Accidental firearm discharge still brings maximum sentence, Supreme Court says

April 30, 9:43 AMBoston Gun Rights ExaminerRon Bokleman

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Chief Justice John G. Roberts

The Supreme Court yesterday ruled on the case of Dean v. United States and concluded that accidentally shooting a gun during the commission of a crime should bring the same penalties as intentionally using a firearm.

Under 18 U.S.C.924(c)(1)(A)(iii), the mere discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence or drug trafficking, even if accidental, is now subject to a ten-year sentencing enhancement.

This case arose from petitioner Christopher Dean’s armed robbery of an AmSouth bank in Georgia in 2004. By his own confession, Dean entered the bank with a mask on and a pistol in his right hand. As he was removing the money from the head teller’s station, the gun discharged in his right hand and shot a hole in the teller partition. When the gun discharged, Dean cursed, as if the discharge was accidental. Immediately after the discharge, Dean fled the scene with a little less than $4000.

Dean and his brother-in-law (as co-conspirator) were arrested for the armed robbery. At trial, the jury convicted both men of conspiring to interfere with interstate commerce and aiding and abetting the other in the discharge of a pistol during the robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(iii). Dean received 100 months in prison for the armed robbery, along with the additional mandatory minimum of 120 months under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(iii).

Dean appealed to the Eleventh Circuit, challenging – among other things – whether 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(iii) requires that the individual firing the weapon during the commission of the felony actually intend to fire the weapon. Although the court of appeals acknowledged that, based on the trial record, the discharge was likely accidental, it nonetheless affirmed the district court’s decision imposing the additional 120 months. The court reasoned that because Section 924(c)(1)(A)(iii) is simply a sentencing enhancement, it contains no elements of the offense, and the language of the statute does not require separate proof of intent. The court relied on the plain language of 924(c)(1)(A)(iii) which only requires that an individual “use[] or carr[y]” a firearm, and that “the firearm is discharged” without reference to any intent.

Chief Justice John Roberts, who called it "the case of the bungling bank robber" in his bench statement, said the law does not require that the discharge be done knowingly or intentionally.

If criminals want to avoid the penalty for accidental gunfire, they can "lock or unload the firearm, handle it with care during the underlying violent or drug trafficking crime, leave the gun at home or - best yet - avoid committing the felony in the first place," Roberts said.

I applaud Chief Justice Roberts and the other 6 Supreme Court Justices that joined in this opinion. The dissenting opinion from Justices John Paul Stevens and Stephen Breyer argued that Congress intended the automatic sentence to only apply to intentional discharges. Yet, Justice Roberts remarked "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."

It’s high time we got tough on the “human criminal element” in this country with the sole intent of actually accomplishing higher levels of public safety – by denying those who commit these acts of violence their freedom to roam among the law-abiding; for a very long time.

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