‘Varsity Blues’ Cases Narrow Path for Honest Services Fraud

Carrie Cohen and Julia Koch authored an article for Bloomberg Law discussing the First Circuit’s decision to vacate convictions in college admissions bribery cases, which is in line with the Supreme Court’s trend of reversing public corruption convictions based on what it views as unconstitutionally broad application by prosecutors of the federal fraud statutes.

“Although the First Circuit left a path forward for prosecutors to rely on a property fraud theory, it closed the door on charging ‘non-traditionally recognized form[s] of bribery’ as honest services fraud,” the authors wrote. “The full scope of what constitutes non-traditionally recognized bribery has yet to be determined. At least in the First Circuit, however, bribe payments made to ‘an agent’s purportedly betrayed principal’ fall squarely within that category.”

They added: “Federal courts’ continued reluctance to criminalize what increasingly is viewed as ordinary business dealings or politics as usual will appropriately require prosecutors to more adequately weigh additional considerations when confronted with atypical public corruption schemes.”

Read the full article.

Reproduced with permission. Published June 14, 2023. Copyright 2023 Bloomberg Industry Group 800-372-1033. For further use please visit https://www.bloombergindustry.com/copyright-and-usage-guidelines-copyright/