Ahmad Abouammo v. United States

This case presents the question whether a defendant charged with vio-
lating 18 U. S. C. §1519—which makes it a crime to knowingly falsify
a document with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation—must
be tried in the district where the falsification occurred, or whether he
may alternatively be tried in the district where the federal investiga-
tion was located.

While employed by Twitter at its San Francisco office, petitioner Ah-
mad Abouammo provided confidential information to a high-level
Saudi official about Saudi dissidents posting on the company’s plat-
form. In exchange, the official wired Abouammo $300,000. Around
the same time, Abouammo left Twitter and relocated to Seattle, where
he started a social-media consulting business. Two San Francisco-
based FBI agents, who were investigating unauthorized disclosures of
Twitter account information, later flew to Seattle to interview
Abouammo at his home. During the interview, Abouammo denied giv-
ing the Saudi official confidential information, claiming that the pay-
ments were for consulting work. When the agents asked for support-
ing documentation, Abouammo went upstairs, created a fake invoice,
and emailed it to one of the agents. Back in San Francisco, the agents
discovered from the emailed document’s date-and-time metadata what
Abouammo had just done.

Abouammo was indicted in the Northern District of California for
falsifying a record under §1519. He moved to dismiss the charge for
improper venue, arguing that he could be tried only where the alleged
falsification occurred. The District Court denied the motion, finding
venue also proper in the place where the FBI investigation was located,
and a jury convicted Abouammo. The Ninth Circuit affirmed, reason-
ing that §1519’s intent requirement—“with the intent” to “obstruct” an
investigation—made the “contemplated effects” of the falsification part
of the “essential conduct” of the offense, thereby permitting trial
“where the investigation” the defendant “intended to stymie [was] on-
going or contemplated.”

A defendant charged with violating §1519 must be tried in the dis-
trict where the falsification occurred; he cannot be tried in a different
district where the investigation was located because no “conduct con-
stituting the offense” happened there.