Court Opinion

ID: 9469572
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:44:08.817475+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:27.450203
License: Public Domain

HARRISON L. WINTER, Chief Judge,
with whom BUTZNER, DONALD RUSSELL and MURNAGHAN, Circuit Judges, join, dissenting:
We respectfully dissent for the reasons set forth in the dissent to the panel opinion, United States v. One Assortment of 89 Firearms, 669 F.2d 206, 210-13 (4 Cir. 1982), and the additional reasons which follow.
In oral argument before us, counsel for Mulcahey conceded that he asserted entrapment as a defense in his trial for violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(1), and that defense *919was submitted to the jury. Of course, in returning a verdict of not guilty, the jury did not specify the grounds of acquittal, but it is as equally possible that the jury found that Mulcahey was engaged in the business of dealing in firearms without a license, but had been entrapped into committing an illegal sale, as found that Mulcahey was not so engaged. Thus in our view, the majority errs when it confidently asserts that the jury verdict in the criminal action conclusively settled the issue that Mulcahey was not engaged in the business of dealing in firearms without a license.
But irrespective of the factual issue of Mulcahey’s guilt or innocence, we remain convinced that the forfeiture provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 924(d) are civil in nature so that any determination in the criminal prosecution is irrelevant to a decision of forfeiture. Our conclusion is reinforced by the language of that subsection. It states disjunctively that “[a]ny firearm involved in or used or intended to be used in, any violation of this chapter ... shall be subject to seizure and forfeiture ...” (emphasis added). Id. Nothing in the provision of § 922 under which Mulcahey was prosecuted renders an intention to engage in the business of dealing in firearms without a license illegal.* Only the completed act of engaging in the prohibited business is rendered unlawful. It is at once apparent that the forfeiture provisions of the Act were intended by Congress to be broader in scope than the criminal sanctions. This is persuasive evidence that Congress did not intend forfeitures to be an additional penalty for the commission of a criminal act but rather that they be a separate civil sanction, remedial in nature,
We would affirm the judgment of the district court.

 While the majority asserts that the “issue of whether the firearms were used or intended to be used in violation of the Act was tried .. . and conclusively decided” (emphasis added) in the earlier criminal case, the emphasized portion of that statement lacks record support. Mulcahey was indicted and acquitted for a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(1) which provides:
(a) It shall be unlawful—
(1) for any person, except a licensed importer, licensed manufacturer, or licensed dealer, to engage in the business of importing, manufacturing, or dealing in firearms or ammunition, or in the course of such business to ship, transport, or receive any firearm or ammunition in interstate or foreign commerce.
Manifestly the question of whether Mulcahey intended to use the firearms he possessed in violation of the statute was neither an issue nor was it decided in his criminal trial.