Opinion ID: 345511
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Broadway Applied

Text: 44 The essential elements of the offense of unlawful possession under 18 U.S.C. § 1708 include (1) proof of possession of the item in question, (2) proof that the item was stolen from the mails, (3) proof of knowledge that the item was stolen, and (4) proof of specific intent unlawfully to possess the item. See United States v. Kimbrell, 487 F.2d 219, 220-21 (5th Cir. 1973); United States v. Martinez, 466 F.2d 679, 687-88 (5th Cir. 1972) cert. denied, 414 U.S. 1065, 94 S.Ct. 571, 38 L.Ed.2d 469 (1973). The first two of these represent the physical elements of the offense, the latter two, its mental elements. 45 The government offered the following proof that Beechum had committed prior similar offenses:(1) Business records of Sears, Roebuck indicating that the company approved credit card applications for Robert T. Locus and Luther McFarland on October 29, 1974 and November 27, 1974, respectively. 46 (2) A stipulation that a Sears representative would testify that it was the regular practice of the company to place credit cards in the mail within ten days of issuance. 47 (3) Testimony by the postal inspector that he found Sears cards in the names of Robert T. Locus and Luther McFarland in Beechum's possession on September 16, 1975. 48 (4) Testimony by the postal inspector that Beechum delivered mail on routes covering the addresses listed on the credit card applications for Locus and McFarland on one or more occasions between the dates of issuance and the date of the alleged offense a period of about ten months. 49
50 The critical deficiency in the government's proof was its failure to show that the credit cards had been stolen. The essential links that might have established that fact circumstantially were Locus' and McFarland's non-receipt of the credit cards, or perhaps alternatively evidence of Beechum's unauthorized use of the credit cards. Were either of these facts true, it would have been an easy matter for the prosecution to obtain competent evidence of its truth. The government failed to offer evidence of either at trial. 51 It might, of course, be argued that even without establishing the addressees' non-receipt or the defendant's use of the cards, the government sufficiently proved that the credit cards had been stolen. The issue is whether the fact of Beechum's possessing two credit cards not in his name constitutes clear and convincing proof that the cards were stolen. We think it manifestly does not. 52 We do not question the validity of the inference from the fact of unexplained possession of concededly stolen items to the conclusion that the possessor knew such items were stolen. See Barnes v. United States, 412 U.S. 837, 93 S.Ct. 2357, 37 L.Ed.2d 380 (1973). In the case at bar, however, the essential matter of whether the credit cards were stolen was itself open to conjecture. This distinguishes Beechum's possession of the cards from otherwise similar conduct punished under 18 U.S.C. § 1708. In similar cases prosecuted under that statute, the fact that the checks possessed by a defendant have been stolen is established either directly, as by testimony of a witness to the theft, or circumstantially, by evidence that the addressees never received the checks, that the payees did not know the defendant, and often that the defendant cashed the check. See e. g., United States v. Dobson, 512 F.2d 615 (6th Cir. 1975); United States v. Kimbrell, supra, 487 F.2d 219; United States v. Johnson, 463 F.2d 216 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1028, 93 S.Ct. 472, 34 L.Ed.2d 322 (1972); United States v. Hughes, 418 F.2d 1222 (5th Cir. 1969). To be sure, evidence of non-receipt tends to show that the checks were stolen from the mails. Evidence that defendant cashed a check made out to a payee who did not know him tends to show that the defendant knew the stolen character of the check. But both of these also tend to show, a fortiori, that the check was stolen. 53 The price of going forward with evidence of non-receipt by the addressees or of Beechum's using the cards, assuming these facts were true, would have been but a few minutes of the government's time. The price of omitting this evidence was the admission of dangerously prejudicial evidence of what the trial court termed a substantially similar offense without convincing verification of its similarity to the charged offense. One can convincingly infer no more from the government's proof than that Beechum's was an unexplained possession of the two credit cards. 54 It follows, a fortiori, that the government also failed to prove that the credit cards had been stolen from the mail. We pretermit the question whether the manner in which the cards were stolen was a requisite point of similarity between a prior offense sought to be admitted to prove intent and a charged violation of § 1708. As a practical matter the distinction may be of little import in Beechum's case, since evidence of Locus's and McFarland's non-receipt of the cards would convincingly demonstrate that the cards were stolen from the mail. See generally United States v. Martinez, supra, 466 F.2d at 687-883; Allen v. United States, 387 F.2d 641 (5th Cir. 1968). 