The question presented by this case calls for interpretation of the Federal Bank Robbery Act. 18 U. S. C. § 2113.
Petitioner entered the Malone State Bank, in Malone, Texas, through an open door and during regular banking hours. He asked for and received certain directions. Thereupon he displayed a revolver, intimidating a bank employee and putting his life in jeopardy, and thus consummated a robbery. A grand jury returned a two-count indictment against him. The first charged the robbery offense; the second, entering the bank with the intent to commit a felony. Petitioner was convicted on both counts, and the district judge sentenced him to 20 years for robbery and 15 years for entering. The sentences were directed to be served consecutively. Some years thereafter, petitioner filed a "Motion to Vacate or Correct Illegal Sentence." The District Court, treating it as a proceeding under Rule 35 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, denied relief without conducting a hearing. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed. 230 F.2d 568.
Whether the crime of entering a bank with intent to commit a robbery is merged with the crime of robbery when the latter is consummated has puzzled the courts for several years. A conflict has arisen between the circuits.
The original Bank Robbery Act was passed in 1934. It covered only robbery, robbery accompanied by an aggravated assault, and homicide perpetrated in committing a robbery or escaping thereafter. In 1937 the Attorney General requested that the Act be amended. In his letter proposing the bill, the Attorney General declared that
The Act was amended accordingly to add other crimes less serious than robbery. Two larceny provisions were enacted: one for thefts of property exceeding $50, the other for lesser amounts. Congress further made it a crime to
Robbery, entering and larceny were all placed in one paragraph of the 1937 Act.
Congress provided for maximum penalties of either a prison term or a fine or both for each of these offenses. Robbery remained punishable by 20 years and $5,000. The larceny penalties were set according to the degree of the offense. Simple larceny could result in 1 year in jail and $1,000 fine, while the maximum for the more serious theft was set at 10 years and $5,000. No separate
The Government asks us to interpret this statute as amended to make each a completely independent offense. It is unnecessary to do so in order to vindicate the apparent purpose of the amendment. The only factor stressed by the Attorney General in his letter to Congress was the possibility that a thief might not commit all the elements of the crime of robbery. It was manifestly the purpose of Congress to establish lesser offenses. But in doing so there was no indication that Congress intended also to pyramid the penalties.
The Attorney General cited the situation of larceny to illustrate his position. It is highly unlikely that he would have wanted to have the offender given 10 years for the larceny plus 20 years for entering the bank with intent to steal. There is no reason to suppose that he wished to have the maximum penalty for robbery doubled by the imposition of 20 years for the robbery to which could be added 20 years for entering the bank.
It is a fair inference from the wording in the Act, uncontradicted by anything in the meager legislative history, that the unlawful entry provision was inserted to cover the situation where a person enters a bank for the purpose of committing a crime, but is frustrated for some reason before completing the crime. The gravamen of the offense is not in the act of entering, which satisfies the terms of the statute even if it is simply walking through an open, public door during normal business hours.
While reasonable minds might differ on this conclusion, we think it is consistent with our policy of not attributing to Congress, in the enactment of criminal statutes, an intention to punish more severely than the language of its laws clearly imports in the light of pertinent legislative history.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed and the case is remanded to the District Court for the purpose of resentencing the petitioner in accordance with this opinion.
Reversed and remanded.
MR. JUSTICE BURTON dissents for the reasons stated in the opinion of the Court of Appeals, 230 F.2d 568.
MR. JUSTICE BLACK took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
FootNotes
"Whoever enters or attempts to enter any bank, or any savings and loan association, or any building used in whole or in part as a bank, or as a savings and loan association, with intent to commit in such bank, or in such savings and loan association, or building, or part thereof, so used, any felony affecting such bank or such savings and loan association and in violation of any statute of the United States, or any larceny—
"Shall be fined not more than $5,000 or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.
"(b) Whoever takes and carries away, with intent to steal or purloin, any property or money or any other thing of value exceeding $100 belonging to, or in the care, custody, control, management, or possession of any bank, or any savings and loan association, shall be fined not more than $5,000 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; or
"Whoever takes and carries away, with intent to steal or purloin, any property or money or any other thing of value not exceeding $100 belonging to, or in the care, custody, control, management, or possession of any bank, or any savings and loan association, shall be fined not more than $1,000 or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.
.....
"(d) Whoever, in committing, or in attempting to commit, any offense defined in subsections (a) and (b) of this section, assaults any person, or puts in jeopardy the life of any person by the use of a dangerous weapon or device, shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than twenty-five years, or both."
Contrary to the Fifth and Tenth Circuits are determinations of the Sixth Circuit in Simunov v. United States, 162 F.2d 314, and a District Court in Wells v. Swope, supra. To the same effect are dicta in Ninth Circuit cases. Madigan v. Wells, supra, at 578; Barkdoll v. United States, 147 F.2d 617.
"Whoever forcibly breaks into or attempts to break into any post office, or any building used in whole or in part as a post office, with intent to commit in such post office, or building, or part thereof, so used, any larceny or other depredation, shall be fined . . . ." (Italics supplied.)
This section was held to create an offense separate from a completed post-office theft. Morgan v. Devine, 237 U.S. 632.
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