Opinion ID: 679962
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Proof of the Alleged Oral Waiver

Text: 26 Given that the FAA regulation in question is not ambiguous, Pan Am next asserts it obtained an oral waiver of the regulation from the FAA and that the district court erred in disallowing evidence of that waiver. Evidence showed that as of April 1986 Pan Am established procedures to ensure that unaccompanied interline bags were not carried on its airlines. However, the process for identifying unaccompanied interline bags proved too cumbersome and expensive. Pan Am therefore stopped performing a match for interline bags in London in February 1987 and in Frankfurt in July 1988. It also eliminated physical searches of unaccompanied interline bags. Thereafter bags were simply x-rayed and put on board, rather than matched against particular tickets. This was a violation of ACSSP XIV, which requires Pan Am to advise the FAA in writing if interline bag match has been discontinued. 27 It is apparent therefore from the record that Pan Am made no distinction on Flight 103 between interline accompanied versus interline unaccompanied bags. Most significantly, the Flight 103 pilot was not informed about the presence of unaccompanied interline bags, in violation of ACSSP XIII E. Pan Am managers allegedly instructed gate employees in London not to advise pilots of unaccompanied bags because it made crews jittery. 28 What remains central to appellants' defense is their reliance on x-ray alone to inspect interline bags transferred to Flight 103. They sought to introduce evidence that at 1986 and 1987 meetings, mostly with unidentified FAA officials, oral permission was purportedly given to Pan Am to allow it to deviate from the ACSSP regulations. Because of that waiver, they contend, they were in compliance with FAA requirements. They thus sought to show that their noncompliance from the letter of the regulations was excused by an exemption. 29 Yet, the relevant regulations expressly require a written application for a waiver and written FAA approval based on certain findings. See 14 C.F.R. Secs. 11.25, 11.27(e), 108.7(a)(2), 108.25(b)-(c) (1993); see also 49 U.S.C.App. Secs. 1357(a)(2)(B), 1421(a)(6) & (c). The Director of the Office of Civil Aviation Security at the FAA at the time of the Pan Am bombing, Raymond Salazar, testified that in order to obtain an exemption from an ACSSP regulation an air carrier would have to file a written request and follow a specific procedure that was then in place. Salazar further denied ever granting an oral waiver to any Pan Am official or for that matter to any other air carrier. His predecessor at the FAA, Billie Vincent, testified to the same effect that written authorization and approval were required for exemption from ACSSP requirements. 30 Salazar was asked by plaintiffs to testify whether he had ever granted an oral waiver to a Pan Am official. The purpose of the question was to get an explanation of a statement contained in a Pan Am electronic mail (e-mail) memorandum. Plaintiffs produced the e-mail message that Pan Am security officer Daniel Sonesen had sent to the regional Pan Am security representatives at Heathrow and Frankfurt. The e-mail message, dated March 28, 1988, stated in part, the Dir. FAA R Salizar has granted x ray as and [sic] alternative to searching pass. baggage. Salazar testified that that representation was inaccurate and a misrepresentation, and when pressed by counsel, characterized it as a falsehood. 31 Despite requirements that exemptions be in writing, Pan Am offered no proof that it had ever applied for a written exemption from the provisions of ACSSP XV C.1. (a) at Heathrow or Frankfurt. There was evidence that Pan Am had made written applications on other occasions for exemptions from ACSSP XV C.1, 2, and 3, indicating that Pan Am was aware of the proper procedure for requesting a waiver. Further, Pan Am's Chairman, Thomas Plaskett, admitted the airline knew waivers had to be in writing. 32 Although the FAA regulations occupied a key role in the trial of this case, it must be kept in mind that Pan Am and Alert's compliance with them is not dispositive of the outcome. As appellants acknowledge in their brief, and as the court instructed the jury, proof of full compliance with the ACSSP would not necessarily provide appellants with a complete defense against a claim of wilful misconduct. FAA regulations only establish minimum requirements for air carriers. A jury could conceivably find certain circumstances under which an air carrier had committed wilful misconduct even though it followed FAA regulations to the letter. Similarly, noncompliance with ACSSP procedures will not necessarily lead to a per se finding of wilful misconduct. A carrier might not have acted with wilful misconduct, even were it to have failed to comply with an FAA regulation. The issue we are called upon to decide, thus, is whether evidence of Pan Am's alleged oral waiver should have been admitted by the trial court. 33
