Source: http://www.ecases.us/case/ca5/c240891/will-parks-clay-v-united-states
Timestamp: 2020-02-28 03:08:30
Document Index: 384993586

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 2707', '§ 471', '§ 3285', '§ 4401', '§ 3285', '§ 2707', '§ 1301', '§ 3321', '§ 545', '§ 781', '§ 3116', '§ 7302', '§ 21', '§ 2235', '§ 1']

Will Parks Clay v. United States, Fifth Circuit, US Court of Appeals Cases, Federal Courts, COURT CASE
Whether the supposed crime was of misdemeanor or felony grade, cf. Mosely v. United States, 5 Cir., 207 F.2d 908, certiorari denied 347 U.S. 933, 74 S. Ct. 626, 98 L. Ed. 1084; Contreras v. United States, 5 Cir., 213 F.2d 96; Clay v. United States, 5 Cir., 218 F.2d 483; Reynolds v. United States, 5 Cir., 225 F.2d 123, certiorari denied 350 U.S. 914, 76 S. Ct. 197, 100 L. Ed. 801, it was one involving merely the failure to pay an occupation and excise tax2 as a gambler and the possible carrying on of that business before registering and paying the stamp tax. United States v. Kahriger, 345 U.S. 22, 73 S. Ct. 510, 97 L. Ed. 754; Lewis v. United States, 348 U.S. 419, 75 S. Ct. 415, 99 L. Ed. 475. The significant thing is that the taking, placing or handling of wagers or conducting a lottery is not a Federal crime unless registration and payment of taxes is not made. Transportation,3 as such, is not a crime. All of this is important since the mere act of a known gambler driving an automobile on a public highway will not justify an officer forcing him to stop to be searched or arrested for a suspected violation of the Federal Wagering Tax Act.
Nothing discernible to the senses taught reasonably that crime was then being done until the Agent saw, and demanded, the lottery booklet. But this was too late, for the strong arm of the law had peremptorily stopped this traveler and placed him under evident, immediate command of Government officers. Clay was not only permitted to submit to this demonstrated show of force, but maintenance of law and order, avoidance of outright physical challenge of the authority of a policeman, a decent respect for the settlement of such controversies by orderly judicial processes, all justified Clay's acquiescence in their commands and requests, United States v. Di Re, 332 U.S. 581, 594, 68 S. Ct. 222, 92 L. Ed. 210, 220; United States v. Rembert, D.C.S.D.Tex., 284 F. 996. A citizen was forceably run down and driven off the highway. If officers have the right to interfere with that essential pursuit of a nation of automobilists, it must be based on what is known or reasonably believed before the commandeering starts. To allow justification to rest on discovery after intrusion would permit "the Government * * * to justify the arrest by the search and at the same time to justify the search by the arrest," Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 16, 68 S. Ct. 367, 370, 92 L. Ed. 436, 442. United States v. Frisch, 5 Cir., 140 F.2d 660, 662.
Was the knowledge of prior events7 sufficient to make an apparently innocuous use of a free highway, Emite v. United States, supra, a telltale of a past or current crime? The inquiry eliminates the question of misdemeanor since, for the misdemeanor to have been committed in the presence of the officer, it is necessary that "the officer has evidence by his senses sufficient to induce a belief in him * * *," United States v. Rembert, supra [284 F. 1006]; McBride v. United States, 5 Cir., 284 F. 416, certiorari denied 261 U.S. 614, 43 S. Ct. 359, 67 L. Ed. 827, and what they could see or sense was the movement of a car on a highway.
The first is of extreme importance for if an officer does not in fact at the moment entertain a genuine good faith belief of this fact (or legal conclusion), then the action taken is itself unlawful because lacking in the indispensable ingredient which excused the issuance of a warrant by a magistrate. Johnson v. United States, supra; United States v. Jeffers, 342 U.S. 48, 72 S. Ct. 93, 96 L. Ed. 59. All that protects the citizen from unwarranted intrusion is the expectation that an officer, zealous and energetic as he may be, will nonetheless feel restrained by law and act only where his belief is genuine and in good faith. If he may act without it, liberty is exposed to the peril of a police state in which high-handed acts of the policemen consciously undertaken in indifference to law, may yet turn out to be justified by the leisurely post-event inquiry and investigation made, not by the officer, but by Government lawyers defending his acts.
