Ravenell appealing money laundering conviction to U.S. Supreme Court after 4th Circuit rejection

A split 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has denied Baltimore defense lawyer Kenneth W. Ravenell’s request to reconsider tossing his federal money laundering conviction, a blow that arrived just days after the court granted Ravenell a last-minute postponement of his prison sentence.

Ravenell’s legal team now plans to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, his lawyer said Friday.

The appellate court voted 9-5 to deny Ravenell’s request, which needed a majority to move forward. A three-judge panel of the court affirmed Ravenell’s conviction in April with a 2-1 vote; he responded by asking the entire court to hear the case en banc.

Ravenell has successfully avoided prison during the lengthy appeals process. He was most recently set to report to federal prison a week ago, but the 4th Circuit at the last minute granted him bail while his case was still pending.

“We are disappointed by the Fourth Circuit’s decision and agree with the five judges who voted for rehearing en banc,” said Ravenell’s lawyer, David M. Zornow, of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP. “We will now seek review in the Supreme Court to vindicate Mr. Ravenell’s constitutional right to a jury determination on all issues.”

The appeal stems from Ravenell’s December 2021 conviction for money laundering. Government prosecutors accused him of helping to launder nearly $2 million in drug money for a former criminal defense client who ran a marijuana trafficking organization.

Jurors acquitted Ravenell of other charges, including racketeering and narcotics conspiracy, but returned a guilty verdict on one count of money laundering. On appeal, Ravenell argued that the jury should have been instructed on the five-year statute of limitations that applies to the federal money laundering law.

In a concurring opinion, Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III wrote that it is inappropriate for the full 4th Circuit to take up the statute of limitations issue because the key disagreement is about the facts of the criminal case, not a question of law.

“I do think it crucial that we give the accused a fair trial and appeal, which we emphatically did here,” Wilkinson wrote. “He had, and deserved, a wholly fair trial. To vary from settled standards of review and settled principles of conspiracy law here would be unwarranted.”

But in a dissenting opinion, Judge Roger L. Gregory wrote that the lingering factual questions mean a jury should have been instructed on the statute of limitations. Determining whether Ravenell withdrew from the conspiracy before the statute of limitations period is critical to assessing his guilt, Gregory wrote.

“Because the district court’s refusal to instruct the jury on the statute of limitations stifled the jury’s ability to weigh Ravenell’s guilt, and I am hard-pressed to think of a question of greater importance than the subjugation of an accused’s constitutional right to a jury trial, I dissent,” Gregory wrote.

Ravenell, 64, was sentenced in June 2022 to serve four years and nine months in federal prison for the money-laundering charge. Despite only recently receiving an appeal bond, he repeatedly avoided reporting to prison for reasons that remain shielded in U.S. District Court in Maryland.