34 The excluded evidence concerning the oral waiver primarily involved the testimony of three witnesses. We are told that the first witness, Daniel Sonesen, would have testified that he approached the FAA in 1986 and received a verbal authorization for the x-ray-only inspection of interline bags, though he could not recall who gave this authorization. He would have testified further, so defendants state, that at an October 1987 meeting with Salazar and others he was advised that x-ray inspection would comply with ACSSP requirements. Sonesen's pretrial deposition testimony was before the district court, but we are unable to find in the record an express offer of proof of what his testimony would have been. Moreover, our faith in the defendants' versions of Sonesen's testimony is not enhanced by the fact that Sonesen's 1990 deposition testimony is substantially inconsistent with the representations made by the defendants before us. Simply put, the defendants refused to put Sonesen on the stand for their own reasons, and yet want us to accept at face value representations not made under oath, not subject to cross-examination, and in fact inconsistent with prior testimony made under oath. See, e.g., Fortunato v. Ford Motor Co., 464 F.2d 962, 967 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1038, 93 S.Ct. 517, 34 L.Ed.2d 487 (1972) (stating that appellate court will not permit a party to allege on appeal what it failed to claim to the trial court, since that would allow a party to obtain a new trial simply on its claim that it would have proven a certain fact or facts had it been given a chance); Moss v. Hornig, 314 F.2d 89, 93 (2d Cir.1963) (holding that an appellate court cannot be expected to reverse where there was no offer of proof, and where the significance of the evidence sought to be introduced is not obvious); Marrone v. United States, 355 F.2d 238, 241 (2d Cir.1966) (holding that the failure to make an offer of proof to demonstrate the significance of excluded testimony must be held to be fatal, even where persuasive authority indicated that the district court should have allowed the testimony). 35 The second witness proffered by the defense was the former co-chair of the Pan Am Security Task Force, Richard Cozzi. Although Cozzi testified at trial, he was not permitted to testify as to Pan Am's purported verbal authorization from the FAA. Since his proposed testimony was preserved, we can see he would have testified that the Task Force in late 1986 wanted to find out if x-ray of interline bags would comply with the ACSSP, even though some members were doubtful it could comply; the Task Force instructed Sonesen to check with the FAA as to whether inspection by x-ray satisfied the ACSSP; and Sonesen reported back that he had done so and that the FAA said that x-ray inspection of interline bags would comply with the requirements. Even had Cozzi been permitted to testify on this issue, his statement respecting what Sonesen reported would have been inadmissible hearsay because it was offered for the truth of the matter asserted, to wit, that Salazar granted Pan Am a waiver of compliance with ACSSP XV C.1. (a). That Pan Am offered Cozzi's testimony for this purpose is clear from the record: 36 MR. SHAUGHNESSY: You talked about what Mr. Sonesen told you about his discussions with the FAA. Do you have an opinion as to whether Mr. Sonesen was telling the truth? 37 .... 38 MR. COZZI: Yes. I certainly believed Mr. Sonesen was telling the truth. There was no reason for him not to. 39 The third witness was Pan Am's Chairman, Thomas Plaskett. Pan Am offered his testimony in an offer of proof, in which Plaskett stated that he did not recall having any conversations or information concerning whether the FAA had authorized Pan Am to use x-ray machines to examine luggage. 40 Additional evidence appellants sought, but were not allowed to introduce to show the supposed appropriateness of their procedures included testimony concerning a September 1988 FAA inspection at Heathrow at which Pan Am was not cited for violating ACSSP XV C.1. (a). 41
42 In a series of oral rulings repeated throughout the record, the trial judge stated that any testimony by defense witnesses as to the purported verbal authorization would be excluded. It treated the proffered evidence as an attempt to mount a so-called government authorization defense, the bounds of which will be discussed shortly. Chief Judge Platt believed that a government authorization defense may only be predicated on authorization from a government official with power to grant such authorization. He held the defense unavailable because anyone who might have given a verbal exemption at the FAA would have had no authority to do so. The trial court also observed that any evidence as to a verbal authorization would be irrelevant since Pan Am was charged with knowing the regulations, including those that stated amendments and exemptions to the regulations must be in writing. 43 Before analyzing the government authorization defense, we briefly discuss one of defendants' arguments for permitting the introduction of the verbal authorization defense: to rebut Salazar's statements concerning Sonesen's e-mail message, which plaintiffs had introduced into evidence. A trial court may in the interests of fairness allow otherwise inadmissible evidence on an issue when necessary to rebut a false impression left by inadmissible evidence introduced by an opposing party. See, e.g., United States v. Rea, 958 F.2d 1206, 1225 (2d Cir.1992). But whether to entertain such sort of proof is left squarely in the trial judge's discretion since the presider at trial is in a better position to assess how to conduct it fairly than is an appellate court reading the record. 