55 At least one circuit has already answered in the negative the question we pretermit, while lending affirmative support to our decision on the question we reach. In United States v. Fearns, 501 F.2d 486 (7th Cir. 1974), the court addressed the issue of the admissibility of similar offenses for purposes of showing intent in a prosecution under § 1708. Defendants were charged with stealing government checks from the mails. A former codefendant testified that, in addition to the four checks that formed the basis of the charged offense, she had received from the defendants between twenty-five and thirty other checks, which she endorsed and cashed, splitting the proceeds with the defendants. The Seventh Circuit said that this evidence failed to show all the elements of the claimed prior similar crimes because it did not show, first, that the payees of the other checks were persons other than the witness, and second, even assuming the witness was not a payee, that the proper payees had not authorized her to endorse their names to the checks. If this missing testimony had been supplied, the facts that the checks were stolen and known to be stolen could be inferred from the circumstances. Id. at 490. 56 The court went on to observe that it was unnecessary to prove that the checks were stolen from the mails. Id. at 490. We express no opinion regarding the Seventh Circuit's view that Broadway would have required proving the manner in which the checks were stolen, but we firmly agree with that court's staunch insistence on proof that the checks had been stolen in some manner. 57 The government's reliance on United States v. Robertson, 460 F.2d 1250 (5th Cir. 1972) is misplaced. Robertson involved a postal employee charged with unlawfully possessing a department store credit card stolen from the mails in violation of § 1708. The government was permitted to show that the defendant gave a witness another credit card (the other card) from the same department store and that the witness and defendant went together to the department store to make purchases. 17 The court, while not specifically identifying this as other crimes evidence, admitted it as evidence tending to show defendant's knowledge that the card found in her possession was stolen from the mails. Although there was testimony regarding the non-receipt of the charged credit card, it is not clear from the opinion in Robertson whether the government also established the non-receipt of the other credit card. In any case, the defendant's use of the other credit card from the same department store, combined with defendant's admission that the card had been given her at the post office, provided sufficient circumstantial evidence that the card had been stolen. By contrast, in the case at bar there was no evidence how Beechum had received the credit cards and no evidence that he or anyone else had ever used them. 58 Finally, the fact that Beechum delivered mail to the addresses of the persons named on the credit cards on one or more occasions during the ten month period after the issuance of the cards does not indicate that the cards were stolen, and certainly not that Beechum stole them. 18 Evidence that Beechum delivered mail to the specified addresses within the ten day period after Sears approved the credit card applications might have been somewhat more persuasive, since the parties stipulated that it was Sears's practice to mail such cards within a ten day period. No such evidence was introduced at trial. That the specified addresses fell within Beechum's assigned route on one or more occasions during the ten month period proves little or nothing. Beechum was a substitute mail carrier. It is likely that thousands of Dallas addresses fell within one or another of his assigned routes at some point during this period. A credit card that was misplaced or otherwise came lawfully into Beechum's possession would likely have borne a Dallas address. 59 Nobody would doubt that the evidence adduced by the prosecution would have been insufficient to prove that Beechum's possession of the credit cards was a § 1708 offense. On the other hand, the standard of proving prior similar offenses falls short of a reasonable doubt standard. 60 There was at least some circumstantial evidence from which it could be inferred that the credit cards had been stolen. After all, carrying two credit cards not in one's own name is an activity that justly arouses our suspicions. At the same time, however, we must be sensitive to the critical importance of similarity in an other crimes context, and thus adhere to the plain, clear and convincing standard of proof. Had the prosecution gone forward with the evidence that the cards were stolen, such as the addressee's non-receipt of the cards or Beechum's unauthorized use of them, the burden of rebutting that evidence would have fallen to the appellant. But on the facts of this record we cannot say that the prosecution has carried its initial burden of showing clearly and convincingly that Beechum's prior conduct was similar to the charged offense, i. e., that the credit cards were stolen.
