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Justice Department Creates New Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team

Written by Kate Forrest on October 19, 2021. Posted in Criminal Defense, Federal Computer Crimes, Federal Crimes.

On October 6, 2021, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that it would be creating a National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team to focus on the investigation and prosecution of criminal activity involving cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum. The taskforce will work on cases related to financial crimes like money laundering and crimes where the proceeds from the sale of contraband are laundered or directly paid out on a virtual currency exchange.

The use of cryptocurrencies for illegal purposes in recent years has been very high. According to the research group, Chainalysis, criminal entities in 2020 engaged in cryptocurrency transactions worth $10 billion, and illicit transactions in 2019 surpassed $20 billion. The majority of these transactions in both years involved “scam” activities like the PlusToken and BitClub Ponzi schemes. The second-largest category of crimes involved Darknet marketplaces like Wall Street Market and Welcome to Video, where vendors sell contraband ranging from drugs to child pornography. Ransomware attacks, which nearly always demand payment in digital coin, are also on the rise—with 220 significant attacks occurring in January through September of this year alone.

DOJ prosecution of these cases has continued to be aggressive in 2021. Significant convictions in fraudulent cryptocurrency schemes have been recently obtained in Texas, California, and New York. In other high-profile cases, defendants have pled guilty to the illegal distribution of prescription drugs and to converting cash into Bitcoin without following the required anti-money-laundering regulations. Related charges have also been brought this year against a cryptocurrency “mixer”—a person who launders the digital money by comingling identifiable funds with anonymous ones—and even against a couple who are accused of being paid in cryptocurrency for acts of espionage.

Despite the large quantity of cryptocurrency funds that are used illicitly, however, over 99% of the cryptocurrency that changed hands last year did so for perfectly legal purposes. Using cryptocurrency is not itself illegal, and so the Government has much more to prove to convict someone of a crime. Because of the largely anonymous nature of many cryptocurrency transactions, that can be a difficult endeavor.

Cryptocurrency cases are extremely complex and require thoughtful, diligent defense. If you or someone you know is accused of committing a crime in connection with digital currency, you need a veteran federal attorney to assist you in untangling the allegations and fighting them in court. For more information on how our team of experienced lawyers can help with your case, contact us today.

Justice Department Limits Use of “No-Knock” Warrants, Chokeholds, and Carotid Restraints

Written by Kate Forrest on September 24, 2021. Posted in Civil Litigation, Constitutional Rights.

On September 14, the Department of Justice announced a change in its policies regarding the use of more aggressive policing techniques by federal law enforcement. Agents will now only be permitted to use chokeholds or carotid restraints in situations where deadly force would be authorized. Additionally, they will only be allowed to use “no-knock” entries in dangerous situations and with prior supervisory approval.

Chokeholds and carotid restraints are both neck restraints that have long been used by law enforcement to subdue subjects. Their connection to recent high-profile police-brutality cases like the killing of George Floyd by Derek Chauvin, however, has made them controversial. As a result, the DOJ is just the latest of many agencies to place limitations on the techniques, with over half of the largest police departments in the country doing so since Chauvin’s conviction at the end of May 2021.

The use of “no-knock” entries has faced recent scrutiny for similar reasons. When police arrive at a private place to serve a warrant, they are usually required to knock on the door and then announce and identify themselves before entering. Under some circumstances, however, law enforcement can be authorized to enter forcibly and without any warning. One such no-knock warrant led to the late-night shooting death of Breonna Taylor in March 2020, and the practice has since come under fire.

Research suggests that such forcible entries cause more harm than they avert, with searches for contraband turning up nothing in 65% of cases, raids being conducted in the wrong location up to 10% of the time, and many deaths resulting—81 civilians and 13 police officers were killed in one 6-year period alone. It is therefore unsurprising that there has been a national trend towards reform in this area as well. The DOJ joins 20 cities and 15 states with partial bans on no-knock warrants as of September 2021.

Unfortunately, it is not immediately clear from the DOJ announcement how either of these new policy changes will be enforced and how or if violations by agents will be punished. The Council on Criminal Justice’s Task Force on Policing has encouraged agencies to use clear enforcement mechanisms with such rules—because without them the policies are unlikely to secure compliance.

