Charlene Marshall was tried alongside co-conspirator Rohan Lyttle, who managed a fraud scheme targeting the elderly. The scheme involved posing as Andrew Goldberg, the former CEO of the Publisher's Clearinghouse, to convince victims they had won sweepstakes. Marshall's specific role was to launder the proceeds. She received illicit cash packages at a business called Ro-Cars and deposited nearly $89,000 into her personal bank accounts in 2020 using multiple ATMs and twelve different branches to avoid reporting thresholds. She reported only $32,425 in income on her 2020 tax return, despite having significantly higher cash receipts. Marshall was convicted on two counts: conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud, and conspiracy to launder monetary instruments. She was sentenced to 34 months in prison, three years of supervised release, and ordered to pay $245,148 in restitution. On appeal, Marshall challenged the admission of Exhibit 296, a summary of her tax returns, and Exhibit 220, a news clip about the lottery scam.
The Third Circuit, writing through Circuit Judge Hardiman, addressed Marshall's evidentiary challenges regarding the admission of her tax returns and a news video. First, the court analyzed the tax return summary under Federal Rules of Evidence 401, 403, and 404(b). The court found the evidence relevant under Rule 401 because money laundering schemes inherently involve attempts to hide or obscure financial transactions; therefore, the tax returns were probative of whether Marshall received funds through lawful means. The court rejected the argument that this violated Rule 404(b)'s bar on character evidence. The government did not introduce the returns to prove Marshall had a bad character or acted in conformity with it. Instead, the evidence was intrinsic to the scheme, used to show she facilitated the commission of the fraud and attempted to conceal income derived from it. The court cited United States v. Cammarata to support the view that such evidence falls outside the scope of Rule 404(b). Under Rule 403, the court held that the probative value of the tax returns substantially outweighed any risk of unfair prejudice, noting that not all prejudice is unfair prejudice. Second, the court addressed the admission of the news video. Relying on its recent decision in United States v. Lyttle, the court found the video admissible. The District Court provided a limiting instruction clarifying that the video was admitted only to show that whoever accessed it may have had knowledge of or familiarity with the scam. The record showed no indication Marshall accessed the video on the Ro-Cars computer, and the government's summation clarified that her co-conspirator Lyttle was the one who viewed it. Consequently, the video did not unfairly prejudice Marshall.
The judgment of conviction is affirmed, meaning Charlene Marshall must serve her 34-month prison sentence and pay the $245,148 restitution order. The decision reinforces the Third Circuit's stance that tax return summaries are admissible in money laundering cases to demonstrate the concealment of illicit funds, provided they are not used to prove general bad character. It also clarifies that circumstantial evidence regarding a defendant's familiarity with a specific scam is admissible even if the defendant did not personally access the source material, so long as the jury is properly instructed on the limited purpose of the evidence.
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