Opinion ID: 2437720
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: General Statement of the Case

Text: This case grew out of a scheme devised by special agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms, United States Treasury Department, designed to connect and convict respondent of violation of the Federal Gun Control Act. [1] In the pursuit of this plan, one Helen Risler was engaged as a special employee, or undercover agent, to work with the operation. Subsequently, her son Britt Risler was brought into the picture. The contract of employment provided that each was to receive a subsistence allowance of $15.00 per day plus an award of $1,000.00 for successful completion of the project. The City of Chattanooga was to pay a similar amount. At the conclusion of the operation, Helen Risler received payments totalling $3,320.00; Britt Risler received $3,440.00. According to the agents the plan was to give defendant an opportunity to violate the law if he so desired. It is apparent that they were well versed in the law of entrapment. In their testimony they drew a fine line between luring or inducing the defendant into the commission of the crime on the one hand and his voluntarily taking advantage of the opportunity they afforded on the other. The record shows that, operating in conjunction with the Rislers, the federal agents took full advantage of artifice, ruse, deceit and deception to accomplish their mission. As distasteful as this may be, it is a legitimate weapon in the arsenal of law enforcement. The law does not mandate a frank, forthright or even honest approach when seeking to ferret out criminal activity. Pursuant to their plan, Helen Risler contacted the petitioner, whetted his interest in joining what he was led to believe was a series of unlawful activities to be conducted by the Risler group. She had a number of meetings with petitioner, and at some of these she was equipped with a body transmitter and the conversations were monitored by the agents. (For more detail, see Section III, infra ). On trial, neither of the Rislers testified. ( See Section IV, infra ). Instead the State's case rested entirely upon the testimony of the two participating ATF agents. Their testimony consisted primarily of reading to the jury the typed transcripts of the various conversations. Hence, the confrontation issue. See Section III, infra.