United States v. Puerto

Eduardo Orlansky was one of three people indicted and convicted by the federal government (plaintiff) on multiple charges arising out of multi-million-dollar fraud schemes over the course of a decade. (The named defendant, Ariadna Puerto, was also one of the three conspirators). At his trial, Orlansky attempted to introduce expert testimony from two witnesses regarding his mental state at the time of the criminal acts. The witnesses were to testify to support Orlansky’s use of an insanity defense, pursuant to the Insanity Defense Reform Act, a statute that required a criminal defendant to prove insanity by clear and convincing evidence. Orlansky also wished to challenge the government’s position that he had the requisite mens rea to commit fraud and to establish that Orlansky had not known about the fraud but that the fraud had been perpetrated by lower management. Dr. Gelblum was to testify about his 2004 diagnosis of Orlansky with progressive vascular dementia. Although electroencephalogram and magnetic resonance imaging results showed issues with Orlansky’s brain, Dr. Gelblum admitted that his diagnosis did not establish whether Orlansky could act to deceive from 1994 to 2003, when the criminal acts occurred. Dr. Gelblum did posit that Orlansky was legally insane in May 2004, but Gelblum based any information regarding prior problems on accounts from family and friends. The other expert, Dr. Crown, was to testify that Orlansky was performing at a 12-year-old level or lower in 2004, but Crown similarly acknowledged that he could not determine whether Orlansky had been insane at any point from 1994 to 2003 when the fraud occurred. The witnesses were excluded from trial, and Orlansky appealed, arguing that the exclusion of the testimony was error.