61 The government's main argument on appeal is that United States v. Simmons, 503 F.2d 831 (5th Cir. 1974), precludes the application of Broadway to the case at bar. The government asserts that Simmons held that Broadway did not apply to cases in which the evidence of prior similar acts made out merely a similar occurrence rather than a prior criminal offense. Although we do not embrace that characterization as fully accurate, we think that even assuming the truth of that interpretation, Simmons is inapposite. 62 Simmons holds merely that in adducing evidence of prior similar acts, the prosecution need not demonstrate conclusively that those acts constitute a criminal offense. In this respect our opinion in Simmons merely reasserts the principle that evidence of prior similar acts is not admissible because it indicates the commission of a crime but in spite of that possibility. See 2 Wigmore, Evidence § 305 (3d ed. 1940); see also note 8 supra. 63 In Simmons the defendant was convicted of furnishing false financial statements to a federal land bank in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1014. In order to show that the defendant's statements were knowingly false, the government introduced testimony of the former vice president of a corporation of which the defendant was the largest stockholder. The witness, Judd, testified that some years earlier, at a time when the corporation was seeking a loan from a bank, the defendant had undertaken to teach Judd how to mislead the bank by means of a false financial statement. On appeal the defendant apparently contended that the evidence should have been excluded because the government had failed conclusively to establish the commission of a criminal offense. We properly rejected this argument, observing that Broadway and its progeny did not hold that proof only of acts which amount to a criminal offense are admissible. Id. at 835. We said that because Judd's testimony was plain, clear and conclusive that Simmons possessed the requisite knowledge to falsify a financial statement to be presented to a bank in conjunction with a loan, the testimony was properly admitted to show intent or guilty knowledge. Id. at 835. 64 We must begin the analysis of Simmons's impact on Broadway by observing that Simmons cannot mean that when the proof adduced by the government fails to establish each element of a putative prior criminal offense, that evidence indicates merely a prior similar occurrence that need not meet the Broadway test. On that interpretation the mere failure to satisfy Broadway by proving the congruent physical elements of the prior offense would in many cases itself obviate the need to satisfy Broadway an absurd result obviously not intended by Simmons. Thus the application of Broadway is not precluded merely because the government did not prove that the credit cards were stolen from the mail or seek to prove that Beechum knew they were stolen. 65 Nor is Broadway inapplicable merely because the government did not explicitly characterize Beechum's possession of the cards as a criminal offense. Of course, the trial judge did term Beechum's possession a substantially similar offense, but the trial judge in Simmons so characterized the prior similar acts in that case. In any event the government's label, whether prior occurrence or prior criminal offense, should not be determinative of whether the Broadway test must be satisfied. Insofar as Simmons is based on a belief that prior similar occurrences will be inherently less prejudicial than prior offenses, the prejudicial effect of admitting such evidence rests not on the label but on the inferences the jury is likely to draw, and it is this index of prejudice that ought to determine whether the full force of Broadway applies. 66 In the circumstances of this case we think it clear that the government intended to imply and the jury would naturally tend to infer that Beechum's possession of the credit cards was part of a prior offense. Indeed, absent such an inference the evidence had little probative value. In Simmons, evidence that the defendant instructed Judd in the art of filing false financial statements was sufficient, without more, to show by plain, clear and conclusive (proof) that Simmons possessed the requisite knowledge to falsify a financial statement . . . . Id. at 835. That fact was independently relevant to the inquiry in Simmons. But the crime of which Beechum is charged requires no particular skill that might be shown by the mere possession of the credit cards. Unlike the simple act of instruction in Simmons, Beechum's possession of the cards conclusively demonstrated no independently relevant fact. 67 The shallowness of the government's position is indicated by the contradictory nature of its assertions. On the one hand, it assumes Broadway applies but claims that it satisfied that test. To do this it would have had to show that Beechum possessed stolen credit cards. On the other hand, as part of its argument that Simmons and not Broadway applies, the government protests that it never sought to prove that Beechum had committed a prior offense but merely sought to adduce evidence of a prior occurrence. 19 The government cannot have it both ways of course, since if it had succeeded in its efforts to prove Beechum possessed stolen credit cards then it would have made out the physical elements of a criminal offense. The point is not that the government's alternative legal argument is improper, but rather that in fact the prosecution sought to have the jury believe, and fully expected it to believe, that Beechum had committed a prior criminal offense. Hence the admission of the credit card was still prejudicial even though the prosecution failed to prove that Beechum's possession of the cards was a criminal offense. 68 If the prosecution offers evidence that a defendant was suspected of committing a prior robbery, as in United States v. Vosper, supra, we do not fail to apply Broadway or to find this evidence dangerously prejudicial merely because the government fails to prove that its suspicions are founded. It is precisely the danger that its suspicions are groundless that underlies the clear and convincing standard. Beechum's case comes squarely within the rule established by Broadway.