Abuse of Discretion – Newly Discovered Evidence

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: United States of America v. Michael Coscia

Case No.: 19-2010; 20-1032

Officials: EASTERBROOK, RIPPLE, and ROVNER, Circuit Judges.

Focus: Abuse of Discretion – Newly Discovered Evidence

A jury convicted Michael Coscia of six counts of commodities fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1348, and six counts of spoofing, in violation of 7 U.S.C. §§ 6c(a)(5)(C) and 13(a)(2). On direct appeal, we affirmed his conviction. We now have before us the appeals of two proceedings that Mr. Coscia initiated after we resolved his direct appeal. The first is a motion for a new trial on the basis of new evidence in which he alleges (1) that data discovered after trial establishes that there were errors in the data presented to the jury and (2) that subsequent indictments against other traders for similar spoofing activities undercut the Government’s characterization of Mr. Coscia as “unique” or a trading “outlier.” The second proceeding is a motion to vacate his conviction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255, in which Mr. Coscia claims that his trial counsel, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, provided ineffective assistance of counsel. Specifically, he alleges that Sullivan & Cromwell had an undisclosed conflict of interest with several of the Government’s witnesses and that this conflict adversely affected counsel’s performance. He also alleges that, even if there was no conflict of interest, his trial counsel nevertheless provided constitutionally deficient representation.

The district court denied both motions, and Mr. Coscia now appeals. He submits that the district court abused its discretion when it denied his new trial motion. In his view, the newly discovered evidence demonstrated that key evidence relied on by the Government to establish his intent to spoof was false and inaccurate. As for his habeas motion, he contends that the district court correctly found that counsel had a conflict of interest, but incorrectly concluded that there was no adverse effect on counsel’s performance. He further submits that the district court erred in rejecting his argument that, even in the absence of a conflict of interest, his defense counsel’s performance was constitutionally deficient. In the alternative, Mr. Coscia requests further discovery and an evidentiary hearing on his ineffective assistance of counsel claims.

We now affirm the district court’s judgments on both the new trial and § 2255 motions. We conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Mr. Coscia’s motion for a new trial on newly discovered evidence grounds. We further conclude that the district court correctly determined that Mr. Coscia failed to demonstrate an adverse effect or prejudice in either of his ineffective assistance of counsel claims.

Affirmed

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Derek A Hawkins is Corporate Counsel, at Salesforce.