Section 1343 reaches whoever, having devised a scheme to defraud or to obtain money or property by materially false or fraudulent pretenses, transmits or causes to be transmitted by wire in interstate or foreign commerce any writing, sign, signal, or sound for the purpose of executing the scheme. The Supreme Court reads the statute broadly and in step with its mail-fraud twin. To prove it, a reviewer would test four elements:

1. A scheme or plan to defraud, or to obtain money or property by materially false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises;
2. The materiality of the false statement or omission — that it had a natural tendency to influence a person to part with money or property (Neder);
3. Intent to defraud — an intent to deceive and to cheat, not merely to deceive (Miller); and
4. Use of, or causing the use of, an interstate or foreign wire to carry out an essential part of the scheme — one who acts knowing that a wire will follow in the ordinary course “causes” its use (Pereira), and the transmission need only be a step in the plot (Schmuck).

The gravamen of the offense is the use of the wires, not the scheme that surrounds it. The Supreme Court fixed the rule a century ago for the mail-fraud statute: each separate use is a separate offense. Because the mail and wire statutes are construed identically, the rule carries to § 1343 — each qualifying transmission is its own count.

This is the core of the modernization point. When the statute was enacted the “wire” was a telephone or telegraph line, and a scheme might turn on a single call. As commerce moved to fax, then to e-mail, electronic-signature platforms, server downloads, and electronic funds transfers, a single scheme can throw off many discrete transmissions where an earlier one threw off a few — a template pulled from a server, each signing-platform envelope, each interbank confirmation. The arithmetic of the counts rises with the speed and number of the connections.

Section 1344 reaches a knowing scheme to defraud a financial institution, or to obtain its funds — or funds in its custody or control — by false or fraudulent pretenses. The Supreme Court has held that § 1344(2) does not require an intent to defraud the bank itself (Loughrin), and that a scheme aimed at a bank customer’s deposits defrauds the bank, which holds a property interest in those funds (Shaw). The unit of prosecution is each execution of the scheme.

This part also supplies the bridge the bank instruments build. Where a § 1343 wire-fraud scheme affects a financial institution, the statutory ceiling on § 1343 itself rises from twenty years to thirty, with a fine to one million dollars. The cashier’s checks and the interbank wires on this record are precisely the instruments that would carry that enhancement.

The mail-fraud statute is the twin of § 1343 and is read identically; the difference is only the channel. The certified cure tender and the move-out packet traveled by United States mail. The same four elements apply, with a mailing that is a step in furtherance of the scheme. The ceiling is twenty years, rising to thirty where the offense affects a financial institution.

On the documented record, the questions are whether each of the following electronic acts is a use of the wires for purposes of § 1343, and whether together they execute a single scheme:

1. The download of the Move-Out Clearance Report template from counsel’s server;
2. The DocuSign and Authentisign envelope transmissions by which the Three-Day Notice and the move-out instrument were authored and circulated;
3. The interbank wire of June 28, 2024, of $5,350 to a personal account, memo “Unknown Contract”; and
4. The collection of the two-payee cashier’s check across bank systems on the indorsement of neither named payee.

Each, if in furtherance of a scheme and interstate in transit, presents a discrete § 1343 question; the bank instruments additionally present the § 1344 question; the mailed instruments present the § 1341 question. These are questions on a documentary record. No finding has been made.

For each actor on the documented record, the map states the conduct presented as a question, the provision it implicates, and the body to which it is referred. Exposure is calibrated honestly: it is marked strong only where the documented transmissions and instruments support it, and stated as a supervisory or state question where they do not. Every actor is presumed innocent. No finding has been made.