UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

WESTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK

-------------------------------------
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

-vs- 09-CR-121S

SHANE C. BUCZEK,

Defendant.
-------------------------------------

Proceedings held before the

Honorable William M. Skretny, Part IV,

U.S. Courthouse, 68 Court Street,

Buffalo, New York on January 14, 2010.

APPEARANCES:

ANTHONY M. BRUCE,
MARY C. BAUMGARTEN,
Assistant United States Attorneys
Appearing for the United States.

JOHN F. HUMANN,
BRIAN P. COMERFORD, ESQ.,
Assistant Federal Public Defender.
Appearing for Defendant.

Michelle L. McLaughlin, RPR,

Official Reporter,
U.S.D.C. W.D.N.Y.
(716)332-3560
 2

1 THE CLERK: Criminal case 09-121S, United

2 States of America versus Shane Buczek.

3 MS. BAUMGARTEN: Morning, Judge.

4 THE COURT: Good morning, Miss Baumgarten

5 and Mr. Bruce.

6 MR. BRUCE: Good morning, Judge.

7 MR. HUMANN: Morning, your Honor.

8 MR. COMERFORD: Morning, your Honor.

9 THE COURT: Okay. Mr. Buczek, good

10 morning.

11 THE DEFENDANT: Morning, Judge.

12 THE COURT: How are you doing today?

13 THE DEFENDANT: Good.

14 THE COURT: Are you doing all right? And

15 I have Mr. Comerford and Mr. Humann here as well.

16 Just give me one second please.

17 Okay. And there's really a trilogy of cases

18 that you are involved with, Mr. Buczek, and I do

19 have in connection with the February 16th trial

20 date, a request for an adjournment of that, and

21 that's under consideration. The government objects

22 apparently to that adjournment, and -- is that

23 correct, Mr. Bruce, or --

24 MR. BRUCE: It is, Judge. There's one

25 added factor that we didn't know at the point in

 3

1 time when we objected. One of our witnesses is a

2 witness from -- he's one of these professional

3 witnesses from the Department of Treasury who will

4 come out and testify concerning Mr. Buczek's

5 accounts or lack of accounts with the Treasury

6 Department. He actually works for the controller

7 of the currency, and he does this in any number of

8 cases, and, fortunately, the week that he -- the

9 week that the Court has already scheduled for trial

10 is a week that he has open, but he has other trial

11 commitments to other assistants in other courts in

12 other weeks, including the week Mr. Humann asked

13 for an adjournment to, so that's a little bit

14 problematical as well.

15 THE COURT: Okay. Well, Mr. Humann, the

16 date that you are asking for is what? I don't see

17 it necessarily.

18 MR. HUMANN: Any other date than that

19 week, your Honor. I don't think I asked for a

20 specific date.

21 THE COURT: I don't think so either. But

22 my inclination was to grant the request over the

23 government's objection, and I was looking to back

24 up the trials a little bit, and I guess you can

25 check with your witness and see if your witness is

 4

1 available on March 2nd, that was the date that I

2 had designated for the passport case,

3 08-criminal-54. So we would put the bank fraud

4 case in on that date, substitute the passport case

5 for the contempt case, which was scheduled for

6 April 6th, and then set a new date for the contempt

7 case to follow. So, that's the schedule that I

8 think works best here.

9 MR. HUMANN: Thank you.

10 THE DEFENDANT: Judge, I do want to make a

11 record before we leave today? Is it okay? I would

12 like to just put on the record somewhere in -- in

13 the time I would like to go have an in-chamber

14 hearing, if that request is granted, because the

15 information I seem to bring up to the Court, kind

16 of very sensitive, and I would like to have that

17 done, if I could please, an in-chamber hearing.

18 THE COURT: Well --

19 THE DEFENDANT: Because I cannot bring

20 things into the public. It's making people very

21 sensitive. And I've learned my lesson back on

22 January 16th when that incident took place.

23 THE COURT: Okay. Both the Supreme Court

24 and the Second Circuit law, Mr. Buczek, is very

25 skeptical of in-chambers proceedings. They are not

 5

1 recommended. What I suggest that you do is speak

2 with Mr. Comerford and Mr. Humann, and if there's

3 something that needs to be submitted under seal on

4 that basis for in camera inspection, I'll consider

5 doing it that way. But I need a proper

6 justification for it under the law. But I'm not

7 closed to it. It's just that I'm not going to

8 commit to having you in chambers at this point.

9 That would not be appropriate. And for the most

10 part all the proceedings should be public

11 proceedings. But if the matter is sufficient for

12 purposes of my consideration under seal, I will do

13 that, but work through your attorneys in that

14 regards.

15 THE DEFENDANT: I still haven't received

16 any proper notice of this case.

17 THE COURT: Okay.

18 THE DEFENDANT: And I'm sorry about the

19 paperwork I filed. I thought the door was wide

20 open on that, and I do have a recusal for Mr. Bruce

21 that I would like to hand to you if that's

22 possible.

