Court Opinion

ID: 9462611
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:45:24.531943+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:40.588390
License: Public Domain

DUNIWAY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I dissent. I would reverse on the ground that the grand jury charged one offense but the government failed to prove it. Instead, *1231the government proved another offense, which the grand jury did not charge.
Section 2314 of Title 18, U.S.Code, defines a number of offenses. Even the first paragraph of the section, which is the one on which the indictment is based, defines more than one offense. It reads:
Whoever transports in interstate or foreign commerce any goods, wares, merchandise, securities or money, of the value of $5,000 or more, knowing the same to have been stolen, converted or taken by fraud; .
Depending on how it is construed, the foregoing language can be said to define at least five offenses: knowing transportation of stolen “goods” or “wares” or “merchandise” or “securities” or “money.” The number can be doubled by treating transportation in “interstate” or “foreign” commerce as separate. They appear in the statute in the disjunctive. Further multiplication by at least three lurks in the differences between “stolen,” “converted,” or “taken by fraud.” Nor is this all. “Securities” is defined in the fifth paragraph of § 2311.1 Again, depending on how the language of § 2311 is construed, the number of possible separate offenses is at least 30, and if we add “forged,” “counterfeited,” or “spurious” as separate, the number approaches 100. All of these can again be increased by tacking on one or more of the alternatives in the first paragraph of § 2314. And the foregoing leaves out for consideration the three definitions of “value” in § 2311: “face, par, or market value, whichever is the greatest.”
I mention the number of possible offenses only to emphasize that this is not a case in which the offense can be charged in the language of the statute. More specificity is required because the defendant has a right, under the Fifth Amendment, to be charged only by a grand jury, and the grand jury has a duty under the Sixth Amendment to inform the defendant of the nature and cause of the accusation, Cf. Russell v. United States, 1962, 369 U.S. 749, 761, 763-64, 765, 82 S.Ct. 1038, 8 L.Ed.2d 240. Nor can deficiencies in the indictment be cured by a bill of particulars. Id. at 769-70, 82 S.Ct. 1038.
In this case the two counts of the indictment charge a conspiracy in Count I:
To willfully and knowingly transport in interstate commerce from Salt Lake City, Utah, to San Francisco, California, 90,000 shares of stolen Flying Diamond Corporation stock with a value of approximately $405,000.00, the defendant then knowing the stock to be stolen, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2314,
and in Count II that the defendants:
did transport in interstate commerce from Salt Lake City, Utah, to San Francisco, California, in the Northern District of California, stolen securities, that is, 90,000 shares of stock of Flying Diamond Corporation, of the value of approximately $405,000.00, knowing the same to have been stolen; in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 2314 and 2.
I find it remarkable that neither § 2314, which mentions “securities,” nor § 2311, which says that “securities” includes about 30 different things, plus “forged, counterfeited or spurious representations” of any of them, mentions “stock.” I cannot help wondering whether the person who drew up the indictment had read the law. The nearest thing to “stock” that the law does mention is, in § 2311, “stock certificate.” Yet it *1232surely is hornbook law that “stock,” which is an intangible interest in the capital of a corporation, is not the same as “stock certificate,” which is a piece of paper that, when genuine, represents, but is different from “stock.”
The proof does not show that the defendants transported stock, or that they conspired to transport stock. What they did conspire to transport, and did transport, was stock certificates. Moreover, the stock that the certificates purported to represent had neither been authorized nor issued, and the certificates lacked the signature of an authorized officer of the transfer agent that would have made them prima facie valid and so negotiable. The evidence is that 90,000 shares of the stock would have been worth $405,000 in the over-the-counter market. But the evidence also is that the certificates in question, because they were spurious, had no value at all; they were not stock; they did not evidence stock. If ever there were a case in which the grand jury’s charge was not proved, this is that case. See: Danielson v. United States, 9 Cir., 1963, 321 F.2d 441 (charge: counterfeiting United States bonds; proof: forging endorsement on genuine United States bonds. Conviction reversed); Jeffers v. United States, 9 Cir., 1968, 392 F.2d 749 (charge: fraud, representation that money received would be used to promote religion; proof: representation that moneys would be used for office supplies and expenses. Conviction reversed).
What the proof shows is that the defendants conspired to transport and transported “falsely made, forged, altered or counterfeited securities” (stock certificates) in violation of the third paragraph of § 2314, or stolen securities (stock certificates) that were “forged, counterfeited or spurious representations,” having a “value” (“par value,” § 2311) of $90,000, not $405,000.00, in violation of the first paragraph of § 2314. This, however, is not what was charged. The court permitted proof of market value of genuine stock, which was not shown to have been involved, and it permitted the jury to find that there were 90,000 shares of stock that were stolen, when the proof showed no such thing. This is not the kind of harmless error to which Rule 52(a), F.R. Crim.P. refers. Here, the error affects substantial rights.
I would reverse both convictions in their entirety.

. “Securities” includes any note, stock certificate, bond, debenture, check, draft, warrant, traveler’s check, letter of credit, warehouse receipt, negotiable bill of lading, evidence of indebtedness, certificate of interest or participation in any profit-sharing agreement, collateral-trust certificate, preorganization certificate or subscription, transferable share, investment contract, voting-trust certificate, certificate of interest in property, tangible or intangible; instrument or document or writing evidencing ownership of goods, wares, and merchandise, or transferring or assigning any right, title, or interest in or to goods, wares, and merchandise; or, in general, any instrument commonly known as a “security”, or any certificate of interest or participation in, temporary or interim certificate for, receipt for, warrant, or right to subscribe to or purchase any of the foregoing, or any forged, counterfeited, or spurious representation of any of the foregoing;