Court Opinion

ID: 9697464
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 19:17:33.900011+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:32.809866
License: Public Domain

SCHWELB, Associate Judge,
dissenting:
The government concedes that Monroe’s possession of the K-Bar-Nine knife was not per se unlawful. Moreover, Monroe admitted that he intended to use the object as a weapon only in lawful self-defense or in lawful defense of a third party. If he or a third party were never attacked, then his conditional intent to use the knife as a weapon would never be carried out. If an attack of sufficient severity were made on him or on a third person, then the use of the knife with a proportionate amount of force would ordinarily be legal. Under these circumstances, it is difficult for me to believe that Congress intended to criminalize the possession of an intrinsically lawful object solely because of the possessor’s hypothetical future intent to use that object lawfully as a weapon, which future intent would only come into play in the event of an unlawful assault by another. Cf. Commonwealth v. Sampson, 383 Mass. 750, 755-56, 422 N.E.2d 450, 453 (1981) (subjective intent to use device as weapon does not bring it within licensing requirements).
There generally being no legitimate use for pistols or other handguns, decisions involving such weapons, see, e.g., Strong v. United States, 581 A.2d 383 (D.C.1990); Logan v. United States, 402 A.2d 822 (D.C.1979); Mitchell v. United States, 302 A.2d 216 (D.C.1973); Schaaf v. Commonwealth, 220 Va. 429, 258 S.E.2d 574 (1979), as well as cases in which the defendant carried or used a knife in a threatening, furtive, or otherwise unlawful manner, see, e.g., Gilmore v. United States, 271 A.2d 783 (D.C.1970): Leftwich v. United States, 251 A.2d 646 (D.C.1969); Scott v. United States, 243 A.2d 54 (D.C.1968); Degree v. United States, 144 A.2d 547 (D.C.1958), seem to me to be distinguishable in principle because they do not hold that a future intent to act in a lawful manner criminalizes otherwise permissible activity. In our other cases involving knives, the question whether a future hypothetical intent to use one in self-defense or in defense of a third party renders its possession criminal was not squarely faced or discussed. See, e.g., Pollen v. United States, 207 A.2d 114 (D.C.1965); United States v. Shannon, 144 A.2d 267 (D.C.1958).
I do not think that we should read a statute as proscribing, (and, incidentally, as authorizing a jail term for) the act of carrying a lawful object with a hypothetical but lawful future intent unless the legislature has plainly and unambiguously made such activity criminal. The rule of lenity “embodies the instinctive distaste against men [and women] languishing in prison unless the lawmaker has clearly stated that they should.” United States v. Bass, 404 U.S. 336, 348, 92 S.Ct. 515, 523, 30 L.Ed.2d 488 (1970) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Section 22-3204, quoted in footnote 1 of the majority opinion, does not expressly say that a future hypothetical intent to utilize an otherwise legal object for self-defense or for defense of a third party converts lawful activity into criminal conduct. Although that is one possible reading — a weapon is something the possessor intends to use as one — I do not think that such a construction is compelled by the statutory language or purpose. Monroe’s central theme on appeal is *443a slightly different one, but I believe that the point I have discussed has been sufficiently preserved.1 Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.2

. Monroe seems to concede, improvidently in my view, that possession of the knife with a present intent to use it in self-defense would violate the statute. Nevertheless, he argues that proof of possession with a future hypothetical intent is insufficient to establish that a crime has been committed. I agree with his conclusion, albeit for somewhat different reasons.

. It is important to note that my colleagues do not believe that the issue discussed in this dissent is properly before us, and that they have therefore not decided that issue. Maj. op. at 442 n. 10.