U.S. v. Ajayi

Record contained sufficient evidence to establish defendant’s guilty verdict on bank fraud and money laundering charges stemming from defendant’s deposit of $344,657.84 altered check and subsequent withdrawals of $171,000 from bank. While defendant argued that record failed to contain evidence that he knew check had been altered, jury could find that defendant knowingly deposited fraudulent check, where: (1) check was deposited via ATM machine instead of bank teller; (2) defendant made several withdrawals totaling $171,000 from different bank branches within 5-day period; and (3) defendant indicated that he was only expecting $45,000 check and yet received and cashed check for almost $350,000. Moreover, jury could look to defendant’s conduct after deposit of check to establish his knowledge about fraudulent scheme to cash bogus check. Fact that jury instruction did not define term “scheme” did not constitute plain error, where jury was informed that it was required to find beyond reasonable doubt that defendant made misrepresentation, and that scheme involved materially false or fraudulent promise. Ct., though, vacated four counts of bank fraud charges, where they were based only on subsequent withdrawals from defendant’s bank account, since bank fraud charge was completed when bank released entire funds from check to defendant’s account, and subsequent withdrawals were dependent on initial release of funds.