False Statement Concealing Travel To Cuba Gets New York Attorney Disbarred

An attorney convicted of a false statement to conceal his travel to Cuba was disbarred by the New York Appellate Division for the First Judicial Department.

On October 29, 2013, respondent was convicted, upon his plea of guilty, in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, of one count of making a false statement on a United States Customs and Border Protection form (USCBP), in violation of 18 [*2]USC § 1001, a felony. On June 3, 2014, respondent was sentenced to two years of probation and a $100 assessment was imposed.

Respondent’s conviction arose from his submission, on or about September 13, 2011, of a USCBP Form 6059B on which he falsely stated that the only country he had visited while outside the United States was Mexico, when in fact he had also traveled to Cuba.

The sanction was premised on the preclusive effect of the conviction

This Court has repeatedly held that a federal conviction under 18 USC § 1001 is analogous to the New York felony of offering a false instrument for filing in the first degree under Penal Law § 175.35, a class E felony based on facial similarity of the statutory language (see Matter of Collazo, 81 AD3d 220 [1st Dept 2011]; Matter of Ramirez, 7 AD3d 52 [1st Dept 2004]). Even if the statutes were not analogous, respondent’s allocution, in which he admitted that he willfully concealed a material fact on his USCBP Form 6059B, taken in conjunction with the information, demonstrates “essential similarity” between the statutes sufficient to strike respondent’s name from the rolls (see e.g. Matter of Adams, 114 AD3d 1 [1st Dept 2013]).

Accordingly, the Committee’s petition is granted to the extent of striking respondent’s name from the roll of attorneys and counselors-at-law in the State of New York pursuant to Judiciary Law § 90(4)(b), effective nunc pro tunc to October 29, 2013, the date of his conviction.

(Mike Frisch)