Opinion ID: 15662
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: jury instructions regarding interstate commerce

Text: 44 Hickman contends that the trial court improperly charged the jury regarding the Hobbs Act offenses by instructing them that the Government need only show a minimal impact on interstate commerce. He submits that following Lopez, the jury should have been told that it had to find that his actions had a substantial impact on commerce. Like the sufficiency of evidence argument discussed above, this position is foreclosed by United States v. Robinson, 119 F.3d 1205 (5th Cir.1997). 45 Hickman also contends that the trial court's instructions on the interstate commerce element of the offense improperly took that element of the crime out of the province of the jury, in violation of United States v. Gaudin, 515 U.S. 506, 115 S.Ct. 2310, 132 L.Ed.2d 444 (1995). Hickman submits that the court's instruction reserved for itself the question of whether Hickman's acts affected interstate commerce; the charge merely asked whether several potential interstate-commerce-affecting events occurred. Yet as Hickman concedes, in United States v. Parker, 104 F.3d 72, 74 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 117 S.Ct. 1720, 137 L.Ed.2d 842(1997)(en banc), and United States v. Miles, 122 F.3d 235, 239-40 (5th Cir.1997), cert. denied --- U.S. ----, 118 S.Ct. 1201, 140 L.Ed.2d 329 (1998), this court upheld substantially similar charges against Gaudin-style attacks. Accordingly, Hickman's Gaudin argument fails.