Court Opinion

ID: 9497645
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:56:42.958686+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:19.990317
License: Public Domain

LAY, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
Because I believe we are bound by our holding in United States v. Sun Bear, 307 F.3d 747, 752-53 (8th Cir.2002), I concur in the judgment of this case. I write separately to voice my agreement with Judge Melloy in his dissent in Sun Bear, as well as the five judges who voted to rehear Sun Bear en banc.
The defendant in this case was charged and convicted of felony stealing. Mo. Rev. Stat. § 570.030. Like the prior offense at issue in Sun Bear, stealing of an operable motor vehicle under Missouri law is not a separate offense, but included as one of several offenses in a statute prohibiting the appropriation of the property or services of another. See id. In holding that attempted theft of an automobile is a crime of violence, the Sun Bear court found that:
The crime begins when a thief enters and appropriates a vehicle, a time when he is likely to encounter a returning driver or passenger, a passerby, or a police officer, any of whom may be intent on stopping the crime in progress. As we observed in Solomon, an encounter between the thief and such a person carries a serious risk of violent confrontation. Once the thief drives away with the vehicle, he is unlawfully in possession of a potentially deadly or dangerous weapon. While he is absconding in the vehicle, with which he will probably be unfamiliar, the thief may be pursued or perceive a threat of pursuit. Under the stress and urgency which will naturally attend his situation, the thief will likely drive recklessly and turn any pursuit into a high-speed chase with the potential for serious harm to police or innocent bystanders.
Sun Bear, 307 F.3d at 752-53 (citations omitted). With this description, the Sun Bear court at most described the potential risks attendant to extreme instances of car theft, but by no means did it describe a generic case of simple car theft.
Most simple car thefts do not result in encounters between the felon and the owner of the vehicle, a police officer, or a passerby. Nor do most simple car thefts result in a pursuit, reckless driving, and *582high-speed chases. While it is true that the potential harm to persons from these scenarios may be described as the potential risks of a car theft, I do not think they may properly be described as serious potential risks. In my view, there must be some aggravating circumstance beyond simple car theft in order to categorically classify ear theft as a crime that, by its nature, is a crime of violence.
For these reasons, I would not place simple car theft on the same level as burglary of a commercial dwelling, theft from a person, or escape. See United States v. Griffith 301 F.3d 880, 885 (8th Cir.2002) (finding that theft from a person is a “violent felony”); United States v. Nation, 243 F.3d 467, 472 (8th Cir.2001) (ruling that all escapes constitute crimes of violence); United States v. Hascall, 76 F.3d 902, 904 (8th Cir.1996) (finding that second degree burglary of a commercial building is a crime of violence). In each of these cases, the probability that another person will be encountered during the commission of the crime is far greater than the potential of a harmful encounter during a simple automobile theft. See Sun Bear, 307 F.3d at 754 (Melloy, J., dissenting) (noting that the proximity of victim and felon in theft from a person, the enhanced law enforcement response to an escape, and the risk that a felon is not aware that a commercial building is occupied create greater potential risks of harm to a person than simple automobile theft). As the Fifth Circuit recognized in United States v. Charles, 301 F.3d 309, 314 (5th Cir.2002), simple automobile theft does not present a serious potential risk of physical injury, it presents “a risk of injury to property, that is, the automobile.” Id. (emphasis in original). Judge Melloy correctly noted in Sun Bear that simple car theft, by its nature, does not involve the same potential risks of injury to a person. Sun Bear, 307 F.3d at 755-56.