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IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE IN AND FOR NEW CASTLE COUNTY STATE OF DELAWARE v. ) ) ) ) ) ) )

ID No. 0611011332/0611011352 0611011396

ANDRE BRIDGERS KEINO CHRICHLOW

Submitted: June 20, 2007 Decided: October 19, 2007

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER UPON CONSIDERATION OF DEFENDANTS' MOTIONS FOR JUDGMENT OF ACQUITTAL GRANTED in part and New Trial GRANTED in part.

Defendants robbed a bank, taking money from several bank employees and threatening several customers at gunpoint. At trial, the court told the jury to consider, among other things, whether Defendants robbed the customers from whom nothing was taken. The jury convicted on all counts. Now, Defendants ask the court to reconsider whether, as a matter of law, threatening a bystander while robbing someone else also makes the bystander a robbery victim. In other words, can it be said that a person who was not the subject of a theft was, nonetheless, robbed?

I. At this point, there is no reasonable doubt that Defendants robbed a PNC bank by taking the bank's money from four employees at gunpoint. Defendants also threatened three other bank employees, Johnson, Gleason and Kirk. Defendant Bridgers first approached Johnson, the branch manager, and told him that Defendants were robbing the bank and he forced Johnson into the vault. Gleason was the assistant branch manager. Bridgers forced Gleason to order her tellers to step back and away from their stations to facilitate the robbery. As the robbery unfolded, Chrichlow confronted nine customers at gunpoint. Defendants did not take anything from them, but Chrichlow held the customers at bay in order to stifle their interfering. During the robbery, Bridgers also noticed Kirk sitting in Kirk's office. He ordered Kirk out and forced him across the bank to where Chrichlow was holding the customers. Under Delaware's law, each employee from whom Defendants took money and the branch manager are separate robbery victims.1 In Delaware, and other states, a single bank robbery may spawn many robbery victims, typically the bank's tellers whose cash drawers are "cleaned-out." And, no one disputes that threatening

Ross v. State, Del. Supr., No. 514, 1988, Moore, J. (Feb. 23,1989) (ORDER). See also McCoy v. State, 361 A.2d 241 (Del. 1976).
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a bystander at gunpoint is a felony, aggravated menacing.2 (It also is possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony,3 a crime carrying a minimum, mandatory prison sentence.4) But now, for the first time in Delaware, the State contends that any person threatened during a bank robbery is a robbery victim, even if he or she is merely a bystander. II. The bank robbery happened on November 16, 2006. Defendants were indicted on sixteen counts of robbery in the first degree, two counts of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, and one count of conspiracy in the second degree. Bridgers was also indicted on one count of possession of a firearm by a person prohibited. As mentioned, the indictment included separate robbery counts for the customers. The getaway driver, Craig Hunter, was indicted too, but he struck a deal, pleading guilty to several charges and testifying for the State. Trial was held on May 24, 2007. The court charged the jury on aggravated menacing as a lesser-included offense of the robbery counts involving Gleason, Kirk, and the customers. Defendants conceded that the evidence justified

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11 Del. C.

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