United States v. Ralph Ceccolini

FEINBERG, Circuit Judge:

This admirably argued case comes to us in an unusual procedural posture. After a *138non-jury trial in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on two counts charging perjury before a grand jury, 18 U.S.C. § 1623, Judge Lee P. Gagliardi found defendant Ralph Ceccolini not guilty on one count and guilty on the other. But the judge then immediately set aside the guilty verdict on the ground that essential testimony against defendant had to be suppressed as the fruit of an illegal search. Citing 18 U.S.C. § 3731 and 28 U.S.C. § 1291, the…