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Case 1:20-cr-00330-PAE Document 204 _ Filed 04/16/21 Page 173 of 239
in bankruptcy proceeding). And the cases the defendant cites in which a perjury or false statements
count was severed only underscore this point. In both cases, the statement itself concerned an
entirely different subject matter, provable through largely if not entirely different evidence. See
United States v. Botti, No. 08 Cr. 230 (CSH), 2009 WL 3157582, at *1, *5 (D. Conn. Sept. 25,
2009) (severing a structuring conspiracy and false statements related to that conspiracy from a
“separate” corruption conspiracy); United States v. Mitan, No. 08-760, 2009 WL 2328870, at *3
(E.D. Pa. July 28, 2009) (severing counts charging a fraud scheme from perjury count for an
affidavit submitted as part of a bail motion, which “was not as an attempt to cover up the scheme
to defraud, but rather an attempt to show that Court had erred” in its bail decision).
Finally, the defendant argues that the counts are unrelated because the defendant’s
testimony was given in response to questions “tangential to the defamation action,” and her
answers “concealed” no crimes because they were “true and reflective of the poor questioning by
the plaintiff's lawyers.” (Def. Mot. 5 at 8-9). The defendant is free to make at least some of these
arguments to the jury, but these assertions are not a lawful basis for severing Counts Five and Six.
This is merely an attempt to refashion the defendant’s claim that she gave truthful, immaterial
answers to ambiguous questions. But, as discussed in detail in Section V, those arguments have
no merit.
Third, the defendant has failed to carry her heavy burden under Rule 14(a) to show
prejudice. At the outset, “[t]he contention that there is some inherent prejudice in joining perjury
and related counts with substantive charges has been widely rejected.” Potamitis, 739 F.2d at 791.
And courts routinely hold that there is no prejudice where the evidence in support of the two counts
is “interconnected.” Blakney, 941 F.2d at 116; see Carson, 464 F.2d at 436 (“[T]he commonality
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Document Details
| Filename | DOJ-OGR-00003107.jpg |
| File Size | 707.6 KB |
| OCR Confidence | 94.9% |
| Has Readable Text | Yes |
| Text Length | 2,104 characters |
| Indexed | 2026-02-03 16:30:50.646884 |