Court Opinion

ID: 9403810
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-06-21 19:00:36.752849+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:09.531998
License: Public Domain

NOT PRECEDENTIAL

                 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                      FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
                            __________

                                No. 21-1384
                                __________

                     UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

                                      v.

                             DONNIE SMITH,
                                                     Appellant
                                __________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                   for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
                        (D.C. No. 2-19-cr-00350-001)
                  District Judge: Honorable Jan E. DuBois
                                 __________

                       Argued on November 16, 2022
                               __________

           Before: AMBRO, KRAUSE, and BIBAS, Circuit Judges

                            (Filed: June 21, 2023)


    Honorable Thomas L. Ambro assumed senior status on February 6, 2023.
Robert C. Patterson       [Argued]
3513 Southwood Drive
Easton, PA 18045
      Counsel for Appellant

Robert E. Eckert, Jr.
Bernadette A. McKeon        [Argued]
Office of United States Attorney
615 Chestnut Street, Suite 1250
Philadelphia, PA 19106
       Counsel for Appellee

                                        __________

                                        OPINION**
                                        _________

KRAUSE, Circuit Judge.

       On appeal of his convictions for Hobbs Act robbery, 18 U.S.C. § 1951(b)(1), and

for carrying and using a firearm during a crime of violence, in violation of 18 U.S.C.

§ 924(c), Appellant Donnie Smith contends (1) that the District Court committed plain

error by failing to instruct the jury that Hobbs Act robbery requires a specific intent to

permanently deprive a victim of her property, (2) that there was insufficient evidence at

trial to sustain his convictions under both the Hobbs Act and § 924(c), and (3) that Hobbs

Act robbery does not qualify as a “crime of violence” for the purposes of § 924(c). For

the reasons explained below, each of these arguments is unavailing, so we will affirm.

       **
         This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7
does not constitute binding precedent.

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I.     DISCUSSION1

       A.     The Mens Rea for Hobbs Act Robbery

       Smith first argues, almost entirely by reference to co-appellant Abid Stevens’s

brief,2 that Hobbs Act robbery requires proof of a specific intent to permanently deprive.

Because Smith failed to object to the District Court’s general-intent instruction at trial,

we review for plain error, United States v. Dobson, 419 F.3d 231, 236 (3d Cir. 2005)

(citations omitted), and find none here. As we explained in affirming Stevens’s

conviction, Hobbs Act robbery requires only that a defendant act with general intent, the

minimum mental state “necessary to separate wrongful conduct from otherwise innocent

conduct.” United States v. Stevens, No. 21-2044, 2023 WL 3940121, at *4 (3d Cir. June

12, 2023) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting Carter v. United States, 530 U.S.

255, 268–69 (2000)). The District Court therefore did not err, much less plainly err, by

instructing the jury that a conviction under the Hobbs Act requires only that a defendant

“knowingly and willfully” commit “robbery,” as expressly defined by the Act. See

Stevens App. 1142–43; Stevens, 2023 WL 3940121, at *5.

       1
         The District Court had jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. § 3231, and we have
jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. Smith was also convicted for unlawful possession
of a firearm by a convicted felon, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). He does not
challenge that conviction on appeal.
       2
        Co-appellants Stevens and Maurice Quinn also appeal their respective
convictions—United States v. Abid Stevens (21-2044); United States v. Maurice Quinn
(21-2174)—but we resolve those appeals separately.

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       B.     Sufficiency of the Evidence

       Smith next asserts that there was insufficient evidence at trial to sustain his

convictions under both the Hobbs Act and § 924(c). We review the “evidence in the light

most favorable to the prosecution,” and will only overturn a conviction if no “rational

trier of fact could have found the essential elements of [a] crime beyond a reasonable

doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979).

       Smith has not made the requisite showing for either conviction. To the contrary,

his entire argument is premised on the incorrect notion that the Hobbs Act requires proof

of a specific intent to permanently deprive. As explained, however, the Hobbs Act

requires no such proof, as a defendant need only “knowingly and willfully” engage in an

“unlawful taking of personal property from the person, or in the presence of another . . .

by means of actual or threatened force.” Stevens App. 1142–43; see 18 U.S.C.

§ 1951(b)(1). And there is no question Smith used actual and threatened force and used a

firearm during the Hobbs Act robbery: he concedes that he both “pointed his gun at the

clerk for the sole purpose of disarming him” and “took the clerk’s gun,” Opening Br. 23–

24, and those concessions are consistent with the video footage in this case and the

testimony adduced at trial.

       The evidence was thus more than sufficient for a rational juror to conclude that

Smith committed an unlawful taking by threat of force.3 And because Smith’s Hobbs Act

       3
         Smith’s further justification defense—that he only engaged in this forceful taking
to protect his wife—does nothing to alter our conclusion. True, Smith’s wife was present
in the store at the outset of the robbery. But Smith first brandished his weapon and
disarmed the clerk only after she had exited the store. As the Government correctly
                                              4
evidence sufficiency claim fails, so too does his § 924 claim. Section 924(c) punishes

“any person who, during and in relation to any crime of violence . . . uses or carries a

firearm, or who, in furtherance of any such crime, possesses a firearm.” 18 U.S.C.

§ 924(c)(1)(A). Smith indisputably brandished a firearm here, so he instead predicates

his § 924(c) challenge on his underlying Hobbs Act sufficiency claim. But for the

reasons just explained, we have rejected that claim, so that ruling dooms his § 924(c)

challenge.

       C.     Hobbs Act Robbery as a Crime of Violence

       Finally, Smith asserts that his Hobbs Act robbery conviction does not qualify as a

valid “crime of violence” for the purposes of § 924(c). To qualify as a crime of violence,

a crime must satisfy the statute’s so-called “elements clause,” which requires it to have

“as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the

person or property of another.” 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)(A). Here, Smith claims that “[t]he

language of the statute confirm[s] that Hobbs Act robbery may be committed by means

other than ‘actual or threatened force.’” Opening Br. 19. While Smith’s appeal was

pending, however, we decided United States v. Stoney, where we held that United v.

Taylor, 142 S. Ct. 2015 (2022)—a recent Supreme Court ruling that attempted Hobbs Act

robbery does not satisfy the elements clause—“[did] not change our [pre-Taylor]

observed at trial, when Smith “ushered his wife out of the store, he ushered any
justification defense right out of this case.” Stevens App. 1115. Moreover, Smith
actively encouraged co-defendant Quinn to “get all the money” and “take everything”
from the cash register, further undermining his justification claim. Stevens App. 182,
414.
                                             5
position” that “completed Hobbs Act robbery is categorically a crime of violence under

§ 924(c)(3)(A).” 62 F.4th 108, 113–14 (3d Cir. 2023). Because Stoney squarely

forecloses Smith’s crime of violence argument, we will affirm his § 924(c) conviction.

II.   CONCLUSION

      For the foregoing reasons, we will uphold Smith’s convictions and will affirm the

judgment of the District Court.

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