U.S. v. Hughes

Decision Date25 August 1983
Docket NumberNo. 82-5082,82-5082
PartiesUNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Daniel B. HUGHES, a/k/a "Sonny", Appellant.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

Gene W. Gardner, Huntington, W.Va. (Lafe C. Chafin, Barrett, Chafin, Lowry & Hampton, Huntington, W.Va., on brief), for appellant.

S. Benjamin Bryant, Asst. U.S. Atty., Huntington, W.Va. (David A. Faber, U.S. Atty., Charleston, W.Va., on brief), for appellee.

Before WIDENER and MURNAGHAN, Circuit Judges, and GORDON *, Senior District Judge.

GORDON, Senior District Judge:

Daniel B. Hughes was convicted in the United States District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia on a jury verdict that he was guilty of kidnapping Penny Lynn Childers, in violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1201(a). On this appeal Hughes contends that his conduct did not amount to a violation of the federal kidnapping statute, and that the trial court should not have permitted Childers' in-court identification of Hughes as her assailant. Finding no error, we affirm.

I.

The evidence at trial established that in the early evening of Sunday, July 27, 1980, thirteen year old Penny Childers was riding her bicycle on a street near her home in downtown Huntington, West Virginia. As she cut across a service station parking lot, someone in a pickup truck that was stopped at a nearby intersection blew the horn at her. The driver then turned his vehicle around and followed as she sped up and turned down an alley that led to her home. She stopped as he pulled up beside her and identified himself as "Sammy Hughes." 1

The two talked in the alley approximately ten to twenty minutes, Childers sitting on her bike and Hughes, whom Childers had not previously met, sitting in the drivers seat of his truck. Their conversation principally concerned a girlfriend of Childers, Marsha Nelson, 2 who lived in nearby Burlington, Ohio, and perhaps her brother, Harry Nelson. Hughes "acted like" he knew Marsha. 3 Hughes then agreed to drive Childers across the Ohio River to Burlington to visit Marsha, and after Hughes helped put her bicycle into the back of the pickup, she entered the cab.

Further, the trial testimony established that Hughes drove around downtown Huntington for ten or fifteen minutes, and then he crossed a bridge into Chesapeake, Ohio. At the first turnoff outside Chesapeake toward Burlington, he turned off the highway onto Tallow Creek Road, which led to a small cemetery. 4 When Childers asked why they had left the main road, Hughes said that he had to meet a friend. He parked the truck near the cemetery, and after sitting quietly for a minute or so he beat Childers savagely.

II.

The initial issue is whether Hughes need have formed his intent to kidnap Childers prior to crossing the state line. 5 If the statute requires nothing more than that the kidnapping be completed sometime during or soon after a journey involving interstate transportation of the eventual victim, then the evidence is indisputably sufficient to support a jury determination that Hughes intentionally seized, confined, and beat Childers against her will as an adjunct of the journey from West Virginia to Ohio.

If, on the other hand, the offense must be complete prior to the state line crossing, then we must also decide whether the facts of this case will support a reasonable inference that Hughes inveigled Childers into crossing into Ohio for the purpose of assaulting her. We believe that the kidnapping must occur prior to the interstate transportation.

A.

Appellee's argument that the statute requires only a loose connection between the confinement and the line crossing rests upon the proposition that the 1972 amendments to 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1201(a), Pub.L. 92-539, changed the previous federal law that plainly required a confinement against the will of the victim prior to the interstate transportation. 6

The legislative history of this amendment indicates that the purpose of the change was to expand the jurisdictional base of the statute. See United States v. Lewis, 662 F.2d 1087 (4th Cir.1981). The Senate Judiciary Committee report noted that:

In lieu of the sole jurisdictional base of transportation in interstate or foreign commerce jurisdiction to punish kidnapping is provided when (1) the victim is transported in interstate or foreign commerce (as under existing law ) (2) the kidnapping occurs within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States; or (4) the victim is a foreign official within the purview of section 116 of title 18.

1972 U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 4316, 4326. (emphasis supplied). The Senate report also explained that the amendment was intended "to clearly differentiate the question of what is criminal from the question of what criminal behavior falls within federal jurisdiction...." Id. at 4318.