23 THE COURT: Again, work through

24 Mr. Comerford and Mr. Humann on that, all right. I

25 know that's your position that he doesn't belong in

 6

1 this case, but -- and I've noted that for the

2 record. And the record does reflect that, but if

3 there's more to be filed, assistance should be

4 given to you from your attorneys in accomplishing

5 that.

6 MR. COMERFORD: We'll sit down in the next

7 couple days and go through the different things

8 Mr. Buczek has brought up. If there's something we

9 can file with the Court, we will. If not, we'll

10 bring it up before the Court.

11 THE COURT: Okay.

12 MR. COMERFORD: I think that's the best

13 way to do it.

14 MS. BAUMGARTEN: Judge, with respect to

15 anything that gets filed on a recusal motion, I'm

16 assuming that I will be assigned to respond to it.

17 But this would proceed just like any other matter.

18 Should it be filed, we'd set a schedule?

19 THE COURT: Yeah. We'll do all of that,

20 so that nobody's disadvantaged unfairly here, and

21 let's see what happens after you have your sit down

22 session with the lawyers here, Mr. Buczek.

23 THE DEFENDANT: And, Judge, I come here as

24 a friend of the court.

25 THE COURT: Okay.

 7

1 THE DEFENDANT: And I don't consent to the

2 name. I've been working very hard work, you know,

3 in honor, and I have documents that I would like to

4 file, and I thought the door was open.

5 THE COURT: Okay. Well, again --

6 THE DEFENDANT: And I prepared this

7 document that I would like to run through

8 Mr. Comerford, and then hopefully get to you.

9 THE COURT: All right.

10 THE DEFENDANT: Thank you.

11 THE COURT: That's fine. Okay. So that's

12 going to be the schedule. Now, let's get that

13 third case scheduled. Do you have a trial date for

14 that, and that would be the contempt case.

15 MR. BRUCE: Judge, I had two case -- I

16 have a case scheduled here with you on the

17 27th that Mr. Rogowski is, in fact, going to try.

18 THE COURT: Which one is that, Mr. Bruce?

19 MR. BRUCE: That's the Koschuk case. I

20 have a case scheduled with Judge Arcara on the same

21 day that's going to last a week to ten days

22 probably. So, I'd ask the Court to factor that

23 into any scheduling that Miss Labuzzetta is about

24 to do.

25 THE COURT: Sure. June 28th.

 8

1 MR. BRUCE: Judge, with respect to each of

2 the three cases, I would ask the Court to exclude

3 the time between now and the start of each of the

4 separate trials.

5 MR. COMERFORD: No objection, your Honor.

6 THE COURT: Okay. I'll exclude time then.

7 But I'm going to keep it on a serious trial track.

8 You deserve to get a speedy disposition to the

9 extent practical and possible, Mr. Buczek. I find

10 that the ends of justice outweigh the interest of

11 defendant and society to a speedy trial, and the

12 exclusions apply to each of the three cases,

13 09-121, 08-54, 09-144 under 3161(h)(7)(A).

14 MR. BRUCE: Judge, with respect to

15 08-CR-54, as the Court's probably aware from some

16 filings I did yesterday and again early this

17 morning, my submissions were due yesterday. I did

18 get them in. I've asked for an extra week. I

19 think given what the Court's done this morning, I'd

20 ask the Court's benevolence and ask for a couple

21 three weeks anyway to get that stuff in.

22 MR. COMERFORD: We have no objection to

23 that, Judge.

24 THE CLERK: What case?

25 THE COURT: That's the passport case,

 9

1 that's 08 criminal 54. We'll extend that

2 submission date by two weeks.

3 MR. BRUCE: That's fine, Judge.

4 THE COURT: Okay.

5 MR. BRUCE: That helps.

6 THE COURT: All right.

7 THE CLERK: Then all the other stuff --

8 THE COURT: Everything else we'll adjust

9 accordingly.

10 MR. BRUCE: I assume you're going to

11 adjust the 09-CR-141, since it's now pretty far

12 out.

13 THE COURT: Well, it is. We'll take a

14 look at the whole thing. That's the June 28th

15 date, so -- all right. We'll work it out so you're

16 not disadvantaged, Mr. Bruce nor Mr. Buczek, okay?

17 THE DEFENDANT: Judge, again, I come here

18 as a friend of the Court. I just want to make a

19 record of it. I just got a review of the Jencks

20 report on case 121, and I see no controversy.

21 Thank you.

22 THE COURT: Okay. All right. Okay. I

23 think that brings it to a close for today.

24 MR. BRUCE: Thank you, Judge.

25 MS. BAUMGARTEN: Thank you, Judge.

 10

1 THE COURT: All right, Mr. Buczek, I

2 understand.

3 * * * * * *

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25
 1 CERTIFICATION

3 I certify that the foregoing is a

4 correct transcription of the proceedings

5 recorded by me in this.

8 s/Michelle L. McLaughlin
Michelle L. McLaughlin, RPR
9 Official Reporter
U.S.D.C., W.D.N.Y.
10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25