Opinion ID: 152880
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Does Richards's Guilty Plea Bar His Coercion Claim?

Text: Next, Richards argues that the government violated the Fifth Amendment's prohibition on government-compelled testimony by placing improper pressure on CA to cooperate in the government's investigation that resulted in CA's insistence that Richards either testify before the SEC or be terminated. The district court rejected Richards's motion to suppress his testimony, which was admittedly false and became the basis for the obstruction of justice charge to which Richards pled guilty, as untimely in light of the district court's schedule for motions. On appeal, Richards argues that his guilty plea should not bar his coercion claim because review of his claim is necessary to preserve the integrity of the judicial process. Richards Br. 32. Richards's coercion claim is easily resolved because the Fifth Amendment does not protect false testimony. As previously noted, a plea of guilty waive[s] any and all non-jurisdictional defects in the indictment. Moloney, 287 F.3d at 239. However, this court may overturn a guilty plea on involuntariness grounds when the defendant shows that his plea was substantially motivated by a coerced confession. United States ex rel. Ross v. McMann, 409 F.2d 1016, 1023 (2d Cir.1969) (en banc), vacated on other grounds sub nom. McMann v. Richardson, 397 U.S. 759, 90 S.Ct. 1441, 25 L.Ed.2d 763 (1970). In addition, a guilty plea that is otherwise voluntary and intelligent may be overturned if it contains constitutional violations that are logically inconsistent with the valid establishment of factual guilt. Menna v. New York, 423 U.S. 61, 62 n. 2, 96 S.Ct. 241, 46 L.Ed.2d 195 (1975) (per curiam). Richards's coercion claim is not viable, because it is based on a fatally flawed premise: that false statementswhether or not made under coercive circumstancesare protected by the Fifth Amendment. To the contrary, the Supreme Court has repeatedly held that the Fifth Amendment does not confer[] a privilege to lie. Brogan v. United States, 522 U.S. 398, 404, 118 S.Ct. 805, 139 L.Ed.2d 830 (1998). [P]roper invocation of the Fifth Amendment privilege against compulsory self-incrimination allows a witness to remain silent, but not to swear falsely.... United States v. Apfelbaum, 445 U.S. 115, 117, 100 S.Ct. 948, 63 L.Ed.2d 250 (1980); see also United States v. Wong, 431 U.S. 174, 180, 97 S.Ct. 1823, 52 L.Ed.2d 231 (1977); Bryson v. United States, 396 U.S. 64, 72, 90 S.Ct. 355, 24 L.Ed.2d 264 (1969). Richards's coercion claim is based entirely on perjured testimony, and thus, is unsupportable. See, e.g., Scher v. Nat'l Ass'n of Sec. Dealers, Inc., 386 F.Supp.2d 402, 409 (S.D.N.Y. 2005) (finding plaintiff could not state a claim for supposed deprivation of her constitutional rights where she had perjured herself before the National Association of Securities Dealers); see also United States v. Nanni, 59 F.3d 1425, 1431 (2d Cir.1995) (negative inferences may not be drawn from immunized exculpatory testimony except to the extent that the testimony amounts to perjury). Richards is attempting to turn the dilemma faced by individuals who are improperly coerced into incriminating themselves or who risk a negative inference from their silence, into a trilemma whereby an individual feels he must either testify truthfully, risk the inference, or lie under oath. See Brogan, 522 U.S. at 404, 118 S.Ct. 805. The Supreme Court rejected this trilemma, which is wholly of the guilty suspect's own making, as insufficient to implicate the Fifth Amendment's protection. Id. The government may have been provided the leverage to secure [Richards's] guilty plea by Richards's lies, see Richards Reply Br. 25, but Richards's attempt to draw a sort of constitutional equivalency between a coerced confession and a coerced lie, see Richards Reply Br. 13 (quoting Higazy v. Templeton, 505 F.3d 161, 171 (2d Cir.2007)), is exactly the type of compassion inflation that the Supreme Court has declared outside the purview of the Fifth Amendment, Brogan, 522 U.S. at 404, 118 S.Ct. 805. Thus, it was not ironic that the government used Richards's false statements in its obstruction charge against him, see Richards Reply Br. 25, but simply a predictable consequence of his mendacity. Richards argues that the rule denying constitutional protection to coerced false testimony does not apply to this case because the government acted covert[ly] in securing his testimony, by compell[ing][him] to speak without disclosing... its role in his dilemma to speak or be fired. Richards Letter at 1. But even assuming that the government engaged in such covert acts by not revealing its role in CA's investigation, see id. a curious claim given that Richards was interviewed at the United States Attorney's Office, and now concedes on appeal that he knew at his interview that he was a target of a securities fraud investigationRichards cites no case law supporting his argument, nor can he because, as he concedes, even [o]utside the immunity context, courts often have repeated that the Fifth Amendment grants no right to lie, id. at 2. While circumstances may provide a duress defense due to improper government pressure, see, e.g., United States v. Knox, 396 U.S. 77, 82-83, 90 S.Ct. 363, 24 L.Ed.2d 275 (1969), nothing about the circumstances under which Richards was interviewed rendered his false statements immune or otherwise afforded him Fifth Amendment protection, see United States v. Jacobs, 547 F.2d 772, 777 (2d Cir.1976) ([A] constitutional claim may not be asserted as a defense to a perjury charge.). Thus, Richards's indictment was neither jurisdictionally deficient nor motivated by a coerced confession, McMann, 409 F.2d at 1023, and his coercion claim is therefore barred by his guilty plea, see Hayle v. United States, 815 F.2d 879, 881 (2d Cir. 1987).