DEAN v. UNITED STATES
No. 08-5274
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 4, 2009—Decided April 29, 2009
556 U.S. 568
Deanne E. Maynard argued the cause for the United States. With her on the brief were then-Acting Solicitor General Kneedler, Acting Assistant Attorney General Glavin, Deputy Solicitor General Dreeben, and Vijay Shanker.*
Accidents happen. Sometimes they happen to individuals committing crimes with loaded guns. The question here is whether extra punishment Congress imposed for the discharge of a gun during certain crimes applies when the gun goes off accidentally.
I
In this case, a masked man entered a bank, waved a gun, and yelled at everyone to get down. He then walked behind the teller counter and started removing money from the teller stations. He grabbed bills with his left hand, holding the gun in his right. At one point, he reached over a teller to remove money from her drawer. As he was collecting the money, the gun discharged, leaving a bullet hole in the partition between two stations. The robber cursed and dashed out of the bank. Witnesses later testified that he seemed surprised that the gun had gone off. No one was hurt. App. 16-19, 24, 27, 47-48, 79.
Police arrested Christopher Michael Dean and Ricardo Curtis Lopez for the crime. Both defendants were charged with conspiracy to commit a robbery affecting interstate commerce, in violation of
Dean appealed, contending that the discharge was accidental, and that the sentencing enhancement in
II
“[A]ny person who, during and in relation to any crime of violence or drug trafficking crime . . . uses or carries a firearm, or who, in furtherance of any such crime, possesses a firearm, shall, in addition to the punishment provided for such crime of violence or drug trafficking crime—
“(i) be sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than 5 years;
“(ii) if the firearm is brandished, be sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than 7 years; and
“(iii) if the firearm is discharged, be sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than 10 years.”
The principal paragraph defines a complete offense and the subsections “explain how defendants are to ‘be sentenced.‘” Harris v. United States, 536 U. S. 545, 552 (2002). Subsection (i) “sets a catchall minimum” sentence of not less than
A
“We start, as always, with the language of the statute.” Williams v. Taylor, 529 U. S. 420, 431 (2000). The text of subsection (iii) provides that a defendant shall be sentenced to a minimum of 10 years “if the firearm is discharged.” It does not require that the discharge be done knowingly or intentionally, or otherwise contain words of limitation. As we explained in Bates v. United States, 522 U. S. 23 (1997), in declining to infer an “intent to defraud” requirement into a statute, “we ordinarily resist reading words or elements into a statute that do not appear on its face.” Id., at 29.
Congress‘s use of the passive voice further indicates that subsection (iii) does not require proof of intent. The passive voice focuses on an event that occurs without respect to a specific actor, and therefore without respect to any actor‘s intent or culpability. Cf. Watson v. United States, 552 U. S. 74, 81 (2007) (use of passive voice in statutory phrase “to be used” in
The structure of the statute also suggests that subsection (iii) is not limited to the intentional discharge of a firearm. Subsection (ii) provides a 7-year mandatory minimum sentence if the firearm “is brandished.” Congress expressly included an intent requirement for that provision, by defining “brandish” to mean “to display all or part of the firearm, or otherwise make the presence of the firearm known to another person, in order to intimidate that person.”
Dean argues that the statute is not silent on the question presented. Congress, he contends, included an intent element in the opening paragraph of
The most natural reading of the statute, however, is that “in relation to” modifies only the nearby verbs “uses” and “carries.” The next verb—“possesses“—is modified by its own adverbial clause, “in furtherance of.” The last two verbs—“is brandished” and “is discharged“—appear in separate subsections and are in a different voice than the verbs in the principal paragraph. There is no basis for reading “in relation to” to extend all the way down to modify “is discharged.” The better reading of the statute is that the
But, Dean argues, such a reading will lead to absurd results. The discharge provision on its face contains no temporal or causal limitations. In the absence of an intent requirement, the enhancement would apply “regardless of when the actions occur, or by whom or for what reason they are taken.” Brief for Petitioner 11-12. It would, for example, apply if the gun used during the crime were discharged “weeks (or years) before or after the crime.” Reply Brief for Petitioner 11.
