United States v. Alfred Villalobos
2014 U.S. App. LEXIS 6686, 2014 WL 1395729, 748 F.3d 953 (2014)
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Rule of Law:
A threat to provide or manipulate testimony in a criminal investigation in exchange for payment constitutes an independently unlawful and therefore 'wrongful' means of obtaining property under the Hobbs Act, rendering a claim of right defense unavailable.
Facts:
- Rabbi Amitai Yemeni operated a scheme to help Israeli nationals obtain visas by pretending they were religious workers at his Center.
- Orit Anjel and her husband Avi participated in this scheme; Avi would cash Orit's paychecks from the Center and return the money to Rabbi Yemeni.
- After Rabbi Yemeni terminated Orit's purported employment, Avi Anjel hired attorney Alfred Nash Villalobos to recoup the money they had paid back.
- Villalobos learned that the government was investigating Rabbi Yemeni's visa scheme and intended to interview Orit.
- Villalobos approached Rabbi Yemeni's lawyer, Benjamin Gluck, and demanded payment.
- In exchange for payment, Villalobos promised that Orit would 'do whatever it is we need her to do,' including impeding the investigation or providing false and misleading statements to investigators and a grand jury.
- At the direction of the FBI, Gluck recorded subsequent conversations with Villalobos discussing the arrangement.
- Villalobos was arrested after Gluck gave him a cash payment as part of the FBI's operation.
Procedural Posture:
- Alfred Nash Villalobos was charged in U.S. District Court with one count of attempted extortion and one count of endeavoring to obstruct justice.
- Following a five-day trial, a jury found Villalobos guilty on both counts.
- The district court entered a judgment of conviction.
- Villalobos, as appellant, filed a timely appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
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Issue:
Does a threat to provide or withhold testimony in a criminal investigation in exchange for payment constitute a 'wrongful' use of fear under the Hobbs Act, regardless of whether the defendant has a legitimate claim to the property demanded?
Opinions:
Majority - Smith, J.
Yes, a threat to provide or withhold testimony in exchange for payment constitutes a 'wrongful' use of fear under the Hobbs Act. A nonviolent threat is 'wrongful' if the means used to obtain the property are unlawful, regardless of the legitimacy of the ends sought. Here, Villalobos's threats to have his client provide false or misleading testimony contingent upon payment were independently unlawful acts of witness tampering and obstruction of justice. Because the means were wrongful on their own, it is irrelevant whether Villalobos had a lawful claim to the money demanded on behalf of his client. While the district court's jury instruction on 'wrongfulness' was erroneous because it effectively read the term out of the statute, the error was harmless because any rational jury would have found Villalobos's conduct was unlawful and therefore wrongful under the proper standard.
Concurring - Watford, J.
Yes, Villalobos's conviction should be affirmed, but on narrower grounds. The critical issue is the unavailability of the claim-of-right defense, which requires a nexus between the subject of the threat and the property demanded. Here, no such nexus existed. The property demanded was allegedly for back wages, but the threat related to testimony in a separate immigration fraud investigation in which Villalobos's client was a participant, not a victim. Because the threat was not connected to the claimed debt, the claim-of-right defense was precluded as a matter of law, and the district court's instructions were therefore correct as applied to the facts of this case.
Analysis:
This decision clarifies the 'wrongful' element of Hobbs Act extortion for nonviolent threats outside the labor context. The court distinguishes between the 'means' (the threat) and the 'ends' (the property sought), holding that if the means are independently unlawful, the act is wrongful per se, and any claim of right to the property is irrelevant. This places threats involving unlawful acts like witness tampering on par with threats of violence, which are considered inherently wrongful. The concurrence offers an alternative 'nexus' test, suggesting that the claim-of-right defense is only available when the threat is logically connected to the property being claimed, providing another avenue for courts to analyze similar extortion cases.
