Opinion ID: 795515
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Whether sections 2332a and 876(c) criminalize only threats of future action

Text: 18 Davila's first argument is one of statutory interpretation. He reads the phrases threatens ... to use and threat to injure in sections 2332a and 876(c) as restricting the scope of those statutes to threats by an individual to engage in future harmful acts. His letter did not constitute such a threat, he argues, because it merely created the false impression that a harmful act had already been committed. 19 At the time that Davila sent his letter in 2002, section 2332a provided that anyone who 20 without lawful authority, uses, threatens, or attempts or conspires to use, a weapon of mass destruction ... (2) against any person within the United States, and the results of such use affect interstate commerce or, in the case of a threat, attempt, or conspiracy, would have affected interstate or foreign commerce ... shall be [guilty of a crime]. 21 18 U.S.C. § 2332a(a) (emphasis added). Section 876(c) provided: Whoever knowingly [deposits to be mailed or causes to be mailed] any communication ... addressed to any other person and containing ... any threat to injure the person of the addressee or of another, shall be [guilty of a crime]. 22 18 U.S.C. § 876(c) (emphasis added). Davila argues that the use of the words threat and threaten, combined with the infinitives to use and to injure, limits the scope of both statutes to threats of future conduct on the part of the threatener. 23 In construing the language of sections 2332a and 876(c), we begin with the fundamental principle of statutory construction that the starting point must be the language of the statute itself. Morenz v. Wilson-Coker, 415 F.3d 230, 234 (2d Cir. 2005) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also In re Edelman, 295 F.3d 171, 177 (2d Cir.2002) (Where the statutory terms are clear, our inquiry is at an end.). 24 Because neither statute defines the words threat or threaten, we give them their ordinary, contemporary, common meaning. Id. at 177 (internal quotation marks omitted). According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a threat is a denunciation to a person of ill to befall him; esp. a declaration of hostile determination or of loss, pain, punishment, or damage to be inflicted in retribution for or conditionally upon some course; a menace. The American Heritage Dictionary, Fourth Edition, defines the word as [a]n expression of an intention to inflict pain, injury, evil, or punishment, or [a]n indication of impending danger or harm. The same dictionary defines the word threaten, in turn, as [t]o express a threat against. We do not read these definitions as applying only to announcements of future action. An impression of impending injury is created not only by a communication promising to commit a dangerous act in the future, but also by the delivery of a substance that appears to be injurious. Because Davila created such an impression by mailing powder that he represented to be anthrax, his conduct qualified as a denunciation to a person of ill to befall him [or her] and an indication of impending danger or harm, and as such, it fell within the definition of a threat. 25 Characterizing Davila's conduct as a threat is also consistent with this court's case law considering the definition of that word. In United States v. Malik, 16 F.3d 45 (2d Cir.1994), we approved of a jury instruction defining a threat as a statement expressing an intention to inflict bodily harm. Id. at 51. In United States v. Kelner, 534 F.2d 1020 (2d Cir.1976), we held that a threat under 18 U.S.C. § 875(c) was punishable [s]o long as the threat on its face and in the circumstances in which it is made is so unequivocal, unconditional, immediate and specific as to the person threatened, as to convey a gravity of purpose and imminent prospect of execution. Id. at 1027. Contrary to Davila's contention, nothing in these definitions suggests that they apply only to warnings of future acts. Here, because Davila's mailing was designed to create the impression that it contained a deadly substance, a reasonable jury could have found that it expressed an intention on his part to inflict bodily harm. Similarly, because the delivery of the powder appeared to be an impending execution of a harmful act, a reasonable jury could have found that it conveyed an imminent prospect of execution. 26 Davila also argues that regardless of whether the word threat by itself implies a requirement of future conduct, such an implication is created by the statutes' use of the infinitives to use and to injure. One connotation of the infinitive is to convey the future tense, and Davila seizes on this connotation to argue that one cannot threaten to use a weapon except by announcing that he will use a weapon in the future. Davila notes that one district court in this circuit has adopted a similar reading. See United States v. Taylor, No. 02CR73, 2003 WL 22073040 (S.D.N.Y. Sept.5, 2003). In Taylor, the defendant had been charged under section 2332a for leaving a note stating that anthrax was on the premises of a store. The court held that this conduct did not fall within the language of the statute, reasoning that 27 [t]he word threatens, taken in conjunction with the words to use, require active employment of something in the future. Because the Note state[d] ... that the anthrax has already been placed in ABC Carpet, and because there is no evidence that Defendant was threatening to actively employ the anthrax, there is no evidence that Defendant threatened to use a weapon of mass destruction. 28 Id. at . 