U.S. v. Colon

Record contained sufficient evidence to support jury’s guilty verdict on money laundering charge, where record showed that: (1) defendant bought large quantity of drugs from drug dealer and resold drugs to other drug dealers through transactions that took place in defendant’s mall; and (2) while defendant’s mall was not profitable, defendant made eight cash deposits in one month into mall bank account that totaled $44,293. Moreover, jury could: (1) properly conclude that defendant used mall as front to facilitate and disguise his drug trafficking activities; and (2) note difference between defendant’s mall income and instant bank deposits to infer that defendant commingled his drug proceeds with mall funds. Also, while Dist. Ct. erred in applying two-level leadership enhancement under section 3B1.1 of USSG on sentences for drug trafficking and money laundering charges, where record showed that no one other than defendant participated in money laundering activities and defendant merely supplied large quantity of drugs to others, any error was harmless, since Dist. Ct. indicated that it would have given same sentence regardless of applicability of enhancement.