United States v. Andrew L. Hunn

In this case the defendant, Andrew L. Hunn, pleaded guilty to five counts of bank robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a). In four of these counts the district court found that Hunn had made express death-threats, thus increasing his offense level by two points. See U.S.S.G. § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F). Hunn appeals his sentence. We affirm.

I. Background

Between August 14th and December 28th, 1992 Hunn committed five bank robberies in the state of Wisconsin. As the following discussion demonstrates, in each of these robberies Hunn, by uttering various threats, successfully intimidated the bank tellers into giving him money from their cash drawers: (1) August 14th — Hunn entered a Racine bank and handed its teller a note which read, “Give me all your money right away,” and simultaneously placed his right hand, still concealed in his coat pocket, on top of the counter; (2) August 27th — Hunn entered a Waupun bank and handed its teller a note which read “This is a robbery, I have a gun, give me your money, don’t try anything foolish,” while keeping his right hand inside his jacket pocket; (3) October 5th — Hunn entered a West Bend credit union, handed the teller a note which read, “This is a hold-up. I have a gun,” while keeping his right hand in a coat pocket, pointed at the teller; (4) November 19th — Hunn entered a Rothschild bank, handed the teller a note that read, “Just give me all your money, I have a gun,” and told the employee “I’m serious, put all your money in the envelope,” all the while, his hands were hidden below the counter; (5) December 28th — Hunn returned to this same Rothschild bank, handed a different teller a note stating, “Give me all the money now. I have a gun. No tricks, I’m watching.” When this teller replied that Hunn must be joking, he insisted, “No, I mean it,” and “Hurry up.” The teller stated that Hunn was pointing something from inside his right coat pocket toward her during the robbery as if he had a hidden gun.

Hunn pleaded guilty to all five counts of bank robbery. See 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a). In its presentenee investigation report (“PSI”) the probation officer recommended a two-level increase in Hunn’s offense level, reasoning that, in any or each of the last four robberies, Hunn made “express threats of death” as defined in U.S.S.G. § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F). Hunn objected to this recommendation. The district court overruled his objection and adopted the Guideline calculations contained in the PSI. • The district court stated that at least during Hunn’s fifth robbery, his oral demand accompanied by his body language (simulating a concealed handgun pointed at the teller) constituted a death-threat. The district court thus applied the two point enhancement eventually sentencing Hunn to five concurrent terms of sixty-three months imprisonment, followed by a three-year term of supervised release.

II. Analysis

This circuit has had the opportunity to decide whether a bank robber should receive the two-level, death-threat enhancement under § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F).1 In United States v. Robinson, a bank robber threatened a teller by stating “I have a gun and am not afraid to use it,” and later using words to that effect in three other robberies. See 20 F.3d 270, 276 (7th Cir.1994). Without a detailed exposition, the Robinson court concluded that the robber’s statement was enough for the § 2B3.1 enhancement. Id. at 277. The Eighth, Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Circuits have also addressed what constitutes an “express threat of death” under the Guidelines. In United States v. Smith, 973 F.2d 1374 (8th Cir.1992), a defendant who had been found guilty of two counts of bank robbery, handed a teller a note stating, “Please give me all your hundreds, fifties, and twenties.” Smith, 973 F.2d at 1375. The teller questioned, “Is this a joke?” Id. In response the defendant placed his right hand under his coat lapel and replied, “You don’t want to find out.” Id. The Smith court held that this statement, combined with the defendant’s gestures threatening to use a gun, sufficiently communicated an “express threat of death” under U.S.S.G. § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F). Id. at 1378.22

In contrast to Smith, the Eleventh Circuit has placed a significantly different twist on § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F). See United States v. Canzater, 994 F.2d 773, 775 (11th Cir.1993). In Canzater, a defendant gave a note to a teller during a robbery which stated, “In the bag a gun 100s and 50s” and then put his hand under his pants’ waistband.3 Id. During a second robbery, this defendant also gave a teller a bag while stating that he had a gun. Id. The court determined that the defendant did not make an express death-threat during either robbery, concluding that a bank robber threatening a teller with the words “I have a gun,” while simultaneously putting his hand into his pants as if to grab a firearm, is not enough for a § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F) enhancement.4 Id. The Canzater court reasoned that a threat to use a gun contains, at most, an implied death-threat. Id.Id.

In choosing between the Eighth and Eleventh Circuit’s approaches, we find the latter’s reading of § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F) to be unnecessarily cramped. While the Guidelines require an “express threat of death,” nothing indicates that speech is the only form of communication implicated. Are we to suppose that a bank robber who used only sign-language or miming to express his death-threat would be immune from a § 2B3.1 enhancement. Fortunately, we need not so speculate. The Guideline’s commentary specifically indicates that “[a]n ‘express threat of death’ as used in subsection (b)(2)(F), may be in the form of an ... act, gesture, or combination thereof.” Application Note 6, commentary, U.S.S.G. § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F) (emphasis supplied). The comment then suggests that “[f]or example ... ‘Give me your money or else (where the defendant draws his hand across his throat in a slashing motion)’ ... would constitute an express threat of death.” Id. (emphasis supplied). We believe that pointing one’s hand, hidden in a coat so as to imitate the presence of a handgun aimed at another, is well within the plain text of § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F) and its accompanying commentary.5 Conduct such as Hunn’s constitutes an aggravated assault, a crime requiring the communication of a threat that creates a reasonable apprehension of death or serious bodily harm. See People v. Chrisopulos, 82 Ill.App.3d 581, 37 Ill.Dec. 910, 912Dec., 402 N.E.2d 912, 914 (1980) (citing People v. Preis, 27 Ill.2d 315, 317, 189 N.E.2d 254, 255 (1963)) (opining that a defendant who “stood up and placed her hand in the right hand pocket of her trench coat [with] a bulge in the right hand pocket pointed toward [the victim],” could be found guilty of assault with intent, to murder even though the victim had not actually seen any gun.); see also Robinson, 20 F.3d at 276. Even the Eleventh Circuit acknowledges that the death-threat enhancement may be applied “to defendants who have engaged in conduct that would instill in the victim a reasonable fear for his or her life,” United States v. Tuck, 964 F.2d 1079, 1081 (11th Cir.1992). We adopt the approach taken in Smith, 973 F.2d at 1378, as recently followed by this circuit in Robinson, 20 F.3d at 276, and hold that a bank robber’s pointing his hand through his coat pocket, while claiming to have a gun, can be a sentence-enhancing, death-threat expression under the plain text of Guideline § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F).