We do not agree that implying an intent requirement is necessary to address such concerns. As the Government recognizes, sentencing factors such as the one here “often involve . . . special features of the manner in which a basic crime was carried out.” Brief for United States 29 (quoting Harris, 536 U. S., at 553; internal quotation marks omitted). The basic crime here is using or carrying a firearm during and in relation to a violent or drug trafficking crime, or possessing a firearm in furtherance of any such crime. Fanciful hypotheticals testing whether the discharge was a “special featur[e]” of how the “basic crime was carried out,” id., at 553 (internal quotation marks omitted), are best addressed in those terms, not by contorting and stretching the statutory language to imply an intent requirement.
B
Dean further argues that even if the statute is viewed as silent on the intent question, that silence compels a ruling in his favor. There is, he notes, a presumption that criminal prohibitions include a requirement that the Government prove the defendant intended the conduct made criminal. In light of this presumption, we have “on a number of occasions read a state-of-mind component into an offense even
Dean argues that the presumption is especially strong in this case, given the structure and purpose of the statute. In his view, the three subsections are intended to provide harsher penalties for increasingly culpable conduct: a 5-year minimum for using, carrying, or possessing a firearm; a 7-year minimum for brandishing a firearm; and a 10-year minimum for discharging a firearm. Incorporating an intent requirement into the discharge provision is necessary to give effect to that progression, because an accidental discharge is less culpable than intentional brandishment. See Brown, 449 F. 3d, at 156.
It is unusual to impose criminal punishment for the consequences of purely accidental conduct. But it is not unusual to punish individuals for the unintended consequences of their unlawful acts. See 2 W. LaFave, Substantive Criminal Law § 14.4, pp. 436-437 (2d ed. 2003). The felony-murder rule is a familiar example: If a defendant commits an unintended homicide while committing another felony, the defendant can be convicted of murder. See
Blackstone expressed the idea in the following terms:
“[I]f any accidental mischief happens to follow from the performance of a lawful act, the party stands excused
from all guilt: but if a man be doing any thing unlawful, and a consequence ensues which he did not foresee or intend, as the death of a man or the like, his want of foresight shall be no excuse; for, being guilty of one offence, in doing antecedently what is in itself unlawful, he is criminally guilty of whatever consequence may follow the first misbehaviour.” 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 26-27 (1769).
Here the defendant is already guilty of unlawful conduct twice over: a violent or drug trafficking offense and the use, carrying, or possession of a firearm in the course of that offense. That unlawful conduct was not an accident. See Smith, 508 U. S., at 238.
The fact that the actual discharge of a gun covered under
JUSTICE STEVENS contends that the statute should be read to require a showing of intent because harm resulting from a discharge may be punishable under other provisions, such as the Sentencing Guidelines (but only if “bodily injury” results). Post, at 583 (dissenting opinion) (citing
And although the point is not relevant under the correct reading of the statute, it is wrong to assert that the gunshot here “caused no harm.” Post, at 578. By pure luck, no one was killed or wounded. But the gunshot plainly added to the trauma experienced by those held during the armed robbery. See, e. g., App. 22 (the gunshot “shook us all“); ibid. (“Melissa in the lobby popped up and said, ‘oh, my God, has he shot Nora?’ “).
C
Dean finally argues that any doubts about the proper interpretation of the statute should be resolved in his favor under the rule of lenity. See Brief for Petitioner 6. “The simple existence of some statutory ambiguity, however, is not sufficient to warrant application of that rule, for most statutes are ambiguous to some degree.” Muscarello v. United States, 524 U. S. 125, 138 (1998); see also Smith, supra, at 239 (“The mere possibility of articulating a narrower construction, however, does not by itself make the rule of lenity applicable“). “To invoke the rule, we must conclude that there is a grievous ambiguity or uncertainty in the statute.” Muscarello, supra, at 138-139 (internal quotation marks omitted). In this case, the statutory text and structure convince us that the discharge provision does not contain an intent requirement. Dean‘s contrary arguments are not enough to render the statute grievously ambiguous.
* * *
It is so ordered.