If that is so, then all of the acts of these officers indicated that they did not entertain a belief that a felony had been committed. First, nothing they saw that day, gave them the right to draw an inference not held the day before. Despite the long and careful surveillance, the plan for the trap of January 28 was evidently thought to be essential to them in the making of a successful case. Running Clay off the highway, peremptorily ordering him about, subjecting his automobile to a "voluntary" search was in no way precipitated because of flight, hot pursuit, or the likely loss of evidence. Indeed, if the knowledge of prior events justified inferences of likely violation of the Wagering Tax Act, the pattern of Clay's actions demonstrated that near 2:00 o'clock each day, he would make this trip toward Hester's store and shortly return to Macon. Nothing about Clay's conduct on January 28 or evidence gleaned from other sources, confidential or otherwise, afforded any basis for believing that this was the last and only chance to catch him. The trap was, therefore, presumably set to obtain8 evidence, the absence of which made their case and belief incomplete. Nothing new having come from the event of January 28 except the fruits of the forceable search, the failure to apprehend this well-known, dissolute, small-time gambler at his known residences undermines any possible claim that at that time they concluded that he had committed a felony. And this was corroborated beyond all doubt by the contemporaneous Complaint filed before the Commissioner (see note 6, supra). At most, it charged only a misdemeanor since an allegation that the accused failed to register and failed to purchase an occupational tax stamp is completely lacking in the essential allegation of the commission of affirmative acts, as distinguished from a mere negative omission, in the establishment of a scheme having as its purposeful objective the deliberate and intentional evasion of the taxing act, Spies v. United States, 317 U.S. 492, 63 S. Ct. 364, 87 L. Ed. 418; Clay v. United States, supra; Contreras v. United States, supra; Mosely v. United States, supra; cf. Reynolds v. United States, supra.
As our decisions indicate, drawing the line between § 2707(b) and 2707(c) is difficult at best. To change the very act which is a misdemeanor into a felony requires a charge and proof of facts which "`lifts the offense to the degree of felony.' Spies v. United States * * *," and "* * * some affirmative act on the part of the defendant showing an attempt to evade the imposition of the tax * * *," and conduct, "* * * the likely effect of which would be to mislead or conceal * * *," Clay v. United States, supra [218 F.2d 485, 486]. And since, "The addition of mere legal conclusions, unaided by essential allegations of fact to support [this inference] will not supply this ingredient," Clay v. United States, supra, then the mere assertion10 now by the seizing officers of the legal conclusion that the circumstances known to them (note 7, supra) amounted to an attempt to evade is insufficient. To justify arrest for a felony, the officer must have grounds for believing the existence of facts of "* * * the knowledge and intent required as elements of the felony under the statute," United States v. Di Re, 332 U.S. 581, 592, 68 S. Ct. 222, 227, 92 L. Ed. 210, 219.
Finally, while the ease and practicability of obtaining the warrant of arrest or to search, Trupiano v. United States, 334 U.S. 699, 68 S. Ct. 1229, 92 L. Ed. 1663, is no longer an invariable rule of thumb, United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 70 S. Ct. 430, 94 L. Ed. 653, availability of the safeguards afforded by an impartial, judicial magistrate is a factor bearing on reasonable, probable cause. That the subject of the search is an automobile (or an occupant) does not let down the bars altogether, Shurman v. United States, 5 Cir., 219 F.2d 282, certiorari denied 349 U.S. 921, 75 S. Ct. 661, 99 L. Ed. 1253; Rent v. United States, 5 Cir., 209 F.2d 893, especially where the automobile is not the present means of flight, of likely destruction of evidence, or where the transportation11 itself is not a crime. Paradoxically, all of the information now claimed to have justified the conclusion that a crime had been committed demonstrated that Clay's actions followed an almost fixed, habitual pattern of time, place and movement. In that, the use of the automobile was purely incidental. And, viewed from the vantage of knowledge held either January 27 or the forenoon of January 28, there was nothing to indicate that procuring warrants of arrest or search would thwart, or impede the efficient enforcement of law, or intrude upon the "* * * judgment of the officers as to when to close the trap * * *," United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 65, 70 S. Ct. 430, 435, 94 L. Ed. 653, 660. Apparently the officers thought the time to close in was the afternoon of January 28. In planning the catch, they were confident that he would be at his usual spots. And, of course, he was. If the officers thought that it would be best to apprehend him on the highway to, rather than from, Hester's store, or on the road instead of at Hester's store or his Macon house or place of business, resort to a Commissioner would have required no alteration in their plan of attack. Compliance with and enforcement of laws intended to secure basic freedoms to the citizen is as much the duty of the officer, Miller v. United States, 5 Cir., 230 F.2d 486, as is the successful making and prosecution of cases under those Federal statutes committed to his agency.
