Opinion ID: 421796
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Application of Official Immunity in This Case

Text: 36
37 Having considered the nature and scope of the official immunity principles relevant here, we turn to their application. Application of the official immunity doctrine to Gray's constitutional claims requires a functional analysis to determine whether the alleged prosecutorial misconduct is advocatory. 36 Applying the analysis set forth above, we conclude that all conduct before the various Grand Juries is advocatory and thus entitled to absolute immunity. For any investigative conduct antecedent to Grand Jury proceedings, we assume arguendo that qualified immunity applies but conclude that this lower level of protection--as a matter of law--bars Gray's suit. 38 (a) Conduct Before the Grand Juries. We regard it as settled that presentation of evidence to an indicting Grand Jury falls within the scope of advocatory prosecutorial conduct protected by Imbler. 37 Participation in Grand Jury proceedings is a vital and customary part of a prosecutor's duties. At least in those instances where an indictment is returned, it can safely be said that much if not all of a prosecutor's conduct in presenting the evidence to a Grand Jury will reflect traditional advocacy directed to securing an indictment. In such cases, it would be an exercise in futility and patently counter-productive to attempt to separate out elements of conduct that might have involved non-advocatory functions. We therefore hold that the trial [229 U.S.App.D.C. 189] court was fully justified in concluding that, in the instant case, the presentation of evidence to the grand jury indisputably is an advocatory function of a prosecutor. 542 F.Supp. at 932. 39 Gray argues, however, that our decision in Briggs v. Goodwin, 569 F.2d 10 (D.C.Cir.1977), cert. denied, 437 U.S. 904, 98 S.Ct. 3089, 51 L.Ed.2d 1133 (1978), dictates a different result. In Briggs, a federal prosecutor allegedly perjured himself during a judicial hearing in connection with on-going Grand Jury proceedings. An individual who ultimately was indicted by the Grand Jury subsequently brought a civil suit for damages caused him by the alleged perjury, and the prosecutor's conduct was held to be non-advocatory. Among the reasons given for this result was that the on-going Grand Jury proceedings were investigative in nature; i.e., at the time the prosecutor allegedly perjured himself, the Grand Jury's investigation had not yet focused on any particular suspect and was essentially a broad fact-finding mission. 38 40 Likewise, in the present case, Gray argues, the defendants presented evidence to various Grand Juries over a period of two years before the indictment of Gray was returned. Thus, it is said, here too the Grand Jury proceedings represented nothing more than a broad fact-finding mission. At least with respect to conduct before non-indicting Grand Juries, the analogy is not without force. Briggs does indeed recognize that some prosecutorial activities during on-going Grand Jury proceedings may involve non-advocatory conduct. But insofar as Briggs compels close scrutiny of prosecutorial conduct before non-indicting Grand Juries to determine which side of the advocatory/non-advocatory line the conduct falls on, we think the limited principles enunciated there have no application in the present case. 41 The various factors identified in Part II.B.2. supra highlight the crucial distinctions between this case and Briggs. First, this case involved focused Grand Jury presentations, i.e., conduct that was sufficiently adversarial to trigger concerns about retaliatory litigation. A pre-indictment investigation, such as the one conducted here, will necessarily have focused on a particular suspect or crime when the prosecutor actually begins presenting evidence of probable cause to a Grand Jury. Any related prosecutorial action before a Grand Jury, moreover, takes place in a formal procedural setting in which the prosecutor's role approximates his role at trial. Although Grand Jury proceedings are ex parte, the prosecutor's role in guiding the proceedings--whether or not he has finally decided to seek indictment of the target of Grand Jury inquiry--has a distinctly inquisitorial quality to it. Furthermore, when working with a Grand Jury the prosecutor must exercise delicate judgments in deciding what evidence to seek and present. The complaint in the instant case is perfectly illustrative: the allegations focus on evidentiary omissions, misrepresentations and fabrications with respect to a particular suspect. 42 Second, in the present case there were procedural safeguards--which Gray in fact availed himself of--to remedy the alleged misconduct in the Government's Grand Jury presentations. Whenever a Grand Jury returns an indictment, the defendant can move to dismiss based on prosecutorial misconduct before the Grand Jury. Many courts have dismissed indictments procured through deliberate presentation of perjured testimony, intentional failure to present exculpatory evidence, and a variety of other [229 U.S.App.D.C. 190] types of prosecutorial misconduct. 39 We need express no view on the scope of such a remedy in this circuit, except to note that there is no settled rule on its availability to redress the misconduct alleged here. The possibility that the trial court could have decided to dismiss the indictment under these circumstances--which Gray recognized by bringing a motion to dismiss--provides an adequate procedural deterrent against the type of misconduct Gray avers. 43 In Briggs, by contrast, the challenged conduct did not involve actual presentation of evidence to a Grand Jury. Instead, the prosecutor was alleged to have perjured himself in court testimony about an aspect of the on-going investigation. Central to the result in Briggs was that the Grand Jury proceedings in that case had been designed as a broad-scale investigation with no focus on any particular suspect. 40 It is true that the prosecutor's misconduct in Briggs occurred in the course of formal judicial proceedings; but the prosecutor and the plaintiff had not yet engaged in an adversarial posture, 41 and the court noted that the prosecutor's conduct in testifying involved little or no discretionary judgment. 