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91-8199.ZS
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1993-11-06
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NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
See United States v. Detroit Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
DEAL v. UNITED STATES
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for
the fifth circuit
No. 91-8199. Argued March 1, 1993-Decided May 17, 1993
On the basis of his use of a gun in committing six bank robberies on
different dates, petitioner Deal was convicted, in a single proceeding,
of six counts of carrying and using a firearm during and in relation to
a crime of violence in violation of 18 U. S. C. 924(c)(1). Section
924(c)(1) prescribes a 5-year prison term for the first such conviction
(in addition to the punishment provided for the crime of violence) and
requires a 20-year sentence ``[i]n the case of [a] second or subsequent
conviction under this subsection.'' The District Court sentenced Deal
to 5 years imprisonment on the first 924(c)(1) count and to 20 years
on each of the five other counts, the terms to run consecutively. The
Court of Appeals affirmed.
Held: Deal's second through sixth convictions in a single proceeding
arose ``[i]n the case of his second or subsequent conviction'' within the
meaning of 924(c)(1). There is no merit to his contention that the
language of 924(c)(1) is facially ambiguous and should therefore be
construed in his favor under the rule of lenity. In context,
``conviction'' unambiguously refers to the finding of guilt that
necessarily precedes the entry of a final judgment of conviction. If it
referred, as Deal contends, to ``judgment of conviction,'' which by
definition includes both the adjudication of guilt and the sentence,
the provision would be incoherent, prescribing that a sentence which
has already been imposed shall be 5 or 20 years longer than it was.
Deal's reading would have the strange consequence of giving a
prosecutor unreviewable discretion either to impose or to waive the
enhanced sentence by opting to charge and try a defendant either in
separate prosecutions or under a single multicount indictment. The
provision also cannot be read to impose an enhanced sentence only
for an offense committed after a previous sentence has become final.
While lower courts have held that statutes providing enhancement
for ``subsequent offenses'' apply only when a second offense has been
committed after conviction for the first, those decisions depend on the
fact that it cannot legally be known that an ``offense'' has been
committed until there has been a conviction. The present statute
does not use the term ``offense,'' and so does not require a criminal act
after the first conviction; it merely requires a conviction after the first
conviction. Nor is the rule of lenity called for on grounds that the
total length of Deal's sentence (105 years) is ``glaringly unjust.''
Under any conceivable reading of 924(c)(1), some criminals convicted
of six armed bank robberies would receive a sentence of that length.
It is not ``glaringly unjust'' to refuse to give Deal a lesser sentence
merely because he escaped apprehension and conviction until the
sixth crime had been committed. Pp. 2-8.
954 F. 2d 262, affirmed.
Scalia, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist,
C. J., and White, Kennedy, Souter, and Thomas, JJ., joined.
Stevens, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Blackmun and
O'Connor, JJ., joined.