United States v. Girard

601 F.2d 69 (2nd Cir. 1969)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Lambert (D1) was an agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration, and Girard (D) was a former agent. D and one James Bond began to discuss an illegal venture that involved smuggling a planeload of marijuana from Mexico into the United States. D told Bond that for $500 per name he could, through an inside source, secure reports from the DEA files that would show whether any participant in the proposed operation was a government informant. Bond became an informant and disclosed his conversations with D to the DEA. Bond asked D to secure reports on four men whose names were furnished him by DEA agents. By tracking access to the names, DEA learned that D's informant was D1, who obtained the reports through a computer terminal located in his office. Ds were indicted and convicted. They appealed from judgments convicting them of the unauthorized sale of government property (18 U.S.C. § 641) and of conspiring to accomplish the sale (18 U.S.C. § 371). Section 641 provides that whoever without authority sells any 'record . . . or thing of value' of the United States or who 'receives . . . the same with intent to convert it to his use or gain, knowing it to have been embezzled, stolen, purloined or converted', shall be guilty of a crime. Ds contend that the statute covers only tangible property or documents and therefore is not violated by the sale of information. This contention was rejected by District Judge Daly.