UNITED STATES v. WASHBURN

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Docket Number

No. 84-3057.

Attorney(S)

Leslie Baker, Asst. U.S. Atty., Portland, Or., for plaintiff-appellee. Robert A. Goffredi, Portland, Or., for defendant-appellant.

Judges

Mary Murphy Schroeder
Arthur Lawrence Alarcon
Robert Boochever

Acts

Crimes And Criminal Procedure — Robbery And Burglary — Crimes — Bank Robbery And Incidental Crimes

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Smart Summary

Factual and Procedural Background

Robert Harvey Washburn was convicted on three counts of bank robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a) for robbing The Oregon Bank, Tigard Branch, in 1983. He appealed Count I of his conviction, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence regarding the bank’s status as federally insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) at the time of the robbery. The case was heard by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit following an appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Oregon.

Legal Issues Presented

Whether the evidence presented was sufficient to establish that The Oregon Bank, Tigard Branch, was insured by the FDIC at the time of the 1983 robbery.

Arguments of the Parties

Defendant-Appellant's Arguments

Contended that there was insufficient evidence to prove that The Oregon Bank, Tigard Branch, was federally insured by the FDIC at the time of the robbery.

Plaintiff-Appellee's Arguments

Presented a copy of the original 1976 FDIC certificate of insurance for The Oregon Bank.
Introduced testimony from the branch manager that the branch displayed current FDIC certificates at the time of the robbery and that such certificates were maintained and verified in the regular course of business by the bank’s main office personnel.

Table of Precedents Cited

Precedent	Rule or Principle Cited For	Application by the Court
United States v. Maner, 611 F.2d 107 (5th Cir. 1980)	Establishes that an FDIC certificate, even if several years old, coupled with testimony regarding the maintenance and display of the certificate, can permit a rational inference of federal insurance at the time of a robbery.	The court accepted Maner’s reasoning as a baseline for acceptable proof of FDIC insurance status.
United States v. Platenburg, 657 F.2d 797 (5th Cir. 1981)	Clarifies that an old FDIC certificate alone is insufficient to prove federal insurance status at the time of the offense.	The court held the proof in this case was stronger than in Platenburg, supporting the sufficiency of evidence here.
United States v. Shively, 715 F.2d 260 (7th Cir. 1983)	Supports Maner’s reasoning regarding proof of FDIC insurance.	Referenced as accord supporting the sufficiency of evidence.
United States v. Ford, 642 F.2d 77 (4th Cir. 1981)	Supports Maner’s reasoning regarding proof of FDIC insurance.	Referenced as accord supporting the sufficiency of evidence.
United States v. Stuart-Caballero, 686 F.2d 890 (11th Cir. 1982)	Applies Maner and Platenburg principles to federal registration of vessels, analogous to FDIC insurance proof.	Referenced to illustrate the broader application of the standards for proof.
United States v. Rowan, 518 F.2d 685 (6th Cir. 1975)	Found sufficient evidence of federal insurance by jury special verdict.	Referenced as consistent with the court’s acceptance of the evidence.
United States v. Campbell, 616 F.2d 1151 (9th Cir. 1980)	Held uncontradicted testimony of ranking bank employees sufficient to establish federally insured status.	Referenced for Ninth Circuit precedent supporting sufficiency of employee testimony.
United States v. Phillips, 606 F.2d 884 (9th Cir. 1979)	Held uncontradicted testimony of ranking bank employees sufficient to establish federally insured status.	Referenced for Ninth Circuit precedent supporting sufficiency of employee testimony.
Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (1979)	Standard for reviewing sufficiency of evidence to uphold a jury verdict.	Applied to affirm that evidence viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict supports the jury’s finding.
United States v. Fleishman, 684 F.2d 1329 (9th Cir. 1982)	Reinforces the standard for sufficiency of evidence under Jackson v. Virginia.	Applied to support affirmance of the conviction.

