United States v. Cohn, 387

• Decision Date: 17 December 1971
• Docket Number: No. 387,Docket 71-1884.,387
• Citation: 452 F.2d 881
• Parties: The UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Herbert J. COHN, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

452 F.2d 881 (1971)

The UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Herbert J. COHN, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 387, Docket 71-1884.

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

Argued December 14, 1971.

Decided December 17, 1971.

Certiorari Denied March 6, 1972.

Jacob W. Friedman, New York City (Joseph Brill, New York City, of counsel), for appellant.

Thomas Fitzpatrick, Asst. U. S. Atty., New York City (Whitney North Seymour, Jr., U. S. Atty. for Southern District of New York, Richard J. Davis, Asst. U. S. Atty., New York City, of counsel), for appellee.

Before SMITH, KAUFMAN and MULLIGAN, Circuit Judges.

Certiorari Denied March 6, 1972. See 92 S.Ct. 1196.

IRVING R. KAUFMAN, Circuit Judge:

Herbert J. Cohn appeals from a conviction for committing perjury (18 U.S. C. § 1621) and obstructing justice (18 U.S.C. § 1503). We affirm.

The indictment charged that he gave "false and evasive" testimony before a federal Grand Jury.¹ Cohn argues that his perjury conviction must be set aside because his testimony was not material to the grand jury investigation and there was no independent corroboration of the testimony of the principal government witness. In addition, he urges that false and evasive testimony will not support a conviction for obstructing justice.

On April 29, 1969, Cohn appeared under a formal grant of immunity before a federal Grand Jury investigating possible corruption among government and labor union officials. Confronted with an envelope addressed to his son on which there were penciled notes such as "indictment," "embezzlement," "5 Count GJ," and "Buffalino Father in Law," he gave the following pertinent answers in response to questions relating to the envelope:

Q. Mr. Cohn, I show you what has been marked Grand Jury Exhibit 1 and ask you whether you can identify that and whether you have ever seen it before? A. I don\'t recall any of this. I recognize the envelope. It was addressed to my son. I recognize the handwriting addressing it to my son as coming from my mother. It must have been a birthday card or something.

Q. Do you recognize the pencilled handwriting? A. There are several here.

Q. Do you recognize any of them? A. Offhand — I can\'t say that I do.

* * * * * *

Q. You never recall seeing that envelope? A. No. This is the first time I have seen it.

Q. You are sure of that? A. I don\'t recall ever seeing this thing. I don\'t know where it comes from or what it is all about.

Q. Does anything that is written on there refresh your recollection concerning anything you might know about? A. The only name that I see here, as I said, I knew was Buffalino. I can\'t make out this and I don\'t understand what the connection is, anyway.

Q. Well, aside from specific names, is there anything in the information that is written on there that would in any way jog your memory as to whether you know anything about what is written on there? A. I don\'t have any recollection of the envelope or any of this.

At trial, Herbert Itkin testified that Cohn was the middle man in late 1962 and early 1963 between himself and Morris Emmanuel, a Labor Department official, in an illegal scheme to obtain information concerning pending federal labor racketeering investigations. Cohn, according to Itkin, gave him the envelope in question and told him that the penciled notes, written by his wife, contained the information he had received from Emmanuel. An FBI handwriting expert testified that some of the notes on the envelope were written by Cohn's wife and that others contained significant similarities to her handwriting. Cohn in his testimony at the trial denied that he had given the envelope to Itkin and reaffirmed his Grand Jury testimony.

We need not pause long in considering Cohn's challenge to the perjury conviction on the grounds that his testimony, relating as it did to events which had occurred prior to the limitations period, could not be a basis for indictment. He argues that as a matter of law it could not pertain to a "material matter."² The Grand Jury's scope of inquiry, however, is not limited to events which themselves may result in criminal prosecution, but is properly concerned with any evidence which may afford valuable leads for investigation of suspected criminal activity during the limitations period. "The test of materiality is whether the false testimony has the natural effect or tendency to impede, influence or dissuade the grand jury from pursuing its investigation." United States v. Stone, 429 F.2d 138, 140 (2d Cir. 1970). Here, by concealing information relating to Emmanuel's suspected unlawful dealings in 1962 and 1963, Cohn may have hindered an investigation into Emmanuel's subsequent activities as a Labor Department official.³

We also find lacking in merit Cohn's challenge to his conviction for perjury on the ground that the evidence did not satisfy the "two-witness rule." Perjury can be proven by two witnesses or by the testimony of one witness corroborated by independent evidence. See, e. g., United States v. Manfredonia, 414 F.2d 760, 764 (2d Cir. 1969); United States v. Marchisio, 344 F.2d 653, 664 (2d Cir. 1965). Itkin's testimony was sufficiently corroborated by the testimony of the FBI handwriting expert and the inferences to be drawn from the contested notes on the envelope, as well as by the very possession of this envelope by Itkin.

Cohn also argues that his testimony, even if it concealed information relevant and germane to the Grand Jury's functions,⁴ will not support a conviction...