Court Opinion

ID: 9423302
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:07:01.012075+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:43.384994
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Stewart,
whom Mr. Justice Fortas joins,
dissenting.
For me, the key issue in this case is whether the acknowledgments of purchase that the appellee carried from New Hampshire to New York come within the *272prohibition by 18 U. S. C. § 1953 (a) of interstate carriage of “any record, paraphernalia, ticket, certificate, bills, slip, token, paper, writing, or other device used, or to be used, or adapted, devised, or designed for use in . . . wagering pools with respect to a sporting event . . . .” In the operation of New Hampshire’s sweepstakes, tickets are sold through special machines, and are retained by the machines after the purchaser fills in a form provided for his name and address. After the tickets are drawn, winners are notified by telegram. The machines also provide the purchaser with an acknowledgment of purchase, which is merely a record of the purchase transaction. In order to be eligible for and to receive a prize, the purchaser of a ticket need not retain or present this purchase acknowledgment.
The Government does not contend that federal law makes it a crime for a person from another State to visit New Hampshire, purchase a sweepstakes ticket there, and return to his home. But it has argued that if a visitor to New Hampshire returns home with a receipt that merely acknowledges his personal purchase and in no way affects his eligibility to receive a prize, he has committed a crime punishable by imprisonment of up to five years.1 Thus the Government requires us to assume that Congress has branded as felons many or most of the thousands of visitors to New Hampshire who have purchased sweepstakes tickets there. I do not believe that Congress intended such an unexpected result, which only the most abjectly literal approach to statutory interpretation could tolerate. No plausible legislative purpose would be served by the Government’s construction, for when an individual takes an acknowledgment of purchase home from New Hampshire, merely retaining it as *273a personal record of his purchase, the anti-gambling policies of other States are in no way undermined, and no opening is provided for the growth of organized racketeering.
The Court apparently shares my concern with the overbroad reach of some of the Government’s contentions. For the Court’s opinion stresses that the Government has informed this Court that in its proof at trial it expects to show that the appellee carried acknowledgments of purchase to New York, not to retain them as personal records of his own purchases, but to deliver them to other people in New York on whose behalf the appellee purchased tickets in New Hampshire. The Court concludes: “We think it sufficient to hold that such a state of facts is comprehended by this indictment and within the terms of 18 U. S. C. § 1953.” Ante, at 271. I agree that if the appellee had been charged with conducting an interstate scheme for sale of sweepstakes tickets and the proof substantiated the charge, he could be validly convicted under § 1953. In such a case, the acknowledgments of purchase would be “used, or adapted ... for use in . . . wagering pools with respect to a sporting event . . .” because they would serve the essential role of providing the ultimate purchasers with a claim against the agent who had purchased tickets in New Hampshire on their behalf. The operation of such a scheme would have the effect of extending sweepstakes sales across state lines, would undermine the anti-gambling policies of other States, and might provide fertile opportunities for racketeers.2
*274However, I must emphatically disagree with the Court’s conclusion that “such a state of facts is comprehended by this indictment . . . .” The indictment merely charged the appellee with interstate transport of “acknowledgements of purchase for a sweepstakes race of the State of New Hampshire” and recited the language of § 1953.3 The Government also furnished a bill of particulars that, insofar as relevant, simply reiterated the bare charge that the appellee had carried acknowledgments of purchase across state lines.4 These charges were consonant with the Government’s broad theory that all interstate carriage of acknowledgments of purchase is prohibited, even if the acknowledgment is retained solely as a personal record of the carrier’s own purchase. That interpretation of the statute, along with the indictment that, embodied it, was properly rejected by the trial court.
*275As the Court appears to concede, although the language of its opinion is not altogether clear, the appellee could be validly convicted only if he were shown to have participated in an interstate scheme for selling sweepstakes chances to persons outside New Hampshire. But no hint that the appellee was being charged with such activities appears in the indictment or bill of particulars. The charges here fell far short of the established requirement that an indictment must specify the elements of the offense intended to be charged and apprise the defendant of the case that he must be prepared to meet. See Russell v. United States, 369 U. S. 749, 760-772, and the cases discussed therein. And the Government is not entitled to enlarge the indictment now by revamping the whole theory of the prosecution and making new and additional charges against the appellee for the first time in the course of proceedings before this Court. This Court cannot remedy the deficiencies in the indictment by retroactively reading the Government’s new charges into it.
We long ago rejected the notion that “it lies within the province of a court to change the charging part of an indictment to suit its own notions of what it ought to have been, or what the grand jury would probably have made it if their attention had been called to suggested changes . . . .” Ex parte Bain, 121 U. S. 1, 10. See Stirone v. United States, 361 U. S. 212; Russell v. United States, 369 U. S. 749, 770-771. As the Court in Bain observed, “Any other doctrine would place the rights of the citizen ... at the mercy or control of the court or prosecuting attorney . . . .” 121 U. S., at 13. The Court’s opinion today ignores these established principles, and allows the appellee to be tried for a crime that he was not charged with committing.
For these reasons, I respectfully dissent.

 18 U. S. C. § 1953 (a) provides that those who are convicted of a violation of the section “shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned for not more than five years or both.”

 New Hampshire has enacted legislation, N. H. Rev. Stat. Ann. §284:21-0, designed to deter those who seek to profit from such a scheme:
“Purchase of Tickets for a Fee Prohibited. No person shall engage in the business of purchasing or offering to purchase a sweepstakes ticket or tickets for, in behalf of, or in the name of another for a fee or service charge which shall make the ultimate cost of *274such ticket or tickets to the registered owner thereof greater than the legal price of such ticket or tickets as established by the sweepstakes commission under the authority of this subdivision. Whoever violates the provisions of this section shall be fined not more than five hundred dollars, or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.”

 The indictment recites, in full: “The Grand Jury charges: That on or about the 24th day of August, 1964, ANTHONY L. FABE.I-ZIO, knowingly did carry in interstate commerce from Keene, State of New Hampshire to Elmira, State of New York, in the Western District of New York, records, papers and writings, to wit: 75 acknowledgements of purchase for a sweepstakes race of the State of New Hampshire, to be used, and adapted, devised and designed for use, in a wagering pool with respect to a sporting event, that is: a sweepstake race of the State of New Hampshire, as he then well knew; all in violation of Section 1953 of Title 18, U. S. C.”

 In response to the appellee’s contention that the indictment failed to state an offense, the Government’s bill of particulars stated: “It is claimed by the United States that defendant knowingly carried in interstate commerce in violation of § 1953, T. 18, United States Code, 75 written acknowledgements of purchase of State of New Hampshire First Sweepstakes Race of September, 1964.”