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Attorney Mark C. Cogan has been practicing exclusively in criminal defense for more than a quarter century. During your initial consultation, Mr. Cogan will personally evaluate your case, clarifying what you can expect and what must be done. When facing serious charges, a qualified attorney is invaluable to protecting you and your future. Becoming informed is the first step in setting your mind at ease.
- A New York University School of Law graduate, Mark C. Cogan specially trained with the best, most highly acclaimed criminal defense attorneys in the nation at the National Criminal Defense College.
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We relentlessly pursue victory, and don't retreat even if the odds are stacked high against our client. Instead, we appreciate the challenge and don't settle for less than the best result which can conceivably be achieved. Contact criminal defense lawyer Mark C. Cogan for a free and confidential consultation.
Warning: Do not write off an attorney because you are guilty or if the circumstances undeniably convey that you are! A criminal defense lawyer can help if provided an opportunity. Unfortunately, many people contact us after the damage has been done, irreversible damage that could have been significantly minimized or altogether avoided. Total vindication is a possibility even in the worst scenarios. Even if a conviction is expected, an attorney can negotiate to substantially minimize penalties.
Mark C. Cogan has achieved numerous Not Guilty verdicts, outright dismissals, and non-prosecution agreements for his clients in a wide range of serious criminal charges. He's argued before both State and Federal courts, representing clients accused of murder, rape, arson, driving under the influence of intoxicants, major drug cases, assault, domestic violence, sex offenses, theft, fraud, embezzlement, and Ballot Measure 11 prosecutions.
With our firm, you'll never feel "out-of-the-loop." We will illustrate, inform, educate, and counsel but, in the end, final decisions are yours. Undoubtedly, you will need to make some very important decisions, but with experienced counsel beside you, you'll have the ability to make good decisions. Attorney Mark C. Cogan will develop an optimum defense strategy. He'll go the extra mile to see that your rights are protected. His impressive track record speaks for itself. We have a proven formula for success!
The Portland Tribune: Stung by FBI, store owners fight back
Filing points to an informant's sex and drug use with a 16-year-old girl in pressing for cases' dismissal
By Todd Murphy
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The Portland Tribune:
Stung by FBI, store owners fight back
Filing points to an informant's sex and drug use with a 16-year-old girl in pressing for cases' dismissal
By Todd Murphy
The Portland Tribune, May 4, 2007
The FBI agent who led the investigation into possible stolen-goods dealing by Portland secondhand stores knew or should have known that a government-affiliated participant in the investigation was having sex with a 16-year-old girl – and providing her with heroin – and did nothing to stop or report the crimes, according to a lawyer for one of the secondhand store owners.
The charges come in a court memorandum filed last week by the lawyer for Curt Gardner, one of several owners of Portland secondhand stores charged in 2005 in federal court with illegally dealing in more than $1 million worth of stolen goods.
The charges come as part of a basic argument repeatedly made by lawyers for the secondhand store owners. The argument: that, in the guise of investigating crime, the FBI and its informants in the secondhand stores investigation of 2004 and 2005 in essence created a stolen-goods network while committing and overlooking a range of crimes.
But the most recent court filing publicly detailed for the first time the circumstances surrounding the 16-year-old girl.
"(A)ll the crimes pale in significance when placed alongside the sexual victimization and heroin addiction which was perpetrated against the minor female," Gardner's lawyer, Mark Cogan, wrote in his filing.
The government's actions throughout the investigation were so egregious, Cogan and other defense lawyers say, that they are arguing that the criminal charges against the store owners should be dismissed because of "outrageous governmental misconduct." It is a legal term and argument that – while difficult to prove – can cause a criminal case to be dismissed.
"At some point, the government must be called to account for ways in which this investigation was allowed to get out of control and cause grave harm to individual victims," Cogan wrote.
The FBI and the U.S. attorney's office in Portland have not formally responded to the most recent charges, and the U.S. attorney's office has responded only in limited ways during the last several months to the "outrageous government misconduct" charge.
An FBI spokeswoman referred all questions about the FBI investigation and the case this week to the U.S. attorney's office in Portland.
The U.S. attorney's office will file a formal response to the misconduct charges, and against the dismissal of the cases, by May 15, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Frank Noonan, who is prosecuting the cases.
"Beyond that I don't think I can really comment," Noonan said.
Cogan's April 26 filing marks the latest turn in an already unusual case that generated significant headlines in fall 2005. That was after a two-year undercover FBI sting resulted in the indictments of 27 people for allegedly dealing in the stolen goods. Those indicted included the owners of 10 Portland secondhand stores.
Newspaper editorials blamed the Portland Police Bureau for largely ignoring the dealing of stolen goods through secondhand stores, sparking another FBI investigation as to whether corrupt cops were to blame.
Defense lawyers have been arguing since last year, however, that the FBI's own investigation was responsible for much of the theft.
They have argued, citing the FBI's own investigative documents, that the FBI coordinated both the supply of stolen goods for the secondhand stores, and the demand for those goods that allowed the stores to easily sell them.
Steal-sell strategy set up
The documents show that one informant working for the FBI – Lorie Brewster – coordinated groups of thieves who stole goods from throughout Oregon and five other Western states. Another FBI informant then bought more than $1.8 million worth of goods from the stores.
While working on behalf of the FBI – and given immunity from prosecution – he apparently then sold the goods and kept profits that amount to more than $1 million, according to defense lawyers' court pleadings.
The defense lawyers have said the records show that the selling and buying of stolen merchandise by the FBI informants tripled and quadrupled the level of business that some secondhand stores had seen only months before the FBI investigation began.
Only in recent court filings, however, have defense lawyers pointed out investigation records relating to the female minor.
Cogan writes in the April 26 filing that one of the thieves – or "boosters" – whose theft was coordinated by Brewster, lived in Brewster's garage in February 2004 with the then 16-year-old girl.
The girl also participated in the FBI-coordinated thefts, according to Cogan. An appendix to the filing, based on FBI investigative materials released to the defense, said the then 36-year-old booster – Robert Resio – used heroin with the girl, and had sexual intercourse with her while living with her.
The girl eventually became pregnant, although she apparently lost the baby because of her continued heroin use, according to the records.
Who knew what, and when?
In his filing, Cogan cites a February 2007 letter from the FBI agent who led the investigation – Chris Frazier – in which Frazier denies knowing the female was under 18.
But Cogan writes in the filing that those claims "are not credible" because of details of what other participants in the FBI investigation knew of the girl and her age.
"No less than 50 FBI reports mention the minor female by name and discuss the work she was doing to advance the FBI's investigation," Cogan writes in his filing. "During more than an entire year of this investigation, the FBI was aware of the sexual abuse and the drug addiction of the minor female. … Instead of protecting the minor female, the FBI allowed her exploitation to continue, while it made use of her services in the shoplifting activity."
In July 2004, Resio was charged in Multnomah County Circuit Court with contributing to the sexual delinquency of a minor, distribution of heroin to a minor and reckless endangerment of a juvenile.
According to court records, a Multnomah County jail release officer called Brewster as a reference for Resio.
The charges against Resio were dismissed in November 2004. The court records give no details as to why.
Attempts to reach Resio, who has been a transient, were unsuccessful. His lawyer in the 2004 case did not return a phone call for comment.
After the U.S. attorney's office May 15 filing, prosecutors and defense lawyers will present their arguments for and against the dismissal of the cases based on outrageous government misconduct at a hearing in front of U.S. District Judge James Redden. The hearing is scheduled for July 24.