Opinion ID: 1499192
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Second Count.

Text: We think that Congress, as it lawfully may, provided that to offer a bribe and to give a bribe are two distinct crimes even when parts of a single transaction, since the one (to give) involves an element which the other (to offer) does not. [1] The test, as stated in Morgan v. Devine, 237 U.S. 632, 640, 35 S.Ct. 712, 714, 59 L.Ed. 1153, is whether separate acts have been committed with the requisite criminal intent.    The present case does not meet that test. Kratter, the principal government witness, testified as follows: On July 17, 1946, in New York City, [2] defendant offered him a bribe of $5,000, and he told defendant he would take it. [3] Defendant then said that, when he had the money, he would telephone Kratter. On July 26, defendant, on the telephone, told Kratter that he had the money and wanted to meet Kratter to give it to him. On July 29, Kratter by phone, arranged with defendant for a meeting at a room in the St. George Hotel in Brooklyn. [4] Kratter went to that room. His own words, as to what then occurred, follow: A few minutes later there was a knock on the door. I opened the door and Mr. Michelson came in, and I closed the door after him. He dropped a package on a dresser or chifferobe, something like that that was in the hotel room, and he sat down and I sat down. I asked him if he had the money, and he said, `Yes, it is in the bag over there.' I took the bag, unwrapped it, and he took out a large number of five, ten and twenty-dollar bills, and he said, Mr. Michelson said, `There is $5,000 there.' I made a quick count of the bills and satisfied myself that there was approximately $5,000 in the package   . Defendant's conduct at that meeting in Brooklyn constituted his performance of the agreement of July 17  an illegal bargain resulting from a previously accepted offer  to give the $5,000 bribe. He did not on that day or at any other time in the Eastern District both offer and give. He merely gave. [5] The offer of July 17 cannot sustain the conviction on count 2. For defendant made that offer in New York City in the Southern District, and the defendant was indicted and tried in the Eastern District. Had that offer been specified in the indictment, defendant, thus warned of the improper venue, would have waived the lack of proper venue by going to trial without interposing an objection. [6] The same might have been true if, during the trial, defendant had in some manner been put on notice that the government intended to rely on that New York City offer as a crime, for which he was being tried. But here there was nothing so to notify him. Indeed, the trial judge, in his charge, told the jury that the issue was whether defendant gave or offered to give, or both, $5,000 to Kratter on July 29 at the Hotel St. George. We therefore conclude that we must reverse as to the second count.