In New York City, for example, most uses of chokeholds have been prohibited since 1993, but Eric Garner was nevertheless killed by the maneuver in 2014, and there have been at least 40 more credible reports of its misuse by the NYPD since Garner’s death. A 2020 NPR review of such bans in other departments around the country found similar results and concluded that the policies are “largely ineffective.” The Task Force on Policing also found that banning neck restraints without offering additional training on alternative de-escalation methods may actually lead to an increase in the use of even more deadly forms of force.

So while reform measures are cause for some hope, infractions are likely to continue. If you or someone you know has been harmed by police brutality, you may be able to file a Section 1983 or Bivens lawsuit and recover financial compensation. Contact our team of experienced attorneys to find out more.

Qualified Immunity Defense Rejected in Case Involving Police Shooting

Written by Kate Forrest on September 7, 2021. Posted in Civil Litigation, Constitutional Rights.

On August 26, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a DeKalb County Police officer’s qualified immunity claim, clearing the way for the litigation against him to proceed to trial. In 2015, Officer Casey Benton conducted a traffic stop on a car in which Troy Robinson was a passenger. Robinson fled from the police on foot and attempted to scale an eight-foot cement wall to evade pursuit. During this climb, Benton fired his taser at Robinson, who ultimately fell and died.

Robinson’s family filed a section 1983 lawsuit against Benton and DeKalb County for Benton’s excessive use of force. The family claimed that Benton shot Robinson with his taser while Robinson was standing on top of the wall, which incapacitated him and caused his fall. Benton, however, maintained that he had deployed the taser while Robinson was still on the ground and that it had not even affected the man since one of the probes failed to connect. The officer then filed a motion for summary judgement, claiming that the doctrine of qualified immunity required the court to dismiss the case against him.

Qualified immunity is a legal principle that protects government officials from being sued as individuals for civil rights violations. First formalized in the U.S. Supreme Court case Pierson v. Ray, qualified immunity makes workers employed by the government “immune” from any such lawsuits unless the actions they took violated a legal right that was objectively “clearly established” at the time. This means that many actions for police brutality are never even allowed to go to trial before a jury —because it is very difficult for a person to show that a right was “clearly established.”

In Robinson’s case, however, the Eleventh Circuit found that the law was in fact clearly established that an officer cannot use deadly force to stop a fleeing person who is unarmed and not suspected of committing a violent crime. Reviewing the evidence from the hearing, the court held that it was possible for a jury to conclude that Benton had shot Robinson while he was on top of the wall, and that if they did, such a use of force would be “obviously unconstitutional.” The court additionally found that the Supreme Court case of Tennessee v. Garner was factually similar enough to Robinson’s case to clearly establish his rights.

Though their lawsuit has not been dismissed, Robinson’s family will still need to present their case at trial or work out a settlement agreement before they can receive payment or any other form of relief on their claims. Cases like these can be lucrative but are very complex to litigate. If you or someone you know has been harmed by police brutality, you need a lawyer with a proven track record of success in civil rights cases. Contact our team of experienced federal attorneys for more information.

Police Responsible for Death of California Man Suffering Mental Health Crisis

Written by Kate Forrest on August 26, 2021. Posted in Civil Litigation, Constitutional Rights.

On August 10, the city of Pleasanton, California, settled a wrongful death suit for $5.9 million. The victim in the case was Jacob Bauer, a 38-year-old man who was killed by police during a mental health crisis.

During a police interaction, people struggling with mental illness are 16 times more likely than other Americans to be killed by officers. In 2015—the last year that the Bureau of Justice Statistics reported data on this topic—at least 27% of all police shootings involved a person in a mental health crisis. The prevalence of police brutality in crisis response situations has led some experts to call for a shift away from law enforcement involvement in this area—but in many places, other options remain rare.

In Bauer’s case, his parents notified the local police department that he was in crisis, and they were assured that peaceful de-escalation tactics would be used to help him. Body-camera footage of the subsequent events, however, showed that Jacob Bauer was punched, kicked, hit with a baton, and tased by eight officers as they pinned him to the ground. During this onslaught, he repeatedly told officers that he could not breathe before ultimately losing consciousness and dying.

Under Section 1983, the Bauers filed a federal lawsuit against the city for the officers’ excessive use of force and deliberate indifference to their son’s need for emergency medical care. Section 1983 lawsuits like this one allow people whose constitutional rights were violated by state or local government officials to sue those officials in federal court. Where government policies are the cause of the violation to a person’s rights, then a state agency or local government entity can also be sued under Section 1983. This allowed the Bauers to sue the city of Pleasanton itself, claiming in their complaint that the customs and policies of the entire police department were responsible for the actions taken by the officers on that day.