44 Here the district court did not abuse its discretion in declining to admit the evidence for this purpose. It directly offered Pan Am and Alert a curative instruction, stating, [o]n the so-called verbal authorization, ... [i]f they want me to give the jury an instruction to disregard the testimony that came in at the outset of the case before I understood what the issue was, I will be glad to give that instruction. Since appellants refused to ask for that instruction, they waived any complaint as to harm they may have suffered due to Salazar's characterization of Sonesen's e-mail as inaccurate. See United States v. Grubczak, 793 F.2d 458, 461-62 (2d Cir.1986). 45 Nor is there merit in Pan Am's contention that it was an abuse of discretion to exclude testimony regarding a September 1988 FAA inspection at which Pan Am was not cited for violations relating to its x-ray procedure. Other evidence that was before the jury showed FAA inspections of Pan Am operations at Heathrow and Frankfurt had not resulted in any FAA citations. 46 Now turning to the substantive question of whether the district court erred in refusing to allow any evidence regarding the oral waiver, the plaintiffs' argue initially that Pan Am failed to make a proper offer of proof with respect to the evidence they sought to introduce. Assuming without deciding that defendants sufficiently preserved their objection does not change the result, as we demonstrate below. 47 We note that the parties and the district court frame the legal issue they faced in different ways. Chief Judge Platt thought the offer of proof was an attempt by defendants to mount a government authorization defense. We believe the proffered proof also can be viewed as an attempt by defendants to invoke what is often referred to as a mistake of law defense. Defendants assert it was proof probative of defendants' states of mind. 48
49 Chief Judge Platt correctly ruled that a government authorization defense was not available to Pan Am and Alert. Such defense requires a demonstration of legitimate reliance on an official interpretation of law. See United States v. Durrani, 835 F.2d 410, 422-23 (2d Cir.1987). Under our case law, the official on whose interpretation the defendant allegedly relied must have actual authority. See United States v. Duggan, 743 F.2d 59, 83-84 (2d Cir.1984) (mistaken belief that individual had apparent government authority did not warrant submission of defense to jury); see also United States v. Schwartz, 924 F.2d 410, 422 (2d Cir.1991). 50 Here all the evidence demonstrated that amendments to or exemptions from ACSSP XV C.1. (a) had to be made in writing by the FAA following written application. Both Salazar and Vincent testified that as Directors of the FAA Office of Civil Aviation Security they did not have the authority to alter the ACSSP orally. The regulations support this view, as did testimony of Pan Am's own witnesses. Pan Am's attempted government authorization defense was therefore properly precluded by the district court because the FAA officials allegedly contacted simply did not have the actual authority to grant any verbal authorization for Pan Am's x-ray-only inspection of interline bags. 51
52 Viewed as a mistake of law defense, defendants offered the oral waiver evidence to show they thought what they were doing was in accordance with the law and, even if they were mistaken, under such a circumstance they should not be held liable for wilful misconduct. Yet, contrary to appellant's view, even were a mistake of law defense one that could be successfully interposed, it would not necessarily absolve Pan Am of liability in this Warsaw Convention case. The same standards governing the availability of mistake of law govern even when it might not supply a complete defense to liability--in this case, for example, the jury might have found that complying with the FAA minimum requirements was still inadequate under the circumstances on the ultimate issue of wilful misconduct. The usual standards defining the permissibility of a mistake of law defense are as effective where the mistaken law is a regulation. See United States v. International Minerals & Chem. Corp., 402 U.S. 558, 563, 91 S.Ct. 1697, 1700-1701, 29 L.Ed.2d 178 (1971) (noting principle that ignorance of the law is no defense applies whether the law be a statute or a duly promulgated and published regulation). 