Thus, although the offense of kidnapping is complete by the unwilling confinement, by any of the enumerated means, of an individual who is held for ransom, reward, or otherwise, federal jurisdiction over that offense attaches only upon an "interstate transporting of the kidnapped person." Id. The legislative history is clear that the 1972 amendments, in expanding jurisdiction, did not alter the established requirement that the criminal activity precede the interstate movement.

In addition, an expansive interpretation of the amendment is inconsistent with federal policy. The amendment was designed merely to provide concurrent federal jurisdiction over "those acts committed against public and foreign officials which interfere with [the] conduct of [national] domestic and foreign affairs," with primary responsibility for the investigation, prosecution, and punishment of kidnapping remaining in the several states. 1972 U.S.Code Cong. & Ad.News at 4323. Specifically, the amendment was intended to remedy defects in the traditional interstate transportation jurisdiction as applied to international terrorism or hijacking situations. Id. at 4322-23.

This express federal policy is not furthered, however, by permitting federal jurisdiction over a wholly intrastate kidnapping simply because during some relevant time period prior to the kidnapping the eventual offender and his victim crossed a state line. Such a situation involves no attempt to escape the jurisdiction in which the offense occurred, and, therefore, it provides no reason for departing from the long established framework of federalism that allocates to the states the primary responsibility for prosecuting kidnapping violations.

The Fifth Circuit has reached this conclusion in United States v. McInnis, 601 F.2d 1319 (5th Cir.1979). That case involved a scheme by the defendants to decoy the victim into voluntarily transporting himself into Mexico, where he would then be abducted. After analyzing the legislative history of the 1972 amendments, the court concluded that the alteration had merely expanded the federal jurisdictional base and had not changed the definition of the federal offense. 601 F.2d at 1325.

Nevertheless, the Court reversed the defendants' convictions on kidnap conspiracy charges on the ground that the "plan did not encompass taking or holding [the victim] against his will and then transporting him in foreign commerce." 601 F.2d at 1325. The Court found that defendants had intended no unlawful interference with the victim's actions prior to his arrival in Mexico, and without some unlawful exercise of control over the victim prior to the interstate transportation, no jurisdiction existed under 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1201(a). 601 F.2d at 1326.

Although that situation is factually distinguishable from the instant case, since the victim in McInnis transported himself into Mexico, rather than the defendants transporting him, the Court extended its holding in that case to include all situations involving an "entirely voluntary act of a victim in crossing a state line even though it is induced by deception." 601 F.2d at 1327; see United States v. McRary, 665 F.2d 674 (5th Cir.1982) (no foreign commerce jurisdiction when kidnapping not manifest until after three-mile limit crossed). We believe that the better position is that of the Eighth Circuit, which has held that a kidnapping victim who accepted a ride from someone who misled her into believing that she would be taken to her desired destination was "inveigled" or "decoyed" within the meaning of the federal kidnapping statute. United States v. Hoog, 504 F.2d 45, 51 (8th Cir.1974); Davidson v. United States, 312 F.2d 163, 166 (8th Cir.1963).

Just as we have failed to find a difference on policy grounds between a purely local kidnapping and one preceded by an otherwise innocent state line crossing, we likewise are unable to distinguish between a case in which the victim knows her captor's intentions from the start and one in which her status becomes manifest only once the crucial border is traversed. The policy justification for the original federal kidnapping statute was to provide federal officials the "power to disregard [state] barriers in pursuing" kidnappers who planned their activities to take the best possible advantage of the limited authority and coordination of state law enforcement agencies. Chatwin v. United States, 326 U.S. 455, 463, 66 S.Ct. 233, 237, 90 L.Ed. 198 (1946).

Nothing in this policy, however, justifies rewarding the kidnapper simply because he is ingenious enough to conceal his true motive from his victim until he is able to transport her into another jurisdiction. The barrier to effective state pursuit is as great in the former situation as it is in the latter.

While it is true that the Court in Chatwin warned against applying the federal kidnapping statute to "general transgressions of morality involving the crossing of state lines" and that lacked the "involuntariness of seizure and detention which is the very essence of ... kidnapping," 326 U.S. at 464, 66 S.Ct. at 237; that case ...

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