United States v. Spivak

Paul Spivak (defendant) was the 62-year-old chief executive officer of a manufacturing company. In June 2021, Spivak was arrested for conspiring to commit securities fraud. The United States government (plaintiff) sought pretrial detention, but the parties ultimately agreed to the imposition of a $600,000 bond and conditions including location monitoring and surrender of Spivak’s passport. Spivak was held in custody pending a home inspection and the deposit of security for the bond. Following the home inspection, pretrial services determined that Spivak’s home was not suitable for home detention because the home had slow internet and shoddy phone service that would have made electronic monitoring difficult. Inspectors had also found weapons in Spivak’s home. Spivak subsequently moved for release, asserting that he had satisfied all the bond conditions and that the government and one of Spivak’s associates had custody of all of Spivak’s weapons. At a detention hearing, the government argued that Spivak presented a serious flight risk because he had access to assets that he could liquidate and use to flee, he had lied to investigators about owning firearms, his spouse was from Russia, and he had expressed a willingness to live in Russia, which was a nonextradition country. The government also asserted that Spivak presented a serious risk of obstruction and pressuring of witnesses based on evidence that after a witness had called Spivak volatile and threatening, the witness found a bag of dead rodents on his doorstep. The government asserted that Spivak had then asked two associates to pressure the witness to say that Spivak was not responsible for the rodents. Spivak disputed the witness-intimidation allegations and denied involvement with the rodents. The magistrate judge ultimately ordered that Spivak be detained pending trial after finding that there was no combination of conditions that would reasonably ensure Spivak’s appearance at trial or the safety of others and the community. Spivak appealed to the district court.