Defendants Stephon Demus, Ryan Clark, and Marlon Barksdale were convicted in the Northern District of Illinois for Hobbs Act robbery and brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence. The incident occurred late at night at a Chicago convenience store called J&J Food and Grocery. The defendants approached a customer standing on the sidewalk outside the store's vestibule and robbed him at gunpoint. They then entered the vestibule and robbed additional customers who were waiting in line to make purchases. The defendants did not demand money from the store employees or attempt to steal from the store's inventory. Following the robbery, the store closed for approximately thirty minutes to an hour to allow for a police investigation. The defendants moved for a judgment of acquittal, arguing the robbery did not affect interstate commerce, but the district court denied the motion. They appealed, raising two main arguments: first, that the robbery did not meet the interstate commerce requirement of the Hobbs Act, and second, that the jury might have convicted them based solely on the robbery of the individual outside the store, which they claimed did not affect commerce.
The Seventh Circuit, writing for the panel, addressed the interstate commerce nexus first. The court noted that the language of the Hobbs Act is 'unmistakably broad' and requires only a 'de minimis or otherwise slight effect on interstate commerce.' The court found that the government easily cleared this bar because the robbery forced the store to shut down, thereby preventing it from engaging in commerce and reducing its profits. The court cited precedent establishing that obstructing commerce in a literal sense, such as by robbing someone directly engaged in commerce, satisfies the Act. Here, the customers were waiting in line to purchase items, establishing a sufficient nexus. The court then addressed the defendants' alternative argument regarding jury confusion. They relied on Yates v. United States, which requires setting aside a verdict if it is supportable on one legal ground but not another, and it is impossible to tell which ground the jury selected. The court rejected this, explaining that a successful Yates argument requires the jury to have been presented with two distinct legal theories. In this case, the defendants were charged with a single count of Hobbs Act robbery. The court reasoned that if the events inside and outside the store constituted a single robbery, the defendants' argument was merely a sufficiency of the evidence claim, not a Yates claim. To succeed on Yates, the defendants would have needed to show the jury was presented with a theory of multiple separate robberies, one of which was legally invalid. Since the jury was not presented with such a second legal theory, the defendants' reliance on Yates was flawed. The court also noted that this argument was never presented to the district court, constituting a waiver. Finally, because the Hobbs Act convictions were affirmed, the firearms convictions under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) were also affirmed.
The decision reinforces the broad scope of the Hobbs Act, confirming that even temporary store closures caused by robberies satisfy the interstate commerce element. It also clarifies that defendants cannot raise Yates arguments on appeal if they failed to present the specific legal theories to the jury at trial. The case is remanded with instructions to affirm the convictions, leaving no unresolved factual questions regarding the commerce nexus in this specific context.
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