Carter v. United States - 530 U.S. 255, 120 S. Ct. 2159 (2000)

Rule:

Fed. R. Crim. P. 31(c)'s provision, that the defendant may be found guilty of an offense necessarily included in the offense charged, requires application of an elements test, under which one offense is not necessarily included in another unless the elements of the lesser offense are a subset of the elements of the charged offense. The elements test requires a textual comparison of criminal statutes, an approach that lends itself to certain and predictable outcomes.

Facts:

Petitioner Floyd J. Carter was indicted by a federal grand jury and was charged with violating 18 USCS 2113(a), which punished whoever, by force and violence, or by intimidation, took from the person or presence of another anything of value which belonged to, or was in the possession of, any bank. Petitioner did not contest the alleged facts of the episode, but pleaded not guilty in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, on the theory that he had not taken the bank's money by force and violence or by intimidation. The petitioner moved, under Rule 31(c) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, that the District Court instruct the jury on the offense described by 18 USCS 2113(b)--which punished, among other matters, whoever took and carried away, with intent to steal or purloin, anything of value exceeding 1,000 which belonged to, or was in the possession of, any bank--as a lesser included offense of the offense described by 2113(a). The District Court denied the motion in a preliminary ruling. At the close of the prosecution's case, the petitioner moved for a judgment of acquittal. The District Court denied the petitioner’s motion and indicated that the preliminary ruling which had denied the lesser-included-offense instruction would stand. The jury (1) was instructed on the offense described in 2113(a) alone, and (2) returned a guilty verdict. The District Court entered judgment pursuant to the jury's guilty verdict. The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed the judgment of the District Court. A writ of certiorari was granted. 

Issue:

Did the district court err in failing to instruct the jury on the offense described by 18 USCS 2113(b) as a lesser-included offense of the offense described by 2113(a)? 

Answer:

No.

Conclusion:

The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeals, holding that the offense described in 2113(b) was not a lesser included offense of the offense described 2113(a)--and therefore, the accused was prohibited as a matter of law from obtaining a lesser-included-offense instruction on the offense described by 2113(b)--as, among other matters, a textual comparison of the elements of the offenses described in 2113(a) and 2113(b) suggested that 2113(b) required three elements--(a) specific intent to steal, (b) asportation, and (c) valuation exceeding 1,000--which were not required by 2113(a). Moreover, the Court held that normal principles of statutory construction did not counsel a departure from what was indicated by a straightforward reading of the statutory text.