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7.12.2001 00:05
Appeals court
orders reduction in
Scungio sentence
• His skill as a lawyer had no bearing on his ability to lie to an FBI agent and was no basis for an increased sentence, the appeals court rules.
BY MIKE STANTON
Journal Staff Writer
Ex-lawyer John A. Scungio's foray into the corrupt world of Providence city government may have cost him his reputation and his law license, but it won't cost him $40,000.
A federal appeals court has ordered a new sentence for Scungio, who pleaded guilty in 1999 to corruption charges involving his delivery of a $5,000 bribe to city tax officials.
Reasoning in part that lying to an FBI agent does not require any special skills, the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston said that a federal judge in Providence erred last year when he increased Scungio's sentence.
Scungio, 62, of 24 Bridle Drive, Lincoln, has already served six months of home confinement, so the only part of his sentence left to be reduced is a $40,000 fine and three years
'
probation.
The amount of the fine is likely to be substantially reduced as a result of the appeals court ruling, though it will be up to a federal judge in Providence to pronounce a new sentence.
When Scungio was sentenced last Oct. 3, U.S. District Judge Ronald R. Lagueux increased the penalty for two reasons -- ruling that Scungio's lies to FBI agents about illicit tax breaks constituted obstruction of justice, and that Scungio had used his "special skills" as a lawyer to mislead the investigators.
Scungio appealed. In an opinion last Friday, the three-judge appeals court agreed with Scungio.
Scungio's conviction arose from a meeting with two FBI agents on May 12, 1999, shortly after the federal corruption probe of City Hall, dubbed Operation Plunder Dome, became public. Scungio lied to the agents about his role as a lawyer for Providence businessman and mob associate Paul A. Calenda and his then-wife, Gail-Ann Calenda.
In 1998, shortly before Paul Calenda went to federal prison for possession of an Uzi machine gun, the Calendas had the value of three properties reduced by $261,000.
To win the tax break, Scungio delivered a $5,000 cash bribe from Gail Calenda to tax
board officials Joseph A. Pannone and David C. Ead. Scungio, who earned $2,600 in legal fees, also gave Pannone another $200 out of his own pocket.
Gail Calenda, who was never charged, cooperated with authorities. That fall, after agents visited Scungio again and confronted him with new evidence, Scungio became the first Plunder Dome defendant to plead guilty, admitting to a single felony count of lying to an FBI agent.
Scungio's plea, a federal prosecutor said at his sentencing last fall, "helped open the floodgates" for other defendants to come forward. His cooperation helped win him a more lenient sentence under the complex federal sentencing guidelines.
But not lenient enough, Scungio argued in his appeal. And the 1st Circuit agreed.
The appeals court ruled that Judge Lagueux had erred in increasing Scungio's punishment by calculating the guidelines based on obstruction of justice rather than fraud and deceit.
Although Operation Plunder Dome had received heavy publicity as an ongoing investigation, the appeals court ruled that there was no evidence that Scungio, when interviewed the first time by the FBI, "knew or had notice of a pending [grand jury] proceeding that his false statements would obstruct."
Lagueux also erred, the appeals court said, by increasing Scungio's sentence based on his "special skill" as a lawyer. There was "insufficient evidence," the appeals court said, to conclude that Scungio's "skill as a tax lawyer significantly facilitated his deceitful responses to the FBI."
Scungio, who runs a family jewelry business, Angelo DiMaria, at 395 Admiral St., Providence, no longer practices law. The quality of his legal skills was rendered moot as a result of his conviction, when he was stripped of his license to practice law.
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