Senate Bill No. 268
(By Senators Mitchell and Kessler)
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[Introduced January 21, 2002; referred to the Committee
on the Judiciary.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact section twelve, article two, chapter
sixty-one of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine
hundred thirty-one, as amended, relating to adding to the
definition of robbery in the first degree situations where
a weapon is threatened, but not shown, during the course of
a robbery.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That section twelve, article two, chapter sixty-one of the
code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as
amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 2. CRIMES AGAINST THE PERSON.
§61-2-12. Robbery or attempted robbery; penalties.
(a) Any person who commits or attempts to commit robbery by:
(1) Committing violence to the person, including, but not limited to, partial strangulation or suffocation or by striking
or beating; or (2) uses the threat of deadly force by the
presenting or the threat of presenting of a firearm or other
deadly weapon, is guilty of robbery in the first degree and,
upon conviction thereof, shall be imprisoned in a state
correctional facility not less than ten years.
(b) Any person who commits or attempts to commit robbery by
placing the victim in fear of bodily injury by means other than
those set forth in subsection (a) of this section or any person
who commits or attempts to commit robbery by the use of any
means designed to temporarily disable the victim, including, but
not limited to, the use of a disabling chemical substance or an
electronic shock device, is guilty of robbery in the second
degree and, upon conviction thereof, shall be confined in a
correctional facility for not less than five years nor more than
eighteen years.
(c) If any person: (1) By force and violence, or by putting
in fear, feloniously takes, or feloniously attempts to take,
from the person or presence of another any property or money or
any other thing of value belonging to, or in the care, custody,
control, management or possession of, any bank, he or she shall
be guilty of a felony and, upon conviction thereof, shall be
confined in the penitentiary a state correctional facility not less than ten nor more than twenty years; and (2) if any person
in committing, or in attempting to commit, any offense defined
in the preceding clause (1) of this subsection, assaults any
person, or puts in jeopardy the life of any person by the use of
a dangerous weapon or device, disabling chemical substance or an
electronic shock device, he or she shall be guilty of a felony
and, upon conviction thereof, shall be confined in the
penitentiary a state correctional facility not less than ten
years nor more than twenty-five years.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to include in the
definition of robbery in the first degree situations where a
weapon is threatened, but not shown, during the course of a
robbery.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken
from the present law, and underscoring indicates new language
that would be added.