Accidents happen, but they seldom give rise to criminal liability. Indeed, if they cause no harm they seldom give rise to any liability. The Court today nevertheless holds that petitioner is subject to a mandatory additional sentence—a species of criminal liability for an accident that caused no harm. For two reasons,
I
It is clear from the structure and history of
The legislative history also indicates that Congress intended to impose an enhanced penalty only for intentional discharge. In Bailey v. United States, 516 U. S. 137, 148 (1995), the Court held that “use” of a firearm for purposes of
II
Even if there were no evidence that Congress intended
Although mandatory minimum sentencing provisions are of too recent genesis to have any common-law pedigree, see Harris v. United States, 536 U. S. 545, 579, 581, n. 5 (2002) (THOMAS, J., dissenting), there is no sensible reason for treating them differently from offense elements for purposes of the presumption of mens rea. Sentencing provisions of this type have substantially the same effect on a defendant‘s liberty as aggravated offense provisions. Although a sentencing judge has discretion to issue sentences under
As the foregoing shows, mandatory minimum sentencing provisions are in effect no different from aggravated offense provisions. The common-law tradition of requiring proof of mens rea to establish criminal culpability should thus apply equally to such sentencing factors. Absent a clear indication that Congress intended to create a strict-liability enhancement, courts should presume that a provision that mandates enhanced criminal penalties requires proof of intent. This conclusion is bolstered by the fact that we have long applied the rule of lenity—which is similar to the mens rea rule in both origin and purpose—to provisions that increase criminal penalties as well as those that criminalize conduct. See United States v. R. L. C., 503 U. S. 291, 305 (1992) (plurality opinion); Bifulco v. United States, 447 U. S. 381, 387 (1980); Ladner v. United States, 358 U. S. 169, 178 (1958).2
Accordingly, I would apply the presumption in this case and avoid the strange result of imposing a substantially harsher penalty for an act caused not by an “evil-meaning mind” but by a clumsy hand.
The majority urges the result in this case is not unusual because legislatures commonly “punish individuals for the unintended consequences of their unlawful acts,” ante, at 575, but the collection of examples that follows this assertion is telling. The Court cites the felony-murder rule,
Contrary to the majority‘s suggestion, the existence of provisions that penalize the unintended consequences of felo-
III
In sum, the structure and history of
JUSTICE BREYER, dissenting.
For many of the reasons that JUSTICE STEVENS sets forth, I believe the statutory provision before us applies to intentional, but not to accidental, discharges of firearms. As JUSTICE STEVENS points out, this Court in Bailey v. United States, 516 U. S. 137, 148 (1995), held that simple possession of a firearm, without some type of “active employment,” such as “brandishing, displaying, bartering, striking with, and, most obviously, firing or attempting to fire,” did not consti-
I concede that the Court lists strong arguments to the contrary. But, in my view, the “rule of lenity” tips the balance against the majority‘s position. The “rule of lenity” as ordinarily applied reflects the law‘s insistence that a criminal statute provide “fair warning . . . of what the law intends to do if a certain line is passed.” United States v. Bass, 404 U. S. 336, 348 (1971) (internal quotation marks omitted). But here, where a mandatory minimum sentence is at issue, its application reflects an additional consideration, namely, that its application will likely produce an interpretation that hews more closely to Congress’ sentencing intent.
That is because, in the case of a mandatory minimum, an interpretation that errs on the side of exclusion (an interpretive error on the side of leniency) still permits the sentencing judge to impose a sentence similar to, perhaps close to, the statutory sentence even if that sentence (because of the court‘s interpretation of the statute) is not legislatively required. See, e. g., United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual
On the other hand, an interpretation that errs on the side of inclusion requires imposing 10 years of additional imprisonment on individuals whom Congress would not have intended to punish so harshly. Such an interpretation would prevent a sentencing court from giving a lower sentence even in an unusual case, for example, where the accident is unintended, unforeseeable, and imposes no additional risk. And such an interpretation, by erroneously taking discretion away from the sentencing judge, would ensure results that depart dramatically from those Congress would have intended. Cf. Harris v. United States, 536 U. S. 545, 570 (2002) (BREYER, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (“[S]tatutory mandatory minimums generally deny the judge the legal power to depart downward, no matter how unusual the special circumstances that call for leniency“). Moreover, because such unusual cases are (by definition) rare, these errors would provide little incentive to the Sentencing Commission or Congress to reconsider the statute.
These interpretive asymmetries give the rule of lenity special force in the context of mandatory minimum provisions. Because I believe the discharge provision here is sufficiently ambiguous to warrant the application of that rule, I respectfully dissent.