Court Opinion

ID: 9460241
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 21:45:31.830224+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:32.481492
License: Public Domain

On Appellee’s Petition for Rehearing and/or Suggestion for Rehearing En Banc
Before: BAZELON, Chief Judge; and WRIGHT and MacKINNON, Circuit Judges.
ORDER
On consideration of the petition of the United States for rehearing and its suggestion for rehearing en banc, it is ordered by the Court that the petition for rehearing is granted for the limited purpose of modifying the Court’s original opinion and judgment by amending Part IV of the opinion to read as follows:
Appellant’s burglary conviction is reversed. However, in convicting appellant of burglary, the jury necessarily found the facts required for conviction of the lesser included offense of unlawful entry, and there is no question that the evidence was sufficient to support this determination. We therefore exercise our power under 28 U.S.C. § 2106 (1970) to remand the case with instructions either to enter, if the Government consents, a judgment of conviction of unlawful entry or, if the court believes it in the interest of justice, to grant a new trial on the lesser offense.9
Under the statute the offense of burglary does not include an element of “breaking” or force; the offense of forcible entry, of course, does.10 Hence, the jury’s verdict against Melton on the burglary charge cannot be taken as indicating that it found all elements necessary to conclude that he had committed forcible entry. We cannot, therefore, properly authorize on remand a judgment of conviction of forcible en*58try, even though evidence was presented at trial from which a jury might have concluded that Melton had indeed committed that offense. It remains open to the Government, however, to decline the unlawful entry conviction, and to seek instead to indict and prosecute Melton for forcible entry.
Reversed and Remanded.
Per Curiam.

. See Austin v. United States, 127 U.S.App.D.C. 180, 382 F.2d 129 (1967).

. 22 D.C.Code § 3101 (Supp. V 1972).