US v. Vignola

• Decision Date: 08 January 1979
• Docket Number: Crim. No. Cr. 78-242.
• Citation: 464 F. Supp. 1091
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America v. Louis VIGNOLA.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

464 F. Supp. 1091

UNITED STATES of America v.Louis VIGNOLA.

Crim. No. Cr. 78-242.

United States District Court, E. D. Pennsylvania.

January 8, 1979.

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Alan M. Lieberman, Theodore A. McKee, Philadelphia, Pa., for Government.

Thomas A. Bergstrom, Philadelphia, Pa., for defendant.

OPINION

JOSEPH S. LORD, III, Chief Judge.

The defendant, Louis Vignola, was appointed President Judge of the Philadelphia Traffic Court in January 1974.On July 21, 1978, the Government filed a five-count indictment¹ charging Vignola with racketeering in violation of the "RICO"²statute, and with attempted tax evasion³ and the filing of false federal income tax returns.⁴The defendant moved before trial to dismiss the RICO count (Count I) and to sever that count from the tax counts.After hearing oral argument we denied those motions.

During the trial a question arose as to the legality of the procedures employed by the prosecution in obtaining disclosure of the defendant's tax returns from the Internal Revenue Service.We believed that an evidentiary hearing might well be necessary to resolve this dispute, a hearing we were reluctant to hold in the midst of a trial before a sequestered jury.The defendant then moved for, and we granted, a mistrial and a severance as to the tax counts.

The jury then convicted the defendant of violating the RICOstatute.He has now moved for a judgment of acquittal or for a dismissal of the RICO count, for arrest of judgment, and for a new trial.For the following reasons we will deny these motions.

I.FACTUAL BACKGROUND

The RICOstatute, inter alia, prohibits

". . . any person employed by or associated with any enterprise engaged in, or the activities of which affect, interstate or foreign commerce, from conducting or participating, directly or indirectly, in the conduct of such enterprise's affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity . . ."

18 U.S.C. § 1962(c).The statute defines a "pattern of racketeering activity" as consisting of at least two acts of "racketeering activity", 18 U.S.C. § 1961(5), and sets forth a list of offenses which constitute such activity.Among these offenses is

"any act or threat involving . . . bribery, . . . which is chargeable under State law and punishable by imprisonment for more than one year . ."

18 U.S.C. § 1961(1).

The indictment in this case alleged that the defendant, as President Judge of the Traffic Court, had the power to appoint and remove writ-servers to execute arrest warrants issued by the Court.⁵As compensation, the writ-servers received a statutorily-prescribed flat fee for each warrant they served;⁶ the more warrants they executed the more money they earned.

The original indictment set forth over sixty-six instances⁷ in which the defendant had allegedly "solicited, accepted, and agreed to accept a pecuniary benefit" from certain named writ-servers, "as consideration for the defendant's decision, recommendation and other exercise of discretion as a public servant, and as consideration for a violation of a known legal duty as a public servant," in violation of 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 4701, the Pennsylvania bribery statute.The indictment charged that these acts of bribery constituted a pattern of racketeering activity, that the defendant was employed by or associated with an enterprise the Traffic Court engaged in, or the activities of which affected, interstate commerce, and that he conducted the affairs of this enterprise through a pattern of racketeering activity, thus violating RICO.

At trial, former writ-server Edwin Lynch, the Government's main witness, testified that he had had a deal with the defendant to make certain monthly and weekly payments to the defendant in order to keep his job, to have warrants channeled to him, and to "fix" traffic tickets.⁸Lynch explained that he would write checks to "cash" in order to generate funds with which to pay the defendant, and that he or members of his family and staff would deliver this cash in envelopes to the defendant's home or office.Lynch identified numerous checks as being the ones he had written in order to generate cash for the pay-offs.He was able to make these identifications on the basis of such annotations as "Judge" or "J.Personal" on the check stubs or scraps of paper he kept with his checks.Lynch's testimony was corroborated by those members of his family and staff who had made deliveries of the monies, and who, on occasion, had endorsed the checks to generate cash.

Writ-server Charles Vare testified for the Government that he and the defendant had had a deal pursuant to which Vare would pay the defendant $1 for each warrant he was given to serve.Vare said that he had made approximately five payments to the defendant of $125 to $250 in cash.

