United States v. Stokes

Facts

Defendant was indicted for three robberies. In all three, the perpetrator was wearing a mask or hat and was carrying a pillowcase with a heavy object at the bottom of each. Witnesses in each robbery described the perpetrator as a dark-skinned male between 5’11” and 6’0″ and between 200 and 250 pounds. In the third robbery the perpetrator fired a shot inside the bank but the police did not release that information to the press. Defendant came to the investigator’s attention after an informant led the officers to co-defendant Casanyl Valentine, who was trying to sell dye-stained cash.

Valentine told officers he hired people to carry out bank robberies for him, and gave officers the details of three robberies defendant conducted and knew the information about the single shot in the last robbery. Officers concluded that the defendant matched surveillance. A teller, a bank vice president, FBI agent, and teller of the last robbery all testified identifying the defendant as the robber. Defendant was convicted for the first two robberies but not the third where the single shot was fired. He appealed arguing that there was no sufficient evidence for his conviction.