About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

1 1 (February 12, 2019)

handle is hein.crs/govzhp0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Receipt of $4.7 Billion Is Not Always a Benefit February 12, 2019 According to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit (First Circuit) in United States v. Bravo-Fernandez, evidence that Puerto Rico received $4.7 billion in federal assistance is not enough to prove that the Commonwealth received at least $10,000 in federal program benefits under the federal program bribery statute. At the time of the First Circuit's most recent opinion, the case was making a third trip up the appellate ladder. The case began when Juan Bravo-Fernandez (Bravo), a businessman, provided Hector Martinez- Maldonado (Martinez), a member of the Puerto Rican Senate, with a trip to Las Vegas complete with first-class hotel accommodations, expensive meals, and highly priced tickets to a boxing match. A trial jury convicted the pair of violating the federal program bribery statute. The statute prohibits any agent - of a private or governmental recipient of more than $10,000 in a single year in benefits under a federal program - from soliciting or accepting anything of value, worth more than $5,000, with the intent to be influenced or rewarded in connection with the entity's affairs. A separate prong of the statute prohibits anyone from bribing an agent under such circumstances. Trial witnesses testified that the Puerto Rican Senate's childcare program received approximately $20,000 a year in federal funding and that the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico received more than $4.7 billion in federal funding overall. The government also produced evidence that Martinez, as Chairman of the Senate Public Safety Committee, took action in support of Bravo's business interest. The defendants argued in their initial appeal that the trial jury had been instructed in a matter which might have permitted it to convict based on an illegal gratuity (an after-the-fact reward) theory rather than a bribe (a quid pro quo exchange) theory. The First Circuit agreed and sent the case back to the district court. The defendants argued unsuccessfully before the district court that the Constitution's Double Jeopardy Clause barred a second trial. The First Circuit agreed with the district court's rejection of the argument, as did the U.S. Supreme Court. The case then returned to the district court. At which point, the parties stipulated that the Commonwealth had received more than $4.7 billion in federal funding. The defendants, however, made clear that they were not stipulating that the Commonwealth had received more than $10,000 in benefits under any specific federal program, a fact the government was obligated to prove in order to afford the district court jurisdiction to try and convict the defendants. Congressional Research Service https://crsreports.congress.gov LSB10258 CRS Legal Sidebar Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most