BALTIMORE — Federal prosecutors say an appeals court should uphold Marilyn Mosby’s convictions, arguing a jury rightfully heard that the former Baltimore state’s attorney used money she got by lying about suffering coronavirus hardships to buy real estate in Florida.

Mosby, 44, appealed her perjury and mortgage fraud convictions in August, asking the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to find that various legal flaws in her two trials voided the results.

Prosecutors responded with a 90-page legal brief Friday, arguing that there weren’t legal problems in the trials and that, if there were, they had no impact on the juries’ decisions.

Indicted in January 2022 on two counts each of perjury and mortgage fraud, Mosby successfully argued to have her case split into two trials: one for the perjury charges and the other for mortgage fraud. She also convinced U.S. District Judge Lydia Kay Griggsby to move her cases to Greenbelt, citing extensive pretrial publicity about her prosecution in the Baltimore area.

A jury in November 2023 found her guilty of both counts of perjury, determining she lied about suffering money trouble because of the coronavirus pandemic, allowing her to make two early withdrawals from her city retirement fund worth a combined $80,000.

On appeal, Mosby took issue with prosecutors presenting evidence of her using the windfall on down payments for a pair of properties in Florida worth nearly $1 million: An eight-bedroom house near Disney World, and a condo on the state’s Gulf Coast. Her attorneys argued those transactions were irrelevant to whether she suffered financial hardship.

Prosecutors disagreed.

“Imagine striking up a conversation (back in 2020) with a person in the grocery store who tells you that he has suffered adverse financial consequences from COVID-19 because he operates a business that has reduced its hours because of the quarantine,” prosecutors wrote in Friday’s filing. “You feel bad for him and give him $100. If you then saw him use most or all of the $100 to buy lottery tickets or caviar, it would justifiably make you wonder whether he told you the truth.”

Mosby also targeted Congress’s language in its first COVID-19 relief package, the federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act. The bill said someone could take money from their retirement savings early if they suffered “adverse financial consequences” because of the pandemic. Mosby argued that language is too vague to support a conviction.

When Mosby checked the boxes saying she suffered financial hardship, prosecutors said, she swore she had experienced trouble because of being quarantined, furloughed or laid off; having reduced work hours; not being able to work because of a lack of child care; and owning or operating a business that closed or experienced reduced hours.

At trial, Mosby’s defense focused on a travel business she planned to operate, arguing the pandemic prevented her from getting the company off the ground. But prosecutors presented evidence showing the business was inoperable and had not taken in a single dollar.

As such, the government said, none of the criteria Congress outlined applied to Mosby, whose salary as state’s attorney increased from 2019 to 2020.

“When terms ‘are undefined, we give them their ordinary meaning,’” prosecutors wrote in Friday’s filing, citing a previous opinion by the Fourth Circuit.

Prosecutors also accused Mosby of lying on mortgage applications for the properties she bought in Florida. The jury that heard that case in February absolved Mosby of all but one alleged lie.

Short about $5,000 to close on the condo in Longboat Key, and at risk of losing a lower interest rate she’d secured, Mosby’s mortgage broker suggested she find someone to pledge to give her that amount of money at closing. Mosby had her ex-husband, Baltimore City Council President Nick Mosby, write a letter saying he would give her a gift of $5,000 at closing.

There was just one problem: Nick Mosby didn’t have $5,000 to give her. After she received her next paycheck, Marilyn transferred $5,000 to Nick. Nick transferred the money from his checking account to his savings account and back again. Then he wired it to Marilyn.

An FBI accountant testified it was the only time Marilyn Mosby transferred money to her husband in the five years the couple’s financial records were reviewed.

Rendering a split verdict, the jury convicted Mosby of one count of mortgage fraud.

Unlike her first trial, Mosby testified at her mortgage fraud trial. When her attorney asked Mosby why she took the witness stand, Mosby responded, “Because I regret not testifying before, and I want this jury to hear my truth.”

Prosecutors argued that Mosby’s answer opened the door for them to question her about the details underlying her perjury convictions because her response implied those guilty verdicts were deficient because she didn’t testify. Griggsby agreed and, eventually, Mosby’s lawyers and prosecutors settled on a limited series of questions prosecutors could ask.

Mosby argued in her appeal that prosecutors shouldn’t have been able to question her about any of the facts of the perjury case.

Prosecutors argued in their brief Friday their questions were irrelevant to the jury’s eventual verdict.

“It was undisputed that Nick Mosby did not gift her $5,000. As the government observed in our closing, ‘Returning Ms. Mosby’s money is not a gift,’” prosecutors wrote.

Mosby also said prosecutors failed to prove she submitted the gift letter from Maryland, meaning that she may have been tried in the wrong jurisdiction. She argued the appeals court should thus throw out her convictions.

But at trial, prosecutors presented evidence of Mosby’s financial transactions around the time she submitted the gift letter, in early February 2021. They doubled down on that evidence in Friday’s filing.

“It would have been unreasonable,” prosecutors wrote, “for any juror to infer that a Baltimore elected official who lived, worked, and spent most of her time in Baltimore and who did not make any in-person purchases outside of Maryland for months had nonetheless decided to leave Maryland to transmit the gift letter that she had turned around in 24 hours.”

After the mortgage fraud conviction, Griggsby sided with prosecutors’ request to order Mosby to forfeit 90% of her Florida condo — or the proportion of the condo she paid for with a mortgage a jury found she obtained by fraud.

The appeals court ruled Mosby didn’t have to forfeit her condo while it considers her case.

Mosby argued to the appeals court that she could have obtained a different mortgage, so she shouldn’t have to give up the property.

Prosecutors offered a hypothetical scenario to explain why they believed the appeals court should reject Mosby’s argument.

“Take another example: A college student earns $3,600 by delivering illegal drugs; because he could have earned the same amount from a legal job, is he saved from forfeiting the money he earned? Of course not. That money is ‘clearly’ subject to forfeiture as ‘property he “obtained . . . as the result of” the crime,’” prosecutors wrote, citing another Fourth Circuit opinion.

Mosby may reply to the prosecutors’ brief before oral arguments, which are scheduled for Jan. 25.

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