Shaw v. United States

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Shaw v. United States
Seal of the United States Supreme Court.svg
Argued October 4, 2016
Decided December 12, 2016
Full case nameLawrence Eugene Shaw, Petitioner v. United States
Docket nos. 15–5991
Citations 580 U.S. ___ ( more )
137 S. Ct. 462; 196 L. Ed. 2d 372
Opinion announcement Opinion announcement
Prior historyUnited States v. Shaw, 781 F.3d 1130 (9th Cir. 2015)
Court membership
Chief Justice
John Roberts
Associate Justices
Anthony Kennedy  · Clarence Thomas
Ruth Bader Ginsburg  · Stephen Breyer
Samuel Alito  · Sonia Sotomayor
Elena Kagan
Case opinions
Majority Breyer, joined by unanimous
Laws applied
18 U.S.C.   § 1344

Shaw v. United States, 580 U.S. ___ (2016), was a United States Supreme Court case that clarified the application of the federal bank fraud statute to cases where a defendant intends to only defraud a customer of the bank, rather than the bank itself. [1]

Supreme Court of the United States highest court in the United States

The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. Established pursuant to Article III of the U.S. Constitution in 1789, it has original jurisdiction over a small range of cases, such as suits between two or more states, and those involving ambassadors. It also has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all federal court and state court cases that involve a point of federal constitutional or statutory law. The Court has the power of judicial review, the ability to invalidate a statute for violating a provision of the Constitution or an executive act for being unlawful. However, it may act only within the context of a case in an area of law over which it has jurisdiction. The Court may decide cases having political overtones, but it has ruled that it does not have power to decide nonjusticiable political questions. Each year it agrees to hear about 100–150 of the more than 7,000 cases that it is asked to review.

Bank fraud is the use of potentially illegal means to obtain money, assets, or other property owned or held by a financial institution, or to obtain money from depositors by fraudulently posing as a bank or other financial institution. In many instances, bank fraud is a criminal offence. While the specific elements of particular banking fraud laws vary depending on jurisdictions, the term bank fraud applies to actions that employ a scheme or artifice, as opposed to bank robbery or theft. For this reason, bank fraud is sometimes considered a white-collar crime.

Contents

Background

Lawrence Shaw received the information from a bank account at Bank of America that belonged to a customer, Stanley Hsu. Shaw used that information to take money from Hsu but did not directly steal from the bank. Shaw was convicted under a federal statute criminalizing fraud against banks and appealed, arguing his target was its customer.

Bank of America American multinational banking and financial services corporation

The Bank of America Corporation is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company based in Charlotte, North Carolina with central hubs in New York City, London, Hong Kong, Minneapolis, and Toronto. Bank of America was formed through NationsBank's acquisition of BankAmerica in 1998. It is the second largest banking institution in the United States, after JP Morgan Chase. As a part of the Big Four, it services approximately 10.73% of all American bank deposits, in direct competition with Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and JPMorgan Chase. Its primary financial services revolve around commercial banking, wealth management, and investment banking.

Decision

In a unanimous opinion written by Justice Stephen Breyer, the Court held that a scheme to defraud customers also deprives the bank of money in which the bank held a "property right", and criminal defendants may therefore be convicted under the federal statute for schemes to defraud bank customers. [2] However, the Supreme Court remanded the case to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to determine whether the trial court administered an erroneous jury instruction. [3]

Stephen Breyer Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

Stephen Gerald Breyer is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. A lawyer by occupation, he became a professor and jurist before President Bill Clinton appointed him to the Supreme Court in 1994; Breyer is generally associated with its more liberal side.

The remand court procedure is used by higher courts to send cases back to lower courts for further action.

United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the districts of Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington

The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is a U.S. Federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts:

See also

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References

  1. ↑ Shaw v. United States, No. 15–5991, 580 U.S. ___ (2016), slip. op. at 1.
  2. ↑ Shaw, slip. op. at 1-3.
  3. ↑ Shaw, slip. op. at 8-9.
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The United States Reports are the official record of the rulings, orders, case tables, in alphabetical order both by the name of the petitioner and by the name of the respondent, and other proceedings of the Supreme Court of the United States. United States Reports, once printed and bound, are the final version of court opinions and cannot be changed. Opinions of the court in each case are prepended with a headnote prepared by the Reporter of Decisions, and any concurring or dissenting opinions are published sequentially. The Court's Publication Office oversees the binding and publication of the volumes of United States Reports, although the actual printing, binding, and publication are performed by private firms under contract with the United States Government Publishing Office.

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