In United States v. Harris, No. 18-12418 (Feb. 19,
2018) (William Pryor, Rosenbaum, Conway), the Court affirmed the
defendant's conviction for Hobbs Act extortion.
First, the Court concluded that the evidence was sufficient
to support the extortion conviction of the defendant, a former prison guard who
discovered and then appropriated for himself a phone scam in which inmates were
posing as government agents and tricking victims into paying fake fines in the
form of prepaid debit-card numbers. The defendant
argued that the government failed to prove that he obtained the debit card
numbers with the "consent" of the inmates, a required element of
extortion, because the inmates had no choice but to turn over the numbers. After an historical overview of the crime of
extortion, the Court explained that "consent" in that context did not
require such a degree of voluntariness; rather, a victim consents so long as he
retains some degree of choice, even if it is a Hobson's choice. Here, sufficient evidence showed that the
inmates consented to the defendant taking their numbers without reporting him
so as to avoid implicating themselves in the scam or possessing contraband. The Court also found sufficient evidence that
the defendant wrongfully used fear, one of the alternative means of extortion.
Second, the Court found that the district court did not
violate the defendant's right to present a complete defense by limiting his
closing argument. Specifically, the
court preventing him from arguing that, although he might have committed theft,
he did not commit extortion. The court,
however, did permit him to argue that, while he may have been guilty of some
crime, he was not guilty of extortion. The
court did not abuse its discretion by precluding the defendant from arguing
that the government should have charged him with theft, as that risk confusing
the jury. And if the jury did not believe he committed extortion, it would have acquitted him.
