01-2283, 01-4078 U.S. v. Marrero

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“Had our defendants not robbed the Detroit dealers, there would have been no transaction-at least with them. But the qualification is vital. Had the defendants not lured the Detroit dealers to Chicago, those dealers would have used their $25,000 to buy cocaine elsewhere, and that purchase, a transaction in commerce whether it would have been made in Detroit or elsewhere because, as we said, all cocaine originates overseas, thus was thwarted, and commerce therefore obstructed, by the robbery. United States v. Thomas, supra, 159 F.3d at 297-98. (This is the ‘depletion of assets’ theory of Hobbs Act jurisdiction. It is orthodox. … Nor is it necessary that the individual criminal act, here the robbery of the Detroit dealers, be shown to have a measurable impact on commerce, which would usually be impossible to show. It is enough if the class of acts has such an impact. Perez v. United States, 402 U.S. 146, 153-54 (1971); United States v. Thomas, supra, 159 F.3d at 298; United States v. Hale, 978 F.2d 1016, 1018 (8th Cir. 1992). Deciding what shall count as a class is difficult, but not in this case. Whether the class is defined broadly as theft from drug dealers or narrowly as theft of cash from drug dealers, it is undoubtedly large enough to have some effect on the drug trade, or what is just as good, would have such an effect if the law did not punish such thefts and by punishing them deter many of the potential thieves and incapacitate the actual ones who are apprehended. Cf. United States v. Olin Corp., 107 F.3d 1506, 1510 and n. 8 (11th Cir. 1997); Proyect v. United States, 101 F.3d 11, 13 (2d Cir. 1996) (per curiam). In either event, it is legitimately punishable under Congress’s power to protect interstate commerce from obstruction.”

Affirmed.

Appeals from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Hibbler, J., Posner, J.