Opinion ID: 765786
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Car Jacking.

Text: 7 The defendants were each charged with two counts of car jacking in connection with the UPS van and Mr. Routte's truck. Their first argument is that the district court erred in its instruction to the jury concerning one of the elements of the offense of car jacking. When objections are raised at trial to jury instructions, this court reviews the charge as a whole to determine whether the jury was misled, whether it had an understanding of the issues, and whether it recognized its duty to determine those issues. United States v. Wimberly, 79 F.3d 673, 676 (7th Cir. 1996) (citing United States v. Donovan, 24 F.3d 908, 916-17 (7th Cir. 1994)). If the instructions provide a fair and accurate summary of the law, and are supported by the record, we will not disturb them on appeal. Id. The district court's use of a particular instruction will be reviewed in the light most favorable to the government. United States v. Stillo, 57 F.3d 553, 559 (7th Cir. 1995). 8 A person commits the offense of car jacking if he or she with the intent to cause death or serious bodily harm takes a motor vehicle (in interstate commerce) from the person or presence of another by force and violence or by intimidation (or attempts to do so). 18 U.S.C. sec. 2119. The defendants argue that the district court erred in instructing the jury that the intent to cause death or serious bodily harm portion of the offense could be satisfied if the jury found evidence that the defendant intended to cause death or serious bodily harm if the victim resisted the defendant's efforts to obtain the victim's motor vehicle. According to the defendants, this type of conditional intent is insufficient because it renders the intent requirement virtually indistinguishable from the by force and violence or by intimidation element of the offense. Rather, the defendants claim that the district court should have instructed the jury that they could be convicted only if they had an unconditional intent to kill or injure their victims from the start. 9 Additionally, the defendants maintain that even under the conditional intent standard there is insufficient evidence to support the jury verdict because the defendants made only empty threats to their victims. While the defendants' claim that these threats may have satisfied the by force and violence or by intimidation element, they did not satisfy the intent element because there was no additional evidence that, had their victims not complied, the defendants would have killed or injured them. On a sufficiency challenge, we review the evidence in the light most favorable to the government, and will reverse a conviction only if no rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. United States v. Miller, 159 F.3d 1106, 1109 (7th Cir. 1998) (citing United States v. Hill, 40 F.3d 164, 166 (7th Cir. 1994)). Thus, a defendant has a heavy burden in challenging a conviction based on the sufficiency of the evidence. Id. (citing United States v. Hickok, 77 F.3d 992, 1002 (7th Cir. 1996)). 10 The defendants rely on the Ninth Circuit's decision in United States v. Randolph, 93 F.3d 656 (9th Cir. 1996), which held that conditional intent was insufficient to satisfy the intent element of 18 U.S.C. sec. 2119. Not only is the Ninth Circuit's ruling contrary to all other circuits to have addressed this issue, see United States v. Lake, 150 F.3d 269 (3d Cir. 1998); United States v. Williams, 136 F.3d 547 (8th Cir. 1998); United States v. Romero, 122 F.3d 1334 (10th Cir. 1997); but in fact the Supreme Court's recent decision in Holloway v. United States, 119 S. Ct. 966, 970-71 (1999), settles the instruction issue in favor of conditional intent. In Holloway, the Court held that conditional intent satisfies the intent requirement in the car jacking statute, though it emphasized that the intent element requires the [g]overnment to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant would have at least attempted to seriously harm or kill the driver if that action had been necessary to complete the taking of the car. Id. at 972. Thus, the requirement will not always be met just by showing that the element of intimidation was present. 11 As for the car jacking of the UPS truck, we conclude the evidence was sufficient to support a finding of conditional intent to do the driver harm had he not complied with the defendants' demands. One of the defendants pointed the gun at the driver and instructed him to do as they ordered or I'll shoot you. This, coupled with telling the driver to get down or else, is strong evidence of conditional intent. It is true that these same facts also support a finding of intimidation, but this does not render the intent element superfluous. Id. For example, had the defendants made the same threats, but carried an unloaded gun, the intimidation element would be satisfied but the intent element might not. 2 Thus, we conclude that there was sufficient evidence of the defendants' conditional intent to harm the UPS driver. 12 The second count, the car jacking of Mr. Routte, while a bit closer, is ultimately supported by the evidence. It is true that there is no direct evidence that had Mr. Routte refused to drive the defendants to Indianapolis, they would have killed or injured him. However, the three fugitives were armed, had admittedly just robbed a bank, and had narrowly avoided capture after a police chase. Moreover, they had brandished a gun at Mr. Routte's wife and seventeen year old daughter. Thus, the defendants' claim that Mr. Routte volunteered to take them into Indianapolis clearly misrepresents the situation. But, the strongest piece of evidence supporting conditional intent is the statement the defendants made to Mrs. Routte that they would kill Mr. Routte if she called the police. This statement alone is sufficiently tied to the car jacking and could be the basis for a jury finding of conditional intent. 13 Therefore, we conclude that the intent instruction was proper and the evidence was sufficient to support both car jacking convictions. 14