53 In any event, the oral waiver evidence was inadmissible for purposes of showing that Pan Am's violation of the FAA regulation was the result of a mistake of law. It has long been a maxim that ignorance of the law is no excuse. The reason for this ancient rule is not because everyone knows the law, but because ignorance of it is a ready excuse easily raised and difficult to refute. We and the Supreme Court regularly acknowledge that a mistaken view of the law usually will not serve as an acceptable defense. Durrani, 835 F.2d at 422; Cheek v. United States, 498 U.S. 192, 199, 111 S.Ct. 604, 609, 112 L.Ed.2d 617 (1991). While cases where the rule is cited typically involve criminal offenses, see, e.g., Cheek, 498 U.S. at 199, 111 S.Ct. at 609, it applies equally in civil cases. See Barlow v. United States, 32 U.S. (7 Pet.) 404, 411, 8 L.Ed. 728 (1833) (Story, J.) (It is a common maxim, familiar to all minds, that ignorance of the law will not excuse any person, either civilly or criminally....); Ruley v. Nelson, 106 F.R.D. 514, 518 (D.Nev.1985) (noting ignorance of law is no excuse in civil or criminal law). 54 In Cheek v. United States, 498 U.S. 192, 111 S.Ct. 604, 112 L.Ed.2d 617 (1991), now a seminal case in the area, the Supreme Court declared that the term wilfully in federal criminal tax statutes carved out an exception to the general maxim that ignorance of the law is no excuse. Id. at 199-200, 111 S.Ct. at 609-610. The Court said that the wilfulness requirement in the tax laws required the defendant to be allowed to introduce evidence as to any belief--no matter how objectively unreasonable that belief might be--tending to show an unawareness of a legal duty on defendant's part. Id. at 203, 111 S.Ct. at 611. 55 In doing so, the Supreme Court carefully limited its decision to the tax field. It emphasized the complexity of the tax laws, 498 U.S. at 200, 111 S.Ct. at 609, the difficulty of the average citizen in comprehending duties imposed by the tax laws, id. at 199, 111 S.Ct. at 609, and constructions of the term wilfulness in the tax context, id. at 201, 111 S.Ct. at 610. Our subsequent decisions and those of other courts acknowledge Cheek 's limited application. See, e.g., United States v. Caming, 968 F.2d 232, 240 (2d Cir.) (collecting other circuits' cases refusing to extend Cheek to non-tax criminal statutes), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 113 S.Ct. 416, 121 L.Ed.2d 339 (1992); cf. Ratzlaf v. United States, --- U.S. ----, ----, 114 S.Ct. 655, 663, 126 L.Ed.2d 615 (1994) (not intending to dishonor the venerable principle that ignorance of the law generally is no defense to a criminal charge while allowing mistake of law defense in the specific context of criminal prosecutions for violations of the anti-structuring provision of the money laundering statutes). 56 We see no reason that would prompt us to view heavily regulated air carriers--certified by the FAA and charged with knowledge of the relevant statutes and regulations under which they operate--the same as average citizens who face the daunting task of unraveling the complexities of the Internal Revenue Code. There is cause to be wary because of the ease with which air carriers could fabricate sham defenses and ignore with impunity safety regulations. See United States v. Squires, 440 F.2d 859, 864 (2d Cir.1971) (stating whenever a defense of ignorance of the law ... is claimed, it is recognized that one may not deliberately close his eyes to what otherwise would have been obvious to him). Accordingly, when a law, rule or regulation that pertains to passenger and crew safety is clear, we hold that an air carrier--one of the handful of corporations in the business of transporting the public by air--may not claim ignorance of the law as an excuse. 57 Our holding is narrow. We reiterate it to emphasize its limitations: in a case brought under the Warsaw Convention involving violations of FAA regulations that pertain to the safety of those aboard an aircraft, against a defendant air carrier charged with knowing and following those regulations, that air carrier may not mount a mistake of law defense. In the instant case, therefore, the evidence offered by Pan Am regarding its mistaken view of what was required by the ACSSP was inadmissible for the purposes of mounting a mistake of law defense. 58
59 Notwithstanding the foregoing, appellants insist the oral waiver evidence was admissible on the question of their wilful misconduct, which is of course the ultimate issue in this Warsaw Convention case, see Ospina, 975 F.2d at 37. In Vinieris v. Byzantine Maritime Corp., 731 F.2d 1061 (2d Cir.1984), we addressed the question of admissibility of evidence going to a defendant's state of mind in the context of a statute that required conscious misconduct be proven for a seaman to recover under the penalty provision in a wage-withholding statute. We held that [n]o evidence which bore even remotely on [state of mind] should have been kept from the jury, unless it interjected tangential and confusing elements which clearly outweighed its relevancy. Id. at 1064. This formulation is in some sense a restatement of the well-known balancing test contained in Rule 403 of the Federal Rules of Evidence. 60 Whether the problems to be anticipated by admission of the oral waiver evidence in the present case clearly outweighed the evidence's relevancy is a close question. Analysis of this issue cannot exist in a vacuum. Because the oral waiver evidence was so intertwined with the government authorization and mistake of law defenses, which as a matter of law were not available to defendants, we believe that admission of such evidence might well have been unnecessarily confusing and perhaps prejudicial so as to justify the trial court's refusal to allow its admission. 