This column reports on several significant, representative decisions handed down recently in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Judge I. Leo Glasser, dismissing mail fraud charges relating to a scheme to help applicants cheat in passing the written test for commercial drivers’ licenses, found that the mailings of the licenses were not really the “mechanism of deceit.” Judge Raymond J. Dearie decided that plaintiff’s state law contract claims against British Airways were not preempted by the Airline Deregulation Act. Judge Frederic Block declined to grant an injunction prohibiting a landlord from demolishing a building that contained works of graffiti art. And Judge Denis R. Hurley granted defendant’s motion for a new trial because of possible jury tampering.

Mail Fraud Statute

In United States v. Ng, 12 CR 553 (EDNY, Sept. 25, 2013). Glasser held that a particular scheme did not violate the mail fraud statute, 18 U.S.C. §1349, where the use of the mails was not part of the execution of the fraud. The court therefore granted defendants’ motions to withdraw both their waivers of indictment and their guilty pleas to an Information, and to dismiss the Information.