RE: $1000.00
Funny stuff... As a law student, I have to critique the joke. "Robber" and "burglar" cannot be used in the same context for the same offense (single offense). It became a robbery when the woman walked in on him; there is now a presentable victim within the element of the crime (depends on the jurisdiction (47 of 50 states), based on eminent, or perceived, threat to safety of victim). Due to the hierarchy rule, the charge would be robbery in the lower degree, i.e. Second, or Third, since the victim was not initially present (a court would have to prove, overwelmingly, that the culpret indeed had the malice aforthought of the victim's presence in the first instance of the entry).
Sorry, I did some case review, locally, for a fellow who was charged with robbery. In reality, although a sentece was deserving, he was convicted of robbery (in the Second Degree) when in fact there was NO material victim to the crime. He was convicted on the premise that he had the 'intent' to rob the victim, but, when he arrived to do the robbery no one was home (this, under a normal judicial majestrate's rational operating mind, would be burglary), but the law explicitly explains the corpus delecti of crime... Poor ******* is doing 20 years for an offense that should have been 1-3 years. This guy wasn't even an habitual offender! This, folks, is why you keep your mouths shut when being interogated by police...do not say "...yeah, I was going to rob him for the money he owed me for a bag of rock, so I took my 'nine'...he wasn't home so I decided to steal his ****", as he did. He plainly gave details to his intent of committing robbery, and since he carried out the majority of the acts in question to obtain the goal of robbery, he was charged as such. Remember, simply thinking of a crime, or illegal act, is NOT a crime. There is no "attempt", it is always 'attemted X' for it to be a crime of attemt. You Free law lesson for the day. -Phil