42 In Briggs, moreover, there was evidence demonstrably showing that the only potential safeguards against the alleged misconduct involved were wholly ineffective. The Government argued that criminal and ethical sanctions were sufficient to cure the prosecutor's alleged perjury, but because four and a half years had passed without official inquiry--even by the court before which the perjury was alleged to have taken place--the prospect of any sanction being invoked was described as theoretical only. Briggs, 569 F.2d at 24. While Gray had access to a remedial process that he himself could and did initiate, the plaintiff in Briggs could only stand by and wait for either the court or the prosecutor to reveal and remedy the misconduct that had occurred. 44 Briggs v. Goodwin therefore does not compel the conclusion that the alleged prosecutorial misconduct before non-indicting Grand Juries is entitled to only qualified immunity. The analogy Gray draws between the investigative conduct in Briggs and the activities that took place in this case has superficial appeal. But we are not content with functional labels that indulge form over substance. On closer examination, the present case, unlike Briggs, involves prosecutorial conduct to which the reasons for absolute immunity apply with sufficient force to justify full protection from suit. 45 (b) Other Pre-Indictment Conduct. Gray does not confine his allegations to prosecutorial misconduct in the presentation of evidence to the Grand Juries. He alleges a broad-ranging pre-indictment investigation involving witness interviews and other conduct in developing evidence to present to the Grand Juries. Gross deficiencies in the entire pre-indictment investigation, Gray avers, ultimately caused the alleged deprivation of his Fifth Amendment rights. 46 We need not labor the question whether absolute or qualified immunity applies [229 U.S.App.D.C. 191] to prosecutorial activities in developing evidence to present to a Grand Jury. 43 Because qualified immunity is readily available to protect these activities, we may assume that this less stringent level of immunity applies without considering the applicability of absolute immunity. Under qualified immunity, executive officials are shielded from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person should have known. 44 Gray cannot clear the threshold obstacle of demonstrating that the Government prosecutors violated any clearly established constitutional or statutory requirement in conducting their pre-indictment investigation. Some courts have recognized a prosecutorial duty to refrain from deliberately presenting perjured testimony or engaging in other sorts of misconduct before a Grand Jury. 45 But there is no authority whatsoever recognizing a prosecutorial duty to conduct in any particular way investigative or other activities antecedent to Grand Jury proceedings. The trial court thus correctly concluded that any arguable duty under the Fifth Amendment to conduct a careful, thorough pre-indictment investigation ... was not clearly established at the time of [the Government's alleged] actions. 542 F.Supp. at 931 n. 5. 47
48 There can be no serious question that the individual defendants are entitled to absolute immunity on Gray's claim of malicious prosecution. In Barr v. Matteo, 360 U.S. 564, 79 S.Ct. 1335, 3 L.Ed.2d 1434 (1954), the Supreme Court held that absolute immunity is available to federal officials on common law claims arising out of discretionary acts undertaken within the outer perimeter of the officials' authority. Under this rule, it is enough if the official performed an act not manifestly or palpably beyond his authority and having more or less connection with the general matters committed by law to his control or supervision, 46 a test easily satisfied here. 47 49 The requirement of discretion is just as plainly satisfied. We conclude in Part III. infra that all of the alleged activities at issue in this case involve discretionary functions protected under the FTCA. Although the concepts of discretion in official immunity law and under the FTCA are not of identical scope, they are similar and may have a common origin. 48 In both areas, the notion of discretion is a benchmark [229 U.S.App.D.C. 192] against which to measure whether judicial scrutiny of a disputed official act might inhibit official policymaking and thus unduly interfere with the efficient operation of government. Because we are satisfied that all of the alleged activities cited by Gray fall within the discretionary function exception, we are confident that the acts for which official immunity is claimed are discretionary as well. 50 Gray argues, however, that he does not complain of actual institution of criminal proceedings, but rather of malicious investigative and administrative acts that ultimately led to the institution of proceedings against him. A claim for malicious prosecution will lie, he contends, so long as a causal connection is established between the acts of the defendant and the decision to prosecute the plaintiff. 49 And where a claim for malicious prosecution is stated against federal officials and prosecutors for actions taken in their investigatory and administrative roles only, Gray urges, the traditional rule of absolute immunity in malicious prosecution cases should be replaced with the current rule allowing only qualified immunity for investigative activities. 50 This attempt to distinguish different types of prosecutorial activity is unavailing. It is well settled that the functional analysis governing prosecutorial immunity as against federal claims has no application to common law claims. Whatever the nature of a prosecutor's activity, he may not be sued at common law for discretionary conduct within the outer perimeter of his authority. Dellums v. Powell, 660 F.2d 802 (D.C.Cir.1981), cited by Gray, has no application. Because that case involved a constitutional claim, 51 anything said therein that might bear on the proper analysis of prosecutorial function is irrelevant to application of immunity as against a common law claim.