United States v. Robert H. Docherty

FRIENDLY, Chief Judge:

In this prosecution of a 35-year old lawyer, the Government has sought to press to the verge the section of the federal criminal code, 18 U.S.C. § 656, prohibiting the theft, embezzlement or misapplication of bank funds by a bank officer or employee. Admittedly, the defendant, a borrower from a Buffalo, N. Y. bank, neither obtained nor sought any personal gain. Moreover, so far as concerns the transactions in which he participated, or of which he knew, he is bound and, so far as the record shows, is able, to make the bank whole. Our problem is whether the Government has…