Robertson v. United States

HOLMES, Circuit Judge.

The appellant was tried, convicted, and sentenced to imprisonment upon an indictment charging that he transported in interstate commerce a certain automobile knowing the same to have been stolen. A motion was duly made to dismiss the indictment because it failed to allege that the vehicle was in fact a stolen car. The court below overruled the motion.

The indictment is in the language of the statute,1 which ordinarily is sufficient; but where the statute itself omits an essential element of the offense or includes it only by implication, the indictment nevertheless should…