Court Opinion

ID: 9462691
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:47:35.443391+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:43.465557
License: Public Domain

(concurring):
Reluctantly I must concur that Kelner’s actions come within the literal terms of 18 *1030U.S.C. §§ 875(c), 2. I do not believe, however, that Congress ever intended this statute to apply to the type of television news broadcast incident involved here.
The admittedly sparse legislative history behind this enactment reveals that it originally was aimed at the interstate transportation of extortion messages. After its passage, but long before the advent of television, the statute was broadened to apply to non-extortion cases involving “any” interstate communication of “any” threat. Prosecutions pursuant to § 875(c) and its relatives §§ 871 and 876 have involved interstate threats made by telephone and mail, all situations involving some direct and immediate action by a threatener in communicating the threat against a particular recipient. See, e. g., United States v. Bozeman, 495 F.2d 508 (5 Cir. 1974), cert. denied, 422 U.S. 1044, 95 S.Ct. 2660, 45 L.Ed.2d 696 (1975) (telephone threats); United States v. Le Vison, 418 F.2d 624 (9 Cir. 1969) (telephone and mail threats). Furthermore, by utilizing the aforementioned modes of transmission, the threaten-er, by paying for the use of the telephone or mail, was entitled to interstate delivery of his message; the mailman or telephone operator who transmitted the threat was truly an “innocent dupe.” No other case involves activity like Kelner’s, which is so detached from the act of transmission itself.
Whatever Kelner may have foreseen, or for that matter whatever he may have wished to happen to his statement at the time he mouthed it, he nevertheless had no control over his threat once it was made. Instead, the decision whether or not to broadcast, which in effect determined whether or not a crime was committed, rested within the discretion of the television personnel. Had Kelner recanted the threat after it was made'but before the broadcast, he would have been powerless to prevent transmission and therefore powerless to prevent the crime charged here. Thus Kelner was in a position unlike other defendants prosecuted under this statute, each of whom had control over the threat until it was transmitted in interstate commerce either by mailing the letter or placing the phone call.
This case, conceded to be one of first impression, deals with the broadcast media which have First Amendment rights separate and apart from Kelner’s and which do not apply to telephone company employees or postmen. If WPIX had reported the story by using silent film but quoting Kelner, or in any manner other than sound film, would the transmission of a communication of a threat have taken place within the meaning of the statute? Would there have been a violation if instead of a television newsman, a reporter for a newspaper which is mailed interstate had asked the question and then written a story with a quotation of the threat?
While I concur in the disposition of this appeal, I believe that its precedential value should be severely restricted. I am apprehensive about the implications of considering the broadcast media to be modes of communication in threat cases. It is obvious from the legislative history that Congress had not considered this eventuality; I can only hope that Congress will clarify its intention as to the scope of this statute.