Court's Reasoning and Analysis

The court analyzed the sufficiency of evidence regarding the bank’s FDIC insurance status at the time of the robbery. It noted the government’s introduction of the original 1976 FDIC certificate and the branch manager’s testimony about the display and maintenance of the certificate. The court acknowledged that no Ninth Circuit precedent directly addressed the issue but found persuasive the Fifth Circuit’s rulings in Maner and Platenburg, adopting their reasoning as consistent with Ninth Circuit decisions. The court emphasized that the evidence here was stronger than in those cases, particularly given the testimony about regular business practices maintaining current insurance certificates. Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict, the court concluded that a rational jury could find the bank was federally insured at the time of the robbery. The court applied the standard from Jackson v. Virginia for sufficiency of evidence to uphold the jury’s verdict.

Holding and Implications

Affirmed.

The court affirmed the conviction on Count I, holding that the evidence was sufficient to establish that The Oregon Bank, Tigard Branch, was federally insured by the FDIC at the time of the robbery. This decision directly affects the parties by upholding the conviction but does not establish new legal precedent beyond adopting the reasoning from other circuits regarding proof of FDIC insurance status.

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, v. ROBERT HARVEY WASHBURN, DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.

PER CURIAM:

Robert Harvey Washburn appeals Count I of his conviction for three counts of bank robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a). He contends that insufficient evidence supports the finding that The Oregon Bank, Tigard Branch, was insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) when he robbed it in 1983.

The government introduced a copy of The Oregon Bank's original 1976 FDIC certificate of insurance. Although the manager of the Tigard Branch admitted that she did not personally update FDIC insurance, she testified that the branch currently displays copies of the FDIC certificate, that it displayed such copies on the date of the robbery, that the branch could not display the certificate if it were not current and that in the regular course of business, personnel from the bank's main office checked to see that the insurance was current.

No Ninth Circuit case is directly on point. The Fifth Circuit, however, has held that an FDIC certificate showing the bank was insured five years before the robbery, coupled with the testimony of bank officials that they had seen a fifteen year old original certificate in the bank's vault, that the certificate was maintained in the regular course of business, and that the copies of the certificate were posted in the bank at the time of the robbery, was sufficient to permit a jury rationally to infer that the bank was insured at the time of the robbery. United States v. Maner, 611 F.2d 107, 110-11 (5th Cir. 1980). In United States v. Platenburg, 657 F.2d 797 (5th Cir. 1981), the court approved Maner as setting the minimum level of acceptable proof and held that a seven year old certificate of insurance alone was insufficient to support a finding of federally insured status. The proof in this case is stronger than in either of those cases, and they are not inconsistent with Ninth Circuit decisions. We accept the Fifth Circuit's reasoning. Accord United States v. Shively, 715 F.2d 260, 265 (7th Cir. 1983), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 104 S.Ct. 1001, 79 L.Ed.2d 233 (1984); United States v. Ford, 642 F.2d 77, 78 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 451 U.S. 17, 101 S.Ct. 1996, 68 L.Ed.2d 310 (1981); see also United States v. Stuart-Caballero, 686 F.2d 890, 893 (11th Cir. 1982) (applying Platenburg and Maner to federal registration of vessel); cf. United States v. Rowan, 518 F.2d 685, 693 (6th Cir.) (sufficient evidence of federal insurance was found by jury in special verdict), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 949, 96 S.Ct. 368, 46 L.Ed.2d 284 (1975).

In United States v. Campbell, 616 F.2d 1151, 1153 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 447 U.S. 910, 100 S.Ct. 2998, 64 L.Ed.2d 861 (1980), and in United States v. Phillips, 606 F.2d 884, 887 (9th Cir. 1979), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 1024, 100 S.Ct. 685, 62 L.Ed.2d 657 (1980), this court held that the uncontradicted testimony of ranking bank employees was sufficient to establish a bank's federally insured status. Neither Campbell nor Phillips states whether bank employees who testified had personal knowledge of the bank's FDIC status at the time of trial or at the time of the robberies, or whether an FDIC certificate was in evidence.

Accordingly, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict, the jury rationally could have found that The Oregon Bank, Tigard Branch, was federally insured at the time Washburn robbed it. See Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 318-19, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2788-89, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979); United States v. Fleishman, 684 F.2d 1329, 1340 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 1044, 103 S.Ct. 464, 74 L.Ed.2d 614 (1982).

Affirmed.