Claims like these can be won, but are very complex and expensive to pursue successfully. If you or someone you know has been harmed by police brutality, excessive force, or any violation of our constitutional rights by a government official, you need a lawyer with a proven track record of success in constitutional rights cases. Contact our team of experienced constitutional rights attorneys for more information.

Travel Act Prosecutions on the Rise in Federal Court

Written by Kate Forrest on August 16, 2021. Posted in Criminal Defense, Federal Crimes.

Federal prosecutors are initiating cases under the Travel Act more frequently in recent months. The latest conviction announced on such charges may also signal that the Department of Justice is beginning to use this legislation to prosecute a broader spectrum of criminal activity

Eric Samuel Jarvis, a defense attorney in Texas, was charged by information with violations of the Travel Act that stemmed from his transmission of public federal court documents to members of a drug trafficking organization in Mexico. In his guilty plea on July 26, 2021, Jarvis admitted to taking money in exchange for the criminal complaints of co-conspirators, which contained information about seized drug shipments in an ongoing investigation. Jarvis’s actions implicated the Travel Act because he used his cell phone to access and transmit the documents.

Originally enacted in 1961 to give the federal government a means to target interstate organized crime, 18 U.S.C. § 1952, or the “Travel Act,” makes it a federal crime for a person to take any of three otherwise innocuous actions if that person acts with the intent to commit a crime which they later do at least attempt to commit.

To fall under the jurisdiction of the Travel Act, a person need only:

travel “in interstate or foreign commerce”;
use the mail; or
use any “facility in interstate or foreign commerce”

A person taking one of those simple actions can then violate the Act if they do so while intending to commit one of the following criminal actions:

distributing the proceeds of an “unlawful activity”;
committing a crime of violence to further an “unlawful activity”; or
promoting, managing, establishing, carrying on, (or facilitating the promotion, management, establishment, or carrying on of) an “unlawful activity”

There is only a true violation, however, if the person later actually tries to commit one of those criminal acts in addition to having merely intended to do so.

The most unusual thing about the Travel Act, is how it defines “unlawful activity.” Because in addition to violations of federal law, this term is defined by the statute to also encompass violations of state laws targeting gambling, liquor, drugs, prostitution, arson, extortion, or bribery. This means that the Travel Act can allow the Department of Justice (DOJ) to prosecute activities that might not otherwise fall under the purview of the federal law.

Though this power was originally designed to provide better ways to target criminal organizations like the mafia, federal prosecutors have recently been finding new uses for the old statute. In addition to Jarvis’s case, DOJ has already announced three other convictions under the Travel Act this year, all in connection with bribery schemes: one against a Texas real estate developer, and two against co-defendants who obtained fraudulent bail bonds from a sheriff’s department in Louisiana. An additional five high-profile indictments have also been announced by DOJ this year for a Medicare fraud scheme, a prostitution service, corrupt state contracting practices, a safe deposit box theft conspiracy, and a bribery scheme between the NYPD and a towing company. In keeping with recent trends in Travel Act prosecution, most of these cases target bribery, theft, or healthcare fraud.

Jarvis’s case, however, is one of a handful in the past few years that use the Travel Act to prosecute drug-related crimes. In 2020, a Virginia man was indicted on both drug charges and a “promotion” charge under the Travel Act. Then, at the end of that year, one man in an 18-codefendant drug and racketeering case in New York was charged with “Travel Act murder” for using a car (“a facility in interstate commerce”) to drive a co-conspirator to another location in the same state, where he was murdered.

In Jarvis’s case, his cell phone was considered to be a “facility in interstate commerce,” and his knowing transmission of helpful documents to a drug trafficker was considered to “promote, manage, establish, carry on” (or to “facilitate”) the “unlawful activity” conducted by that drug trafficker—namely his conspiracy to possess drugs with the intent to distribute them. This allowed the federal government to charge Jarvis with a crime in connection to the drug trafficking scheme without having to prove all elements of a conspiracy charge against him.

Charges brought under the Travel Act are tricky to defend because they often involve overlapping issues of state and federal law. If you or someone you know is facing a Travel Act case, you need an attorney who is skilled in both of these practice areas to give you the best defense in your case. To find out more about how our firm can help, contact our team of experienced lawyers today.