Case Note

'Clerical Error' Must Be Altered to Reflect the Plea, Not the Indictment

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, Western Division, has granted a convicted business' motion to alter case record because a clerical error was made in the “Offense Ended” date, where a fact set forth in the plea agreement differed from that recorded by the court. United States v. Maruyasu Indus. Co., Ltd., 2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 181357 (S.D. Ohio 10/23/18).

Defendant Maruyasu Industries was indicted in June 2016 on one count of violating the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. section 1, through conspiracy to suppress and eliminate competition by agreeing to fix prices, allocate customers, and rig bids for automotive steel tubes sold to car manufacturers in Japan that were then incorporated into vehicles sold in the United States. The company agreed to plead guilty to that count, not on the basis of the facts alleged in the indictment in full, but pursuant to the terms of the plea agreement. Despite this, the judgment form filed by the court in the case in accordance with Fed. R. Crim. P. 32(k)(1) (“In a judgment of conviction, the court must set forth the plea, the jury verdict or the court's findings, the adjudication, and the sentence”) stated that the criminal activity ended in July of 2011, rather than the December 2008 stated in the plea agreement. The government contended that court document should not be altered because although there was “no dispute” that the defendant admitted only the facts as set forth in the plea agreement, the July 2011 was the date set forth in the indictment, and Maruyasu pleaded guilty to count 1 of the indictment. Specifically, the government stated in court filings that “[b]ecause the Indictment is the operative charging document to which Defendant Maruyasu pled guilty, the Judgment should reflect the conspiracy end date contained therein — July 9, 2011.” However, the court concluded that this position disregarded the factual findings to which the parties had agreed, and which the court had adopted in accepting the defendant's guilty plea. Consequently, it directed the court clerk to file an amended judgment with the correct “Offense Ended” date of Dec. 31, 2008.

— Janice Inman, Editor-in-Chief