The dissent intimates that a bank teller may have an idiosyncratic view of bank robberies if she understands the gestures of a bank robber — thrusting an object reasonably believed to be a gun directly at her while stating “Give me all the money now. I have a gun. No tricks, I’m watching” — as an express death-threat. In' support, the dissent argues that:

[v]ariations on T have a gun’ are designed to create fear, all right, but not necessarily fear of death. Robbers with real guns may create fear by shooting into the air or by shooting to wound; they may use guns as bludgeons (McLaughlin v. United States, 476 U.S. 16, 18 [106 S.Ct. 1677, 1678, 90 L.Ed.2d 15] (1986)). Thieves want cooperation and money, not dead tellers.

See dissent post at 999. Other than McLaughlin,6 the dissent, when it opines about what “is ordinary for a bank robbery,” see dissent post at 1000, does not reference any specific basis for its assertion. With all due respect, the dissent’s contention provides little more insight into this particular form of criminal conduct and its intended responses than the comical images of Woody Allen’s well-known movie Take the Money and Run, Palomar Pictures (1968), in which the bank teller misreads the robber’s note as stating that he had a “gub,” rather than a “gun,” and then the teller proceeds to argue with the robber (played by Allen) as to what the note reflects. Theorizing about the reasonableness of the teller’s interpretation of Hunn’s gestures, in the abstract manner of the dissent, discounts real-world uncertainties. The record indicates that the teller read Hunn’s combined actions, gestures, and words as expressing a death-threat. Though by no means statistical, a search of relatively recent bank robberies tragically confirms that the community of tellers are often at fatal risk. See e.g., Grillo v. National Bank of Washington, 540 A.2d 743 (D.C.App.1988) (teller killed); Brown v. State, 262 Ga. 728, 425 S.E.2d 856 (1993) (tellers killed); Houchin v. Indiana, 581 N.E.2d 1228 (Ind.1991) (teller killed); Allen v. Indiana, 562 N.E.2d 39 (Ind.1990) (teller killed); Louisiana v. Flank, 537 So.2d 236 (La.Ct.App.1988) (teller killed); Missouri v. Royal, 610 S.W.2d 946 (Mo.1981) (teller killed); Oregon v. Nefstad, 309 Or. 523, 789 P.2d 1326 (1990) (teller killed). The dissent argues that'“[o]nly what the bandit says or conveys in signs, not what the victim reads” is relevant in applying Guideline § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F). See dissent post at 999. If the dissent is suggesting that a court, while deciding on this Guideline enhancement,- should apply an objective test, what a “reasonable” victim would read from the robber’s conduct, we agree. Nevertheless, we believe that since death can easily occur at the hands of a bank robber armed with a gun, a reasonable victim could understand Hunn’s message loud and clear as a death-threat — -without stopping to reflect on the likelihood of whether Hunn actually possessed a weapon.

The § 2B3.1 Guideline enhancement requires the robber to “instill in a reasonable person, who is a victim of the offence, significantly greater fear than that necessary to constitute an element of the offense of robbery.” See Application Note 6, commentary, U.S.S.G. § 2B3.1. We disagree, however, with the dissent’s conclusion that Hunn could not have crossed this line. See dissent post at 1000. The elements of bank robbery require the taking by force, violence, or intimidation, anything of value from a bank. See 18 U.S.C. § 2113. Had Hunn robbed the bank without communicating (through his acts, gestures, and words) his conditional death-threats, he still could have been convicted of violating § 2113. The fact that a bank robber’s chance of success might be increased by his pointing a gun at the teller does not read such conduct out of this Guideline, enhanc'ement. Thus, we conclude that Hunn’s conduct may be of the type that is significantly greater than necessary to constitute an element of the offense of bank robbery.

Having determined that Hunn’s non-verbal act may be an expressed death-threat under § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F), we next must evaluate the district court’s factual findings. This court must give “due deference” to the district court’s application of the Guidelines to the facts. 18 U.S.C. § 3742(e). In Hunn’s case the district court found that Hunn made an “express threat of death” under Guideline § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F) during four of the five robberies. Similar to Smith, Hunn’s December 28th death-threat7 constituted a union of words and gestures. The combination of Hunn’s note, which stated “Give me all the money now. I have a gun. No tricks, I’m watching;” and his gesture that he was pointing a gun through his right pocket at the teller, comprised an express threat that if she disobeyed she would be shot. Cf. Smith, 973 F.2d at 1378. This is enough. The teller who was robbed on December 28th reasonably believed that Hunn threatened her life during the robbery. Under our reading of the Guidelines we conclude that the district court’s findings regarding Hunn’s death-threats are not in any way clearly erroneous.

III. Conclusion

From the record we conclude that the district court properly enhanced Hunn’s sentence under U.S.S.G. § 2B3.1(b)(2)(F) for his death-threats made during the bank robbery. We affirm.

AFFIRMED.