Richard Hatch, the Survivor winner who thought that 300 million witnesses were wrong to him winning $1 million, had his appeal denied today by the First Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Hatch will likely have to complete his sentence of 51 months at ClubFed.
Hatch appealed his conviction on various grounds:
“Hatch argues that the district court violated his Sixth Amendment rights by precluding Hatch’s testimony about his alleged discovery during the taping of “Survivor” that the production company, SEG, was “cheating” by giving food to other contestants and otherwise violating its own rules for how the contest would be run. Hatch’s discovery of these irregularities, he now says in his appellate briefs and argument, led the show’s producer, Mark Burnett, to promise Hatch, in exchange for his silence, that SEG would pay his taxes if he were to win the prize.”
There’s a problem with this line, though; the Court gave Hatch several opportunities to elicit such testimony. “The court thus opened the door for defense counsel to ask Hatch whether Burnett or someone else at SEG had promised to pay the taxes on the money he won. Hatch’s counsel, however, did not follow up with questions of this sort.”
Hatch also argued that the Court prevented him from introducing evidence, “…[of] a subjective belief he had no legal duty to pay his taxes, an argument which would negate the element of willfulness required to prove his guilt.” The Appellate Court found no evidence of that.
“But without evidence that the producers had agreed to pay Hatch’s taxes, the evidence that Hatch had caught those running the show cheating was of no contextual materiality to the revenue violations with which Hatch was charged. The court was well within its discretion to reject further testimony of Hatch’s complaints about ‘cheating’ during the show until the defense furnished evidence of a tax payment promise that made such contextual evidence relevant.”
Hatch also argued that the District Court limited his arguments on cross-examination. But that argument held no water; “Here, the district court’s limitations on cross-examination in this nine-day trial were thoughtful and far from being excessive.”
Hatch also argued that the expert witnesses called (generally, accountants that Hatch had used and IRS agents) should not have been admitted. Here to, though, the Appellate Court disagreed. “Taking each witness in turn, we find no error.”
And the final claim made by Hatch on appeal was also turned down: “Lastly, Hatch challenges in the briefest of language his sentence on the grounds that the court erred in the loss finding and in applying a perjury enhancement. Both claims are undeveloped and fail in any event.” You may remember that the District Court judge felt that Hatch had lied during his testimony (thus, the perjury enhancement). The Appellate Court has told Hatch that he did indeed lie,
“…the court catalogued many instances in which Hatch had committed perjury, noting that the list was ‘a pretty long one’ and included lying on the stand about his failure to disclose the income which formed the bases for the charges on which he was convicted and about his alleged failure to read the letter drafted by Wallis regarding the hypothetical Exhibit One which he then submitted for his tax return.”
So for the next 27 months or so Hatch will complete his sentence at ClubFed. Hopefully he’ll learn from this experience that usually 300 million witnesses are right.
Full Appellate Court Ruling Here
AP Story Here
Link to previous Taxable Talk posts on Richard Hatch
Hat Tip: How Appealing
