Wilton R. Thompson v. United States

Appellant and Nathan Nyland Robeson were charged by indictment with entering a savings and loan association with intent to commit a larceny, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113 (a). Robeson pleaded guilty. Appellant pleaded not guilty and stood trial. The jury was unable to agree. Appellant was retried on an information charging the same offense. He was convicted and appealed. We find no prejudicial error, and therefore affirm.

Appellant objected to the admission of testimony of the witness Blair on the ground that proof of unexplained possession of unusual amounts of money after a robbery, “standing alone,” is not competent evidence to connect the possessor with the robbery absent a showing of prior poverty, and that the government failed to establish the latter. However, the relevance of Blair’s testimony did not depend apon the large amount involved but rather upon other unusual circumstances which the jury could regard as incriminating — particularly that appellant produced the sum ($3,000) from a brown paper shopping bag; that it consisted entirely of bills not over twenty dollars in denomination and included two large bundles of five dollar bills and two hundred one dollar…