United States v. Mandel, No. 09-4116 (7th Cir. 2011)
Annotate this CaseDefendant approached an employee of his business for help in finding a hit-man to kill his business partner. The employee went to the authorities, was outfitted with a wire, and recorded conversations in which he and defendant plotted the details of the murder in person and over the telephone. A jury convicted defendant on charges that he used facilities of interstate commerce, a cellular telephone and his car, in furtherance of a murder for hire scheme (18 U.S.C. 1958(a)). He was sentenced to 138 months in prison. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, rejecting claims of "manufactured jurisdiction." The evidence was sufficient to refute a claim that defendant was entrapped into using his cell phone in furtherance of the murder scheme. Although the informant placed calls to defendant’s cell phone to discuss the scheme, defendant willingly reciprocated. The court correctly determined that intrastate use of a personal automobile falls within Commerce Clause power and can form the basis for a federal charge.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.