We believe that there was ample evidence for the jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant had solicited and accepted bribes.The defendant does not seriously challenge the sufficiency of the evidence as to the bribery; rather, he has challenged his conviction as encompassing racketeering activity not falling within the ambit of RICO.

II.MOTION FOR JUDGMENT OF ACQUITTAL; MOTION TO DISMISS COUNT I; MOTION FOR ARREST OF JUDGMENT

The defendant's initial claim is that the Philadelphia Traffic Court is not an "enterprise" within the meaning of the RICOstatute.We reject this contention as contrary to the plain language of RICO, which defines an enterprise as including

"any individual, partnership, corporation, association, or other legal entity, and any union or group of individuals associated in fact although not a legal entity",

18 U.S.C. § 1961(4)emphasis added.As a creature of statute, 17 P.S. § 712.1 et seq., the Philadelphia Traffic Court is a "legal entity" and is therefore an "enterprise" for the purposes of RICO.

The defendant argues, however, that Congress did not intend RICO to apply to the judiciary, and, in enacting RICO, was not concerned with corruption of that branch of government.We disagree.RICO was enacted as Title IX of the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970; the over-all purpose of that Act is to combat so-called "organized crime", which Congress viewed as a spreading cancer in American society.⁹The major thrust of the 1970 Act is to rid the American economy and the channels of interstate commerce from the influences of "organized crime".Congress has chosen to accomplish this objective not by proscribing the elusive status of "organized crime", but by prohibiting certain behavior, such as syndicated gambling and racketeering, which it has concluded is commonly engaged in by members of "organized crime".¹⁰This does not mean, however, that Congress intended the 1970 Act to apply exclusively to members of "organized crime", and, of course, the Government need not prove that a RICOdefendant is a member of "organized crime".SeeUnited States v. Mandel,415 F.Supp. 997, 1018-19(D.Md.1976).

RICO, or Title IX of the 1970 Act, is aimed at removing racketeering influences from enterprises engaged in, or the activities of which affect, interstate commerce.Through RICO, Congress hoped to reduce the burden placed upon interstate commerce by racketeers, and, to that end, Congress has given "enterprise" the broad definition previously quoted.This definition makes no exception for public entities such as the judiciary, nor do we find any basis in the legislative history for implying one.¹¹Indeed, in adopting the 1970 Act, Congress expressed a particular concern for the subversion and corruption of "our democratic processes" and the undermining of the "general welfare of the Nation and its citizens" by "organized crime".Congressional Statement of Findings and Purpose, Pub.L. No. 91-452, 84 Stat. 923.¹²

Congress has specifically directed that RICO be "liberally construed to effectuate its remedial purposes . . ."Pub.L. No. 91-452, § 904, and the courts have recognized and given effect to that mandate.They have been in near-unanimity in rejecting challenges to the characterization of a particular entity as an "enterprise", and have held, for example, that the Pennsylvania Bureau of Cigarette and Beverage Taxes,¹³ the Pennsylvania State Senate,¹⁴ a municipal police department,¹⁵ and the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority¹⁶ are all enterprises within the meaning of RICO.¹⁷

The Third Circuit, in a case involving an executive agency, rejected the argument that RICO is inapplicable to government entities, stating that

". . . Congress' concern was enlarging the number of tools with which to attack the invasion of the economic life of the country by the cancerous influences of racketeering activity; footnote omitted Congress did not confine its scrutiny to special areas of economic activity.Congress had no reason to adopt a constricted approach to the solution of the problem.Congress was concerned with the infiltration of organized crime into the American economy and to sic the devastating effects that racketeering activity had upon it. footnote omitted Yet, we are asked to believe that Congress' approach to a monumental problem besetting the country was myopic and artificially contained.Is it conceivable that in considering the evermore widespread tentacles of organized crime in the nation's economic life, Congress intended to ignore an important aspect of the economy because it was state operated and state controlled?We think not.Congress declared that the provisions of Title IX`be liberally construed to effectuate its remedial purposes.'84 Stat. 947."

United States v. Frumento,563 F.2d 1083, 1090-91(3d Cir.1977), cert. denied sub nom.Millhouse v. United States,434 U.S. 1072, 98 S.Ct. 1256, 55 L.Ed.2d 775(1978).

Judge Becker found this reasoning controlling in United States v. Cianfrani, Cr.No. 77-412(E.D.Pa. Bench op. filed December 16, 1977), and declined to create a RICO exception for a state legislative body.We also...