Opinion ID: 552750
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: authorization and intent

Text: 93 The IC also challenges the per curiam holding that 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2071(b) requires subjective knowledge of unlawfulness for conviction. 12 Maj. op. at 886 (emphasis in original). As the IC suggests, it seems difficult to reconcile this requirement with the majority's express rejection of the infamous Nuremberg defense that following orders ... can transform an illegal act into a legal one. Maj. op. at 881. Indeed, I can think of no way to harmonize the rejection of the following-orders defense with the claim that a jury may acquit a defendant who relied on an admittedly unreasonable belief that he was authorized to commit what he otherwise knew was an unlawful act. Unfortunately, this novel holding has broad implications; as the petition notes, twenty-six federal criminal statutes contain wording similar to that in 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2071(b). Petition at 13. Under any one of them, a defendant can now be found to lack the requisite intent, even though he knew an act was otherwise unlawful, if he unreasonably relied on a vague instruction from a superior official. This cannot be the law and the majority's ruling that it is clearly warrants rethinking. 13