AI Generated Opinion Summaries

This summary was computer-generated without any editorial revision. It is not official, has not been checked for accuracy, and is NOT citable.

Facts

• The case involves the Defendant, Tin Cheung, and his co-defendant, Gordon Leong, who were charged with multiple felony counts related to selling New Mexico driver’s licenses or identification cards to foreign nationals during 2009 and 2010. The charges against the Defendant included forgery, conspiracy to commit forgery, racketeering, conspiracy to commit racketeering, and making false affidavit perjury (para 2).

Procedural History

• State v. Leong, 2017-NMCA-070, 404 P.3d 9: The co-defendant, Gordon Leong, was tried separately, and his forgery and related conspiracy convictions were reversed.

Parties' Submissions

• Plaintiff-Appellee (State): Conceded that the Defendant’s convictions for forgery, conspiracy to commit forgery, racketeering, and conspiracy to commit racketeering cannot be sustained but argued that sufficient evidence supports the Defendant’s convictions for false affidavit perjury (para 1, 6, 11).
• Defendant-Appellant (Tin Cheung): Challenged the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his convictions on all counts (para 1).

Legal Issues

• Whether the evidence was sufficient to support the Defendant's convictions for forgery, conspiracy to commit forgery, racketeering, conspiracy to commit racketeering, and making false affidavit perjury.

Disposition

• The court reversed and vacated the Defendant's convictions for forgery, conspiracy to commit forgery, racketeering, conspiracy to commit racketeering, and making false affidavit perjury (para 1, 9, 10, 18).

Reasons

• The panel, consisting of Judges Jacqueline R. Medina, Linda M. Vanzi, and Julie J. Vargas, unanimously agreed on the decision. The court found that the State's concession regarding the insufficiency of evidence for the forgery, racketeering, and conspiracy convictions was correct, referencing the precedent set in State v. Leong. The court determined that the Defendant's actions did not constitute forgery as defined by law because the documents in question were genuine and contained the Defendant's actual signature, thus not meeting the criteria for forgery which requires falsification of the document itself (paras 7-9). Similarly, without the predicate offenses of forgery, the convictions for conspiracy to commit forgery and racketeering were also reversed (para 10). Regarding the false affidavit perjury charges, the court declined the State's request to abandon the two-witness rule, which requires the testimony of two witnesses or one witness with corroborating evidence to prove perjury. The court found that the State failed to provide sufficient evidence under this standard to support the perjury convictions (paras 11-17).