Opinion ID: 757051
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Conditioning the Presentation of Psychiatric Evidence on

Text: Submission to a Psychiatric Examination 56 Hall next contends that the district court erred in conditioning his right to present psychiatric evidence in mitigation of punishment upon his submission to a government psychiatric examination prior to trial. Hall first argues that the district court could not properly compel him to undergo a government psychiatric examination as a condition upon his being allowed to introduce psychiatric evidence at sentencing because doing so unconstitutionally forced him to choose between exercising his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and his Eighth Amendment right to present evidence in mitigation of punishment. We disagree. 57 This court has long recognized that a defendant who puts his mental state at issue with psychological evidence may not then use the Fifth Amendment to bar the state from rebutting in kind. Schneider v. Lynaugh, 835 F.2d 570, 575 (5th Cir.1988). This rule rests upon the premise that [i]t is unfair and improper to allow a defendant to introduce favorable psychological testimony and then prevent the prosecution from resorting to the most effective and in most instances the only means of rebuttal: other psychological testimony. Id. at 576. 58 Hall correctly notes that he did not waive his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination merely by giving notice of his intention to submit expert psychiatric testimony at the sentencing hearing. See Brown v. Butler, 876 F.2d 427, 430 (5th Cir.1989) (holding that the state could not introduce expert testimony based upon a previous psychological examination of the defendant where the defendant announced an intention to offer expert psychological evidence but never actually did so). However, had he actually offered such evidence, the district court would not have violated Hall's privilege against self-incrimination by admitting psychiatric testimony subsequently offered by the government. Hall's claim that the district court could not condition his right to introduce expert psychiatric evidence based upon out-of-court examination of Hall upon his submission to a government psychiatric examination therefore lacks merit. In the same sense that Hall could not himself testify at the sentencing hearing regarding his remorse or acceptance of responsibility and then refuse cross-examination on this issue, he could not offer expert psychiatric testimony based upon his own statements to a psychiatrist and then deny the government the opportunity to do so as well in rebuttal. See Estelle v. Smith, 451 U.S. 454, 461-69, 472, 101 S.Ct. 1866, 68 L.Ed.2d 359 (1981) (holding that the admission of statements made by the defendant during a pretrial psychiatric examination violated his Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled self-incrimination because he was not advised before the examination that he had a right to remain silent and that any statement that he made could be used against him at a capital-sentencing hearing, but noting that a different situation arises where a defendant intends to introduce psychiatric evidence at the penalty phase); Vanderbilt v. Collins, 994 F.2d 189, 196 (5th Cir.1993) (If a defendant requests a [psychiatric] examination on the issue of future dangerousness or presents psychiatric evidence at trial, the defendant may be deemed to have waived the fifth amendment privilege.). 9 59 Hall, along with the American Orthopsychiatric Association and the American Association on Mental Retardation as amici curiae, argues in the alternative that, in order to adequately safeguard his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, the district court could not order a government psychiatric examination unless it sealed the results of the examination until the penalty phase of trial. Otherwise, he argues, he could have no guarantee that the government would not utilize the results of the examination or the fruits thereof as evidence in the guilt phase of his trial. This argument lacks merit. 60 The Supreme Court has held that, when a defendant claims that the government has sought to introduce the fruits of a coerced confession, the defendant must go forward with specific evidence demonstrating taint, upon which the government has the ultimate burden of persuasion to show that its evidence is untainted. Alderman v. United States, 394 U.S. 165, 183, 89 S.Ct. 961, 22 L.Ed.2d 176 (1969); see also Nardone v. United States, 308 U.S. 338, 341, 60 S.Ct. 266, 84 L.Ed. 307 (1939) ([T]he trial judge must give opportunity, however closely confined, to the accused to prove that a substantial portion of the case against him was a fruit of the poisonous tree. This leaves ample opportunity to the Government to convince the trial court that its proof had an independent origin.); United States v. Cherry, 759 F.2d 1196, 1207 (5th Cir.1985) (It is firmly established that, once the defendant goes forward with specific evidence demonstrating taint, the government has the final burden of persuasion to show that the evidence is untainted.); 5 WAYNE R. LAFAVE, SEARCH AND SEIZURE § 11.2(b), at 45 (3d ed.1996). 61 We are convinced that this evidentiary framework provides all of the protection against the introduction of the fruits of the government psychiatric examination prior to Hall's introduction of psychiatric evidence that the Constitution requires. Had Hall undergone the government psychiatric examination and believed that the government was improperly seeking to introduce evidence that it derived from the examination, he could have precluded the introduction of such evidence by offering some evidence of taint. The district court would have been required to exclude the evidence unless the government could carry its burden of persuading the court that the evidence was not tainted. 62 The only specific safeguard that Hall requested in his motion opposing the government's request for a psychiatric examination and oral argument on this motion was the sealing of the results of the examination until the penalty phase of his trial. Hall has cited several cases in which district courts have imposed such a safeguard. See United States v. Beckford, 962 F.Supp. 748, 761 (E.D.Va.1997); United States v. Haworth, 942 F.Supp. 1406, 1408-09 (D.N.M.1996); United States v. Vest, 905 F.Supp. 651, 654 (W.D.Mo.1995). While we acknowledge that such a rule is doubtless beneficial to defendants and that it likely advances interests of judicial economy by avoiding litigation over whether particular pieces of evidence that the government seeks to admit prior to the defendant's offering psychiatric evidence were derived from the government psychiatric examination, we nonetheless conclude that such a rule is not constitutionally mandated. 63 Our conclusion in this regard is bolstered by Rule 12.2(c) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which provides that, when a defendant intends to rely upon an insanity defense during the guilt phase of his trial, the district court may order a mental examination upon motion by the government. See FED.R.CRIM.P. 12.2(c). In order to safeguard the defendant's privilege against self-incrimination, the rule provides as follows: 64 No statement made by the defendant in the course of any examination provided for by this rule, whether the examination be with or without the consent of the defendant, no testimony by the expert based upon such statement, and no other fruits of the statement shall be admitted in evidence against the defendant in any criminal proceeding except on an issue respecting mental condition on which the defendant has introduced testimony. 65 Id. Noticeably absent from the rule is any requirement that the government be denied access to the results of the examination until after the defendant actually introduces testimony regarding his mental condition. Rather, the rule merely precludes the government from introducing as evidence the results of the examination or their fruits until after the defendant actually places his sanity in issue. Yet the rule has consistently been held to comport with the Fifth Amendment. See, e.g., United States v. Lewis, 53 F.3d 29, 35 n. 9 (4th Cir.1995); United States v. Stockwell, 743 F.2d 123, 127 (2d Cir.1984) ([W]hile we do not wish to encourage the practice of requiring defendants to submit to a psychiatric examination in the prosecutor's presence (either in person or through the use of a tape recording), such a procedure cannot be said to constitute a per se violation of Rule 12.2(c) and the defendant's Fifth Amendment rights.). Given that the government presents its case-in-chief during the guilt phase prior to the defendant, we perceive no functional distinction between the risk that the government will improperly utilize the fruits of a psychiatric examination undertaken pursuant to Rule 12.2 during its case-in-chief (and thus prior to the defendant's offering psychiatric evidence of insanity) and the risk that the government in this case would improperly utilize the fruits of the court-ordered psychiatric examination prior to Hall's introduction of psychiatric evidence during the penalty phase. 10 We therefore reject Hall's contention that the district court violated his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination by ordering him to undergo a psychiatric examination as a condition upon his offering psychiatric evidence during the sentencing hearing or by declining to order the results of the examination sealed until the sentencing hearing. 11