United States v. Eugene Billy James

By Count II of an indictment, appellant was charged and later convicted by a jury of violating 26 U.S.C. § 5861 (d), in that he did possess a 20-gauge automatic Remington shotgun, Model 11, Serial No. 1035377, with a barrel length of Ui/2 inches, which had not been registered to him in the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record maintained under 26 U.S.C. § 5841 .

Section 5861(d) provides in pertinent part that it shall be unlawful for any person “to receive or possess a firearm which is not registered to him in the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record.”

Appellant was sentenced to the custody of the Attorney General for a term of five years, “said sentence to run consecutively to the one which he [appellant] is obliged to serve with the State.” Later the district court modified the sentence to provide that the same be served under the provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 4208 (a) (2).

Following the commencement of the trial, appellant moved to strike Count II of the indictment on the ground that such count was violative of the appellant’s Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself. This motion was denied, and at the close of the trial the jury returned its…