Conviction for the alleged offense of July 8-9, 1953, involved in this case only indirectly as a claimed basis for the officers' belief (see note 7, infra) that Clay was engaged in the lottery business, was reversed by us, Clay v. United States, 5 Cir., 218 F.2d 483, (January 1955) long after the events of January 28, 1954, involved herein. However, submitted simultaneously below were motions to suppress the fruits of the January 28, 1954 seizure, as well as the earlier search and seizure of July 8, 1953, which the District Court held to have been unreasonable, following which the Information for the July 8 offense was dismissed
Chapter 27a — Wagering Taxes, § 471 (a), Act October 20, 1951, 26 U.S.C.A. §§ 3285 through 3298 (now recodified 26 U.S.C.A. §§ 4401 through 4423). Under § 3285 an excise tax of 10% is imposed on all wagers, which expressly includes lotteries. Section 3290 requires the payment of an annual $50.00 occupation tax for a person "who is liable for [the] tax * * * or who is engaged in receiving wagers for or on behalf of any person so liable." Section 3291 requires registration. Section 3292 expressly incorporates, amongst others, Section 3271 that "No person shall be engaged in or carry on any trade or business mentioned in this chapter until he has paid a special tax therefor in the manner provided in this chapter." Section 3294 covers penalties establishing a fine of $1,000.00 to $5,000.00 for persons liable for the tax who do not pay it and subsection (c), for willful violations, expressly incorporates 26 U.S.C.A. § 2707 (Firearms Tax Statute) with the following gradation of penalties:
Of course, carrying or transporting "ininterstate or foreign commerce any paper, certificate, or instrument purporting to be or to represent a ticket, chance, share, or interest in * * * a lottery * * *" is a specific offense, 18 U.S. C.A. § 1301. But the lottery here was a purely Georgia affair.
Numerous laws provide that where a Federal tax in respect of goods, or commodities, etc., has not been paid, the goods and other property may be subject to forfeiture: e. g., in 1939 Code 26 U.S.C.A. §§ 3321(b), 2803(f), 2806(c), 2806(f) (1), 3173, 3072, 2876, 3720(a), 3322, 3323(b), 3793(a) (2); 18 U.S.C.A. § 545; and, under 49 U.S.C.A. §§ 781, 782, transportation and carriage of contraband by vessel, vehicle, or aircraft subjects the vehicle to forfeiture; but "contraband" is statutorily defined to comprise only (1) narcotic drugs, (2) firearms subject to the National Firearms Act, (3) forged, altered, counterfeit coins or securities of the United States or foreign governments and paraphernalia for counterfeiting. Whether driving an automobile in some phase of the Numbers lottery business, cf. United States v. Lane Motor Company, 344 U.S. 630, 73 S. Ct. 459, 97 L. Ed. 622; United States v. One 1951 Cadillac, D.C.E.D.Mo., 125 F. Supp. 661, brings the vehicle under 26 U.S.C.A. § 3116 (1954 Code may be broader, 26 U.S.C.A. § 7302) which provides, "It shall be unlawful to have or possess any liquor or property intended for use in violating the provisions of this part, or the internal-revenue laws, * * or which has been so used, and no property right shall exist in any such liquor or property * * *", it is clear that this statute, if it declares a "crime" at all, does not prescribe either a misdemeanor or felony grade to such act of use or possession. By its terms the right of seizure requires a search warrant under Title XI, Act June 15, 1917, 40 Stat. 228, since repealed, Act June 25, 1948, c. 645, § 21, 62 Stat. 862, now covered by 18 U.S.C.A. §§ 2235, 1621, 2231, 2234, 3105, 3109, Rule 41, Fed.R. Crim.P. which establishes the usual test of a misdemeanor in the officer's presence or knowledge of a past felony. As the only penalty is forfeiture, the "unlawful" use or possession is neither misdemeanor nor felony and no basis exists for the exemption, United States v. Jeffers, 342 U.S. 48, 51, 72 S. Ct. 93, 96 L. Ed. 59, 64, for a valid warrant.
From the Officer's point of view, the arrest did not come until after discovery of the booklet. The Agent-in-Charge testified:
On the hearing of the motion to suppress, the Revenue Agents, qualifying as experts, demonstrated how the gross collections less the pickup man's 25% commission tied into sheets and entries in the Manila booklet which also contained entries of the "Bug" (winning) number for January 26, 27, 28, 1954, based on the particular digits shown in the daily newspapers for those dates on the bond sales and stock sales in the New York market
The Complaint is headed "Complaint for Violation of USC Title 16 [sic] Section 3290, 3291(a)" stating: "That on or about January 28th, 1954 * * * Clay did (here insert statement of the essential facts constituting the offense charged) fail to register as a person engaged in the business of accepting wagers prior to engaging in such business of accepting wagers, and did fail to purchase an occupational tax stamp as required by law * * *."
