News and Notes

1. Pharmed sentencing: 9 years, top of the guidelines. From the Herald article:

Saying she was concerned about maintaining community values, U.S. District Judge Patricia A. Seitz Wednesday sentenced Carlos and Jorge de Céspedes to nine years in prison.
Despite testimony that they had given millions to charity, the judge decided the brothers -- who built up and then destroyed the Pharmed medical supply company -- should be sentenced at the top of the recommended guidelines of seven to nine years.
She said the brothers had been ''two-faced for too long'' and noted that the fraud against Kendall Regional Medical Center had gone for 14 years. The brothers had also pleaded guilty to a count of tax evasion. They will serve the sentences concurrently.


2. Helio Castroneves: The already great legal team adds superstar Roy Black to represent Helio along with David Garvin. Roy's partner Howard Srebnick represents sister Kati, and Bob Bennett and Lily Ann Sanchez represent the third defendant, an attorney. AUSA Matt Axelrod represents the government.

Govt appeals order in Ben Kuehne case

Here's the text of the notice:

Notice is hereby given that the United States of America, plaintiff/appellant in the
above-captioned case, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3731 and Fed. R. App. P. 4(b)(1)(B)(i), hereby
appeals to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit from the Order Granting
Defendant's Motion to Dismiss Count One of the Third Superseding Indictment (Docket Entry
192) entered in the above entitled matter on December 22, 2008.
DATED this 7th day of January, 2009.
Respectfully submitted,
MATTHEW W. FRIEDRICH
ACTING ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL

PAUL O'BRIEN, CHIEF
Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section
Robert Feitel
United States Department of Justice
Criminal Division Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section

I wonder why this was filed so quickly, and why they didn't wait until after President-Elect Obama became President. The case likely will now be placed on hold for a while during the appeal.

Disturbing story from state court

There has been a bunch of news about this Order out of Broward state court, disqualifying the state attorney's office for listening in on attorney-client conversations in a first degree murder prosecution.

The State took a breath-taking position -- because the call originated from jail, the inmate waived the attorney-client privilege. The judge quickly dismissed this position. The defense argued that the case should be dismissed for the egregious violation. The judge didn't go that far, but did disqualify the entire prosecution office from the case.

Two questions for you. Does this happen over here? And if it did ever happen, what would the likely result be. I put two polls for you below:

How frequently do AUSAs listen in on attorney client phone calls from FDC?
	Never
	Rarely
	Often
pollcode.com free polls

If an AUSA did listen in on an attorney client conversation, the likely result in this District would be:
	Case dismissed
	Disqualification of the AUSA
	Disqualification of the entire USA office
	Evidence suppressed
	Nothing
pollcode.com free polls

Judge Cooke has all the fun...

She just got the huge Mutual Benefits indictment (a viatical fraud case alleging over $1 billion in fraud), which includes two local lawyers -- Michael McNerney and Anthony Livoti, Jr.

Here is the indictment.

The government is estimating a whopping 120 days for trial. In this economy, how is it going to be possible to seat a jury for such a case. Does a jury consisting of senior citizens and unemployed citizens help the defense or the prosecution?

Monday news and notes

Ahhhh, Monday morning after a holiday weekend. So much fun. Here's what's happening:

1. Pharmed sentencing today. (via Sun-Sentinel & Herald) Here are the letters in support of leniency, the government's sentencing memo, and the defense sentencing memo. Quick summary: government says the guidelines are appropriate; defense says they are too high.

2. The Chief Justice released his year end report. Quick summary: judges need more money.

3. More on Ben Kuehne. (via DBR). Quick summary: the case against him sucks.

4. Medicare fugitives. (via Herald). Quick summary: every now and then, people flee as they did in this case.

Dead Friday

Anyone working today?

Back to regular blogging on Monday.

2009 should be exciting -- trial #3 of Liberty City 7, trial #2 of Joe Cool, trial (or dismissal) of the Ben Kuehne case, Dolphin playoffs, and possibly 2 new district judges in the SDFLA because of judges taking senior status. What else?

Have a nice long weekend.

Happy New Year!

Shocking story

Jay Weaver's story this weekend about an FDC prisoner being repeatedly raped by guards is a must-read.

The victim successfully sued the prison officials in federal court, but her case against the Bureau of Prisons was dismissed because of the statute of limitations:

A female inmate cooperating as a government witness was sexually assaulted numerous times by guards at the Federal Detention Center in Miami, but prison officials discredited her reports and did nothing to protect her over a four-year span, a federal judge has found.
Even the judge couldn't help the woman after she sued the U.S. government and four guards in 2007, accusing them of making her strip, touching her genitals and, in the case of one correctional officer, raping her repeatedly.
The victim, identified as ''S.R.'' in court papers, settled with three of the officers but lost her $5 million liability case against the government because of a technicality -- the two-year statute of limitations had run out.
But that didn't stop the judge from finding the U.S. Bureau of Prisons at fault.
''S.R. was sexually abused on numerous occasions by the individual defendants,'' Judge Cecilia Altonaga wrote in a November order. ``The BOP and FDC Miami did have notice of the illegal conduct taking place, and were woefully deficient in addressing it and giving S.R. protection.''

Although she was acting as a cooperating witness, the BOP falsely claimed that she was crazy and her allegations were made up:

According to court records, the Bureau of Prisons wrote off the inmate as ''mentally ill'' in an unsigned memo. A senior U.S. Marshals Service official said her allegations were ''fabricated.'' The Justice Department's Office of Inspector General -- which waited more than a year to question two of the three guards and didn't question the third -- said it couldn't substantiate her allegations in early 2005.

That's shameful, especially because the same government thought she was credible enough to use as a witness. The victim responded to Jay Weaver in a telephone interview:

S.R. said the prison system's dismissive response exacerbated her ordeal in the Federal Detention Center, which houses defendants awaiting trial and convicted prisoners cooperating with prosecutors.
''What they did to me they could never undo. I can't sleep at night. I've gotten to the point I don't trust anybody,'' said S.R., a 36-year-old North Carolina resident who was released from prison in 2006 after 10 years behind bars.
''The system took advantage of me,'' she told The Miami Herald in a phone interview. ``They knew when to pull me to testify. I was a very credible witness. I was competent. But then when I needed them, I was mentally ill. I was incompetent.''

What happened to the guards?

Prison authorities have fired two of the four guards named in S.R.'s lawsuit -- Antonio Echevarria and Damioun Cole -- for reasons unrelated to her allegations.
In 2005, Cole pleaded guilty to sexual abuse of female inmate ''B.P.'' at the Miami detention center and received a one-year sentence. Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandro Soto said at the plea hearing that the government could have proved that Cole also sexually assaulted S.R., but Soto agreed not to prosecute Cole on that battery charge as part of the plea agreement.
The second accused guard, Echevarria, denied sexually assaulting S.R., according to investigative records. In 2006, he lost his job after pleading guilty to buying a firearm for a felon and was sentenced to five months in prison.
The third accused guard, Isiah W. Pollock III, resigned in 2003. He testified at S.R.'s civil trial that he resigned for family reasons, but prison officials testified he got caught playing cards with male inmates and bringing in contraband for female inmates.
Pollock's lawyer, Michael Pasano, vehemently denied his client ever sexually abused the inmate.
The fourth accused guard, Charles E. Jenkins, still works as a correctional officer at the detention center. He denied sexually assaulting S.R., records show.
After Justice Department investigators said they couldn't substantiate S.R.'s complaints against Echevarria, Pollock and Jenkins, federal prosecutors in Miami declined to file charges against them in 2005.