29 In our view, however, the words to use and to injure cannot reasonably be limited to the restrictive reading urged by Davila and adopted by the district court in Taylor. In common parlance, a construction such as threaten to use can serve as a substitute for the phrases threaten the use of or threaten to be using. For example, an individual who makes a phone call making the false claim that she has released a toxic substance into a public water supply can be said to have threatened to use the substance. 30 Both of the Courts of Appeals that have considered the issue presented here have adopted this broader and more natural reading of the phrases threatens ... to use and threat to injure, concluding that these phrases do not imply any requirement of future action on the defendant's part. The Fifth Circuit held that a defendant was properly convicted under section 2332a for telling a phone representative at his mortgage company, I just dumped anthrax in your air conditioner. United States v. Reynolds, 381 F.3d 404, 405 (5th Cir.2004). The court held that a threat under section 2332a need not contain a reference to a future act. Id. at 406. The holding of Reynolds was reaffirmed in United States v. Guevara, 408 F.3d 252 (5th Cir.2005), which involved a set of facts almost identical to this case. In Guevara, the defendant had mailed a letter to a judge containing a harmless powder and a note stating you have been now been [ sic ] exposure [ sic ] to anthrax. Id. at 255. The court held that section 2332a covered the defendant's conduct, specifically rejecting his argument that the infinitive to use connoted a requirement of future action. Id. at 257 & n. 4. 31 In United States v. Zavrel, 384 F.3d 130 (3d Cir.2004), the Third Circuit considered and rejected an argument similar to Davila's in the context of section 876. The defendant had mailed letters containing powdered cornstarch, which she intended to resemble anthrax, to various individuals. Rejecting the defendant's argument that the statute only prohibited threats of future action, the court expressed agreement with the district court's instruction defining a threat as a communication which expresses an intention to inflict injury at once or in the future. Id. at 136. In any event, the court held, even if the statute were construed as prohibiting only threats of future harm, the defendant's conduct still qualified because the people who received the letters would reasonably fear that they would suffer health problems in the future from their exposure. Id. 32 Davila makes much of the fact that after he sent his letter, Congress enacted a statute that was apparently aimed more directly at hoaxes of the type he engaged in. That statute provides: 33 Whoever engages in any conduct with intent to convey false or misleading information under circumstances where such information may reasonably be believed and where such information indicates that an activity has taken, is taking, or will take place that would constitute a violation of [various statutes relating to weapons and explosives, terrorist acts, and related activities] shall [be guilty of a crime]. 34 18 U.S.C. § 1038(a)(1). The legislative history of section 1038 does suggest that Congress sought to address potential limitations in the existing law. A May 2004 report of the House Judiciary Committee stated that [n]either terrorism hoaxes nor the war time hoaxes are adequately covered by current Federal law, and that [a] gap exists . . . in the current law because it does not address a hoax related to biological, chemical or nuclear dangers where there is no specific threat. H.R. Rep. 108-505, at 4, 7 (2004). 35 Davila's reliance on section 1038 and its accompanying legislative history is misplaced for two reasons. First, the intent of Congress in 2004 is not necessarily indicative of the intent of the earlier Congress that enacted section 2332a. See Waterkeeper Alliance, Inc. v. E.P.A., 399 F.3d 486, 508 (2d Cir.2005) (noting that subsequent legislative history is a hazardous basis for inferring the intent of an earlier Congress) (internal quotation marks and emphasis omitted). Congress's perception in 2004 that existing law contained a gap was likely influenced by decisions such as Taylor that adopted a narrow reading of section 2332a; by itself, this fact does not suggest that the earlier Congress intended section 2332a to exclude conduct such as Davila's. For this reason, it would be inappropriate to read too much into the passage of section 1038(a). Second, to the extent that the legislative history is relevant, it merely indicates that Congress perceived a gap with respect to hoaxes that did not involve a specific threat. In this case, there was ample evidence from which a reasonable jury could conclude that Davila made a specific threat; not only did he bear a grudge against a state prosecutor, but he included a threatening note containing an apparent reference to anthrax. 36 Because neither the text of the statutes nor Congress's subsequent enactment of section 1038(a) presents adequate support for Davila's narrow reading of sections 2332a and 876, we join our fellow circuits in holding that neither statute requires a threat of future action. 37 Moreover, in any event, the evidence was sufficient to show a violation of both statutes even if the terms threaten to use and threat to injure are construed as limited to threats of future conduct. To illustrate by example, in the famous movie The Godfather (Paramount Pictures 1972), when the movie producer found in his bed the severed head of his horse, there could be no doubt that the delivery of the horse's head was not merely an announcement of a past act of violence but a threat of a future act of violence. The sending of white powder with a reference to anthrax can reasonably be construed as a threat to send real anthrax the next time. 38