The Agents knew that ten years before, 1944, in a Macon Municipal Court, Clay was convicted of a misdemeanor charge of violating a Georgia law on lotteries; and knew, of course, of his conviction (see note 1, supra) for the July 8, 1953, occurrence at which time they had seen him in possession of lottery paraphernalia. Clay was reputed by law enforcing agencies to be engaged in the lottery business and, from confidential informants, United States v. Li Fat Tong, 2 Cir., 152 F.2d 650; King v. United States, 9 Cir., 1 F.2d 931, 932; Cannon v. United States, 5 Cir., 158 F.2d 952, certiorari denied 330 U.S. 839, 67 S. Ct. 980, 91 L. Ed. 1286, they had been told that Clay was using Hester's store-residence on the Macon-Columbus highway as a place to check the daily settlement of receipts, disbursements, and the like
The Agent-in-Charge was pressed on cross examination:
Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 13, 68 S. Ct. 367, 369, 92 L. Ed. 436, 440: "The point of the Fourth Amendment, which often is not grasped by zealous officers, is not that it denies law enforcement the support of the usual inferences which reasonable men draw from evidence. Its protection consists in requiring that those inferences be drawn by a neutral and detached magistrate instead of being judged by the officer engaged in the often competitive enterprise of ferreting out crime. Any assumption that evidence sufficient to support a magistrate's disinterested determination to issue a search warrant will justify the officers in making a search without a warrant would reduce the Amendment to a nullity and leave the people's homes secure only in the discretion of police officers. * * * When the right of privacy must reasonably yield to the right of search is, as a rule, to be decided by a judicial officer, not by a policeman or Government enforcement agent * * *."
On the hearing, none of the Agents testified that, immediately prior to the curbing of Clay's car, he believed that Clay had committed a felony. At most it was that Clay had violated the law — a statement inadequate where distinction between the grades of crime is decisive and where, unlike the more patent offenses of physical acts, the shading between felony and misdemeanor is so delicate
United States v. Di Re, 332 U.S. 581, 584, 587, 68 S. Ct. 222, 223, 224, 92 L. Ed. 210, 215, 216, points out that Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132, 45 S. Ct. 280, 69 L. Ed. 543, and its progeny, Husty v. United States, 282 U.S. 694, 51 S. Ct. 240, 75 L. Ed. 629, concerned search and seizure made under provisions of the National Prohibition Act, 27 U.S.C.A. § 1 et seq., in which "Transportation of liquor in violation of that Act subjected first the liquor, and then the vehicle in which it was found, to seizure and confiscation, and the person `in charge thereof' to arrest * * *." So that "* * * the Carroll decision falls short of establishing a doctrine that, without such legislation [National Prohibition Act], automobiles nonetheless are subject to search without warrant in enforcement of all federal statutes. This Court has never yet said so." The Court seems plainly to limit the Carroll case (and our similar ones, e. g., Cannon v. United States, 5 Cir., 158 F.2d 952, certiorari denied 330 U.S. 839, 67 S. Ct. 980, 91 L. Ed. 1286); cf. Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 69 S. Ct. 1302, 93 L. Ed. 1879, to situations in which transportation is itself a crime:
DocketNumber： 15996_1
Citation Numbers： 239 F.2d 196
Filed Date： 12/11/1956
United States v. Lane Motor Co. , 344 U.S. 630 ( 1953 )
Mosely v. United States , 207 F.2d 908 ( 1953 )
Contreras v. United States , 213 F.2d 96 ( 1954 )
Will Parks Clay, Walter Jolly, Andrew B. Turk and Andrew ... , 218 F.2d 483 ( 1955 )
Evelyn Miller v. United States , 230 F.2d 486 ( 1956 )
Cannon v. United States , 158 F.2d 952 ( 1946 )
Douglas Joseph Hodges and Vernon Clyatt, Rewis v. United ... , 243 F.2d 281 ( 1957 )
Estate of Albert D. Phillips, Deceased, Viola T. Chartrand, ... , 246 F.2d 209 ( 1957 )
Elvina Cash Canida v. United States , 250 F.2d 822 ( 1958 )
Hubert R. Grogan, and Ruby Alene Anderson, Surety v. United ... , 261 F.2d 86 ( 1959 )
united-states-v-one-1957-ford-ranchero-pickup-truck-motor-no-b7kx-125697 , 265 F.2d 21 ( 1959 )
T. B. Wingo v. United States , 266 F.2d 421 ( 1959 )
Nolan E. Patenotte v. United States , 266 F.2d 647 ( 1959 )
A. C. Carter v. United States , 314 F.2d 386 ( 1963 )
Ernest Oliver Ortiz and Jack Ross Berryhill v. United States , 317 F.2d 277 ( 1963 )
Andrew Nicholson, and Richard Reed Criswell v. United States , 355 F.2d 80 ( 1966 )
Robert Lafayette Potter, Jr. v. United States , 362 F.2d 493 ( 1966 )
Frank A. Niro, Jr. v. United States of America, Edward M. ... , 388 F.2d 535 ( 1968 )
William Teasley v. United States , 396 F.2d 949 ( 1968 )
John Henry Brown v. United States , 404 F.2d 874 ( 1969 )
United States v. Joe Summerville , 477 F.2d 393 ( 1973 )