Arthur L. Harris, Sr. v. United States

Sixty-seven counts, charging defendants therein named of devising a scheme to use the mail to defraud ( 18 U.S.C.A. § 1341 ), and the sixty-eighth count, charging conspiracy to accomplish the substantive offenses ( 18 U.S.C.A. § 371 ), were contained in one indictment. Defendants Arthur L. Harris, Sr., Arthur L. Harris, Jr., Charles W. Marshall and Ernest F. Lea have appealed from the judgment of conviction entered on the jury verdict of guilty of conspiracy and of such substantive counts which had not been abandoned and dismissed.

Defendants were charged with entering into a scheme and artifice to defraud persons who might be induced to purchase lots in a subdivision known as Rocket Town, which was located in the Mojave Desert not far from the Inyokern Naval Ordnance Test Station, and to use the mails in connection therewith. The allegations of false representations were specific and fell generally into seventeen classifications. The briefs in this case are voluminous and reflect the tremendous record.

One of the major specifications of error is that there was not sufficient *795 competent and relevant evidence to establish the offenses charged in the indictment and to connect…

An able petition for rehearing has been filed which insists that our opinion too narrowly applies the rule of the Jencks case, 353 U.S. 657 , 77 S.Ct. 1007 , 1 L.Ed. 2d 1103 . Any such intention is disavowed. However, at the trial defendants made no great point of the request for these statements in the only two instances where it was denied. There had been fourteen investor witnesses upon the the stand before any such attempt was made to see answers to any questionnaire. The point made at the trial may well have been that defendants were claiming the government influenced the investor witnesses by the form of letter and the questionnaire. In any event, one of these transmittal letters and the blank form of the questionnaire were read to the jury by the defense.

Defendants did not specify these rulings as error on this appeal, and only raised the point by a supplemental brief after the announcement of Jencks.

This last circumstance is no reason for denying relief if the rights of a defendant have been violated. But this Court should not frustrate justice to satisfy a formalistic pattern. All these matters are relative. Denial of the right of cross-examination is error. Yet…

261 F.2d 792 Arthur L. HARRIS, Sr., et al., Appellants, v. UNITED STATES of America, Appellee. No. 15222. United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit. June 24, 1958. Rehearing Denied November 6, 1958. COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED Douglas Badt, Alden F. Houck, Wirin, Rissman & Okrand, Los Angeles, Cal., for appellants. Laughlin E. Waters, U. S. Atty., Norman W. Neukom, Lloyd F. Dunn, Ray H. Kinnison, Asst. U. S. Attys., Los Angeles, Cal., for appellee. Before FEE, CHAMBERS and HAMLIN, Circuit Judges. JAMES ALGER FEE, Circuit Judge. 1 Sixty-seven counts, charging defendants therein named of devising a scheme to use the mail to defraud ( 18 U.S.C.A. § 1341 ), and the sixty-eighth count, charging conspiracy to accomplish the substantive offenses ( 18 U.S.C.A. § 371 ), were contained in one indictment. Defendants Arthur L. Harris, Sr., Arthur L. Harris, Jr., Charles W. Marshall and Ernest F. Lea have appealed from the judgment of conviction entered on the jury verdict of guilty of conspiracy and of such substantive counts which had not been abandoned and dismissed. 2 Defendants were charged with entering into a scheme and artifice to defraud persons who might be induced to…