{"id":7041,"date":"2009-09-12T16:37:57","date_gmt":"2009-09-12T21:37:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=7041"},"modified":"2009-09-12T16:41:32","modified_gmt":"2009-09-12T21:41:32","slug":"seventh-circuit-criminal-case-of-the-week-carrying-unloaded-gun-during-bank-robbery-puts-tellers-life-in-jeopardy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2009\/09\/seventh-circuit-criminal-case-of-the-week-carrying-unloaded-gun-during-bank-robbery-puts-tellers-life-in-jeopardy\/","title":{"rendered":"Seventh Circuit Criminal Case of the Week: Carrying Unloaded Gun During Bank Robbery Puts Teller’s Life in Jeopardy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"seventhSimple bank robbery carries a maximum sentence of twenty years, but armed bank robbery has an enhanced maximum of twenty-five.\u00a0 Should\u00a0a robbery\u00a0be considered armed, though,\u00a0when the robber carries an unloaded<\/em> weapon?\u00a0<\/p>\n

It turns out that the armed bank robbery statute, 18 U.S.C. \u00a7 2113(d),\u00a0can be satisfied in either of two different ways.\u00a0 First, a\u00a0robber qualifies for increased punishment\u00a0by committing an assault.\u00a0 As the Seventh Circuit indicated\u00a0many years ago\u00a0in United States v. Smith,<\/em>\u00a0103 F.3d 600 (7th Cir. 1996), the assault\u00a0prong of the statute is satisfied when a teller has a reasonable fear of imminent bodily injury.\u00a0 Brandishing a gun — loaded or unloaded — seems almost certain to create such a fear.<\/p>\n

The second prong, though, raises a closer question.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Under this prong, a robbery qualifies as armed if the robber “puts in jeopardy the life of any person by the use of a dangerous weapon or device.”\u00a0 This prong turns, not on the teller’s belief <\/em>that his or her life is in jeopardy, but on the objective reality of the danger.\u00a0 And the danger is surely far less when a robber carries an unloaded than a loaded weapon.<\/p>\n

Because of the availability\u00a0of the assault prong, it would seem to be\u00a0academic whether carrying an unloaded weapon triggers the in-jeopardy prong.\u00a0 But, for reasons not\u00a0clear to me, prosecutors\u00a0in\u00a0United States v. Simmons<\/a> <\/em>(No. 08-2207) charged the defendant bank robber only under the in-jeopardy prong.\u00a0 His conviction and subsequent appeal thus presented the Seventh Circuit with an opportunity to address whether carrying an unloaded weapon puts a teller’s life\u00a0in jeopardy.\u00a0 The First and Ninth Circuits had previously answered in the affirmative a closely related question (whether carrying a fake gun puts a life in jeopardy).<\/p>\n

The Seventh Circuit (per Judge Tinder) reached the same conclusion.\u00a0 Although the unloaded weapon was obviously of little direct threat to anyone, jeopardy was nonetheless established by the “potential violent reaction of the victim or law enforcement” to the apparent (but not actual) threat posed by the weapon.<\/p>\n

I find it hard to quarrel with the result, but the case does illustrate a “missing category” problem in the bank robbery statute.\u00a0 Although it is more dangerous (and thus more blameworthy and\u00a0more suitable\u00a0for enhanced punishment) for a robber to carry an unloaded gun than it is for a robber to leave his gun at home, it also surely more dangerous for a robber to carry a loaded than an unloaded gun.\u00a0 An important distinction in offense severity seems lost without an intermediate offense category for carrying an unloaded (or fake)\u00a0weapon.\u00a0 Fortunately, a sentencing judge may exercise his or her discretion to make the appropriate distinctions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Simple bank robbery carries a maximum sentence of twenty years, but armed bank robbery has an enhanced maximum of twenty-five.\u00a0 Should\u00a0a robbery\u00a0be considered armed, though,\u00a0when the robber carries an unloaded weapon?\u00a0 It turns out that the armed bank robbery statute, 18 U.S.C. \u00a7 2113(d),\u00a0can be satisfied in either of two different ways.\u00a0 First, a\u00a0robber qualifies […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,28,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-criminal-justice","category-criminal-law-process","category-seventh-circuit","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7041\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}