U.S. v. Carlisle, 96-3475

• Citation: 118 F.3d 1271
• Decision Date: 09 July 1997
• Docket Number: No. 96-3475,96-3475
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Elbert Emmanuel CARLISLE, Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Page 1271

118 F.3d 1271

UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Elbert Emmanuel CARLISLE, Appellant.

No. 96-3475.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted May 21, 1997.

Decided July 9, 1997.

Virginia G. Villa, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Minneapolis, MN, argued (Andrew H. Mohring, on the brief), for appellant.

D. Gerald Wilhelm, Assistant U.S. Attorney, Minneapolis, MN, argued, for appellee.

Before BOWMAN, WOLLMAN, and MORRIS SHEPPARD ARNOLD, Circuit Judges.

WOLLMAN, Circuit Judge.

Elbert Carlisle appeals from the judgment entered by the district court ¹ following Carlisle's conviction of attempted robbery of a federally insured bank, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a). We affirm.

Carlisle met Kristina Gildseth at a bar in downtown Minneapolis in November of 1995. Carlisle learned that Gildseth was in need of money, and he intimated that he might be able to offer her a position cleaning his house. Gildseth began cleaning Carlisle's residence and shortly thereafter the two developed an intimate relationship.

Carlisle raised the subject of a bank robbery to Gildseth in early January of 1996. On January 10 or 11, Gildseth accompanied Carlisle as he drove to a First Bank branch in Minneapolis (First Bank). Carlisle informed Gildseth that it was the bank he wanted to "nail." According to Gildseth, Carlisle watched First Bank to "see people come and go" and described how he wanted the robbery to take place. Gildseth testified that this conversation was one of "many conversations concerning the bank robbery." The plan was that Gildseth would be the driver and would meet Carlisle at a Minneapolis cafe. From there she would drive Carlisle to the Minneapolis Greyhound bus station, where he would change clothes. The two would then proceed to First Bank.

Carlisle had Gildseth purchase a length of pipe, which he then used to construct a fake bomb. Three days before Carlisle's arrest, Carlisle dictated, and Gildseth printed, a demand note:

This is a robbery for $50,000. I have a bomb that will take out this bank and 1/2 the block by remote control. I can hear Police calls on my radio, so No silent alarms and No dye money.

On January 16, Carlisle informed Gildseth that he wanted to rob First Bank the following day. That evening, Gildseth informed the Minneapolis Police, and subsequently the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), of Carlisle's plan.

Minneapolis police officers and FBI agents went to the designated cafe the morning of January 17. Carlisle entered the cafe at approximately 8:00 a.m. and proceeded to drink coffee, a police scanner on the table beside him. When Gildseth failed to arrive, Carlisle called her, leaving a message on her answering machine that he was waiting for her. Carlisle left the cafe at approximately 10:15 a.m. and was arrested as he entered his car. Carlisle was wearing eleven layers of clothing at the time.

A search of Carlisle's vehicle revealed a knapsack in the trunk containing a hunting knife, a dark blue ski mask, sunglasses, several bank deposit envelopes, a fake bomb, a remote control device, and the demand note. Investigators recovered the police scanner and a manual for the scanner, a book of radio frequencies, and a gym bag containing a toy gun from the back seat of the car. The credit card used to purchase the scanner, and the receipt for the scanner showing that it had been purchased approximately a week earlier, were also found in the car.

At trial, Carlisle contended that it was Gildseth, not he, who was interested in performing a robbery and that she had urged him to rob the bank and had helped plan the robbery. Carlisle claimed that his involvement was merely a "charade" to enable him to continue his relationship with Gildseth. Apparently unpersuaded by this account of events, the jury convicted Carlisle, and he was sentenced to 210 months' imprisonment.

Carlisle contends that the district court erred in denying his motion for judgment of acquittal, arguing that the evidence was insufficient to establish that he took a substantial step in furtherance of the robbery or to establish that the bank was insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). In reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence, we view the evidence in the light most favorable to the government and give the government the benefit of all reasonable inferences. See United States v. Bordeaux, 84 F.3d 1544, 1547 (8th Cir.1996). We will overturn the jury's verdict "only if a reasonable jury must have had a reasonable doubt" that the elements of the crime were established. Id.

To support the conviction of attempted robbery, the evidence must prove both that Carlisle intended to engage in criminal activity and that his conduct amounted to a "substantial step" towards the commission of the crime "which strongly corroborates the actor's criminal intent." United States v. Crawford, 837 F.2d 339, 340 (8th Cir.1988) (per curiam). A substantial step is conduct such that if it had not been extraneously interrupted would have resulted in a crime. See id.

In Crawford, the defendant recruited an accomplice to provide a getaway car, coveralls, ski masks, gloves, and a weapon, and he and the accomplice cased the target bank. 837 F.2d at 339. He also instructed the accomplice to leave in a church parking lot a car which the defendant could use to drive to the bank. Id. The defendant was arrested when he arrived at the church parking lot and started the car that had been left by the accomplice-turned-informant. Id. We found that this conduct was "directly aimed at the commission of a bank robbery" and strongly corroborated the defendant's intent, and that the robbery was interrupted only because of...