since those financially able to pay the fine selected by the sentencing judge as the appropriate penalty for the offense, or the costs, would be imprisoned, whereas those financially responsible could satisfy...