ABOVE: Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals

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The Fourth Circuit recently handed down a decision in United States v. Bishop in which it upheld the conviction of Brian Bishop, a U.S. foreign service officer, who was convicted of an attempted export of ammunition in connection with his move from his residence in Alabama to his post in Jordan. Bishop’s appeal centered on the knowledge requirement for an export conviction, arguing that he was unaware that the items he was exporting were on the USML. The Fourth Circuit held that specific knowledge that the items were USML is not necessary to support a conviction and ruled that the District Court had adequate evidence that Bishop knew that the exports were illegal.

The odd part of this finding is that Bishop had left the ammunition in the boxes in which the ammunition was purchased and which were clearly labelled “ORM–D” and “cartridges, small arms.” Indeed, the District Court relied on that labeling to acquit Bishop on charges of delivering ammunition to a carrier without notice in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(e). Generally speaking, criminal export cases almost always rely on mislabeling the goods as the most significant indicia of criminal intent, so this case is a bit of an outlier.

The evidence of Bishop’s intent relied on by the District Court, and upheld by the Fourth Circuit, seems pretty sketchy. The Fourth Circuit cited State Department training that Bishop received on the Foreign Affairs Manual, which states that shipment of ammunition is prohibited. The FAM cites 27 C.F.R. § 478 as authority for that prohibition and that regulation cites the Arms Export Control Act, although there is no suggestion that Bishop looked up the text of that regulation, not cited in the FAM, and saw its reference to the AECA. And, worse yet, the State Department employee who provided the FAM training to Bishop herself testified: “I can’t tell you what the State Department’s reasoning is” for prohibiting the shipment of ammunition.

The Fourth Circuit further cites an email from the moving company that Bishop’s wife received after the moving company had taken possession of the household effects stating that the shipment of the ammunition was illegal. This hardly seems probative of Bishop’s state of mind when he gave the ammunition to the moving company for export. Also cited by the Court was an inventory, prepared by the movers, which Bishop signed, and which did not mention the ammunition.  However, there was no evidence that he read the inventory carefully or noticed the omission. The worst evidence for Bishop is, perhaps, the fact that some of the ammunition was repacked by Bishop in boxes labelled “weights,” although it seems hard to rely on that when some of the ammunition remained in its original packaging and was clearly marked as ammunition.  Indeed, all of the evidence cited by the two courts cannot trump the simple fact that Bishop shipped the ammunition in clearly marked boxes.

Ironically, in a case that turns on knowledge of illegality, the court and the prosecutors themselves seem to be confused about what ammunition is and isn’t on the USML. Excluded from the AECA charges were “nearly 2,000 rounds of .45–caliber and 12–gauge shotgun ammunition.” These were only included in the count alleging delivery of ammunition without notice to a carrier. The 12-gauge shotgun shells are probably not Category III of the USML because shotguns with barrel lengths of 18 inches or longer are excluded from Category I. That ammunition would therefore be controlled under ECCN 0A984 and could be exported to Jordan without license. But .45 caliber ammunition is clearly covered under USML Category III, so it is odd that it was excluded from the count alleging the AECA violations.