Court Opinion

ID: 9456719
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 20:01:01.21833+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:35:05.231730
License: Public Domain

MOORE, Circuit Judge
(concurring):
I concur in the reversal of the judgment of conviction but for reasons differing somewhat from those expressed in the majority opinion. My problem is how to reconcile my own belief that the defendant did not “knowingly” commit the crime (1) with the trial court’s charge correctly (in my opinion) defining “knowingly” and (2) without usurping the fact-finding function of the jury.
Finding no errors of commission, I am quite convinced that an error of omission may well have been of vital importance to the jury’s deliberations, namely, the failure to direct the jury to consider whether Form 4473 was reasonably designed to give a person adequate warning as to the representations as to which he was certifying.
The government’s case depends almost entirely on the form which Squires signed. The first page of the form (Appendix hereto) is relied on by the government to establish notice. The only place for the transferee’s (the purchaser’s) signature is in a section entitled “Section B — Statement of Transferee” and under a paragraph reading as follows:
“I certify that I am not prohibited by the provisions of Chapter 44 of Title 18, United States Code, or Title VII of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (Public Law 90-351, as amended, 18 U.S.C., Appendix) from receiving a firearm in interstate or foreign commerce.”
A purchaser, while in the process of transacting a purchase and certainly under the circumstances attendant to the purchase here, could hardly be expected to hire a lawyer or go to a law library to ascertain the prohibitions of the statute. Moreover, the “Notice to Transferees” which contains the prohibitions is relegated to a position at the bottom of the form and far below any place for a transferee’s (purchaser’s) signature which might well escape his attention. Normally, a subscriber certifies or attests to that which appears above his *866signature — not to a paragraph of somewhat fine print at the bottom of the page below all signatures. Thus, the situation here is not unlike the “fine print” cases frequently involving passenger tickets, baggage claim checks, bills of lading and the like.
Since Congress made “knowingly” an essential element of the crime, I, therefore, would be better satisfied of Squires’ guilt had the element of notice been stressed in the instructions insofar as this particular form and its format were concerned.