61 Nonetheless, even were it an abuse of discretion to deny admission of the oral waiver evidence on the foregoing grounds, we hold that such an error was harmless. An evidentiary ruling is harmless when we are fairly assured that it had no substantial effect on the jury's verdict. See Rea, 958 F.2d at 1220. In the instant case, the record is replete with evidence that wholly undermines Pan Am's claim of good faith. The overwhelming evidence presented during the course of the three and one-half month trial established that Pan Am officials ignored repeated warnings and signals that its security measures were insufficient. 62 The scope and nature of this evidence needs to be set forth in some detail. We begin in 1983 when a Pan Am flight leaving Rome, Italy for New York was the target of a bomb planted in an unaccompanied interline suitcase. Disaster was averted only when Turkish authorities conducted a passenger/bag match that uncovered the suitcase. Pan Am thus knew of this type of sabotage and that physical matches of suitcases were successful in averting such a terrorist act. 63 In 1985 a bomb hidden inside a radio and packed in an unaccompanied interline bag exploded on an Air India 747 over the North Atlantic, killing all aboard. The dangers of a bomb hidden inside radios packed in interline bags were well known to Pan Am and the airline industry. These two incidents not only led to the adoption of ACSSP XV.C.1(a), but they conveyed clear warnings that what actually happened at Lockerbie was a distinct possibility. 64 In September 1986 Pan Am received a report from a group of Israeli security experts commissioned to review Pan Am security at various airports, including Heathrow and Frankfurt. The security experts concluded that under the present security system, Pan Am is highly vulnerable to most forms of terrorist attack. The fact that no major disaster has occurred to date is merely providential. The report specifically cautioned Pan Am on the use of x-ray machines as substitutes for physical searches, and the dangers of interline unaccompanied bags. 65 In October 1988 Alert Manager for Germany Ulrich Weber wrote a memo to New York headquarters citing the need for more personnel to remedy Frankfurt's security shortcomings. Only minimum efforts were made to remedy them. 66 In July 1988 the FAA issued a Security Bulletin warning of the high threat of a terrorist retaliatory attack because of the downing of an Iranian Jetliner. In November 1988 Pan Am received an FAA Security Bulletin warning that a raid on a terrorist group had uncovered a bomb built into a Toshiba radio cassette player. (Toshiba Warning). The bulletin warned that the bomb was difficult to detect by the use of normal x-ray. 67 The most wilful disregard of passenger safety, bordering on the outrageous, was in December 1988 when Pan Am received an FAA Security Bulletin advising that the United States Embassy in Helsinki had received a telephone warning that a Pan Am flight from Frankfurt to London and on to New York would be bombed. (Helsinki Warning). The Helsinki warning came just 14 days before the instant tragedy and specifically referred to the Toshiba Warning. Despite these warnings, Pan Am failed to conduct searches of unaccompanied interline luggage, and instead inspected such bags only by x-ray. Pan Am did not even alert x-ray technicians to watch for Toshiba radios. It violated FAA regulations by failing to match the bags with particular tickets without advising the FAA in writing that interline bag match had been discontinued. And it violated other FAA regulations by failing to warn pilots about the unaccompanied bags on board for fear that the crews might become jittery. Additionally, Pan Am did not replace several members of its security team who were woefully undertrained given their responsibility for thwarting terrorist attacks. 68 Moreover, the Helsinki Warning was deliberately placed under a pile of papers on the desk of the security officer who received the bulletin and was first discovered in the morning following the downing of Flight 103. There was also evidence that Weber, the security officer in charge, ordered the Pan Am employee who discovered the bulletin after the explosion to backdate the warning to give government investigators the impression that the warning was timely disseminated when received. The district court found that the backdating was evidence of consciousness of guilt on the part of Pan Am for its part in the wrongful causation of the crash. 69 This and other evidence overwhelmingly supported the jury's conclusion that but for Pan Am's wholly inadequate terrorist prevention techniques and its deliberate indifference and overt acts of wilfulness, the bombing and the senseless loss of life would not have occurred. Even had Pan Am been permitted to present Sonesen's deposition testimony to the jury, the above recited proof, plus the additional fact that any waiver of FAA regulations had to be in writing, make it plain to us that it would not have affected the jury's finding that Pan Am was guilty of wilful misconduct. Its exclusion was therefore harmless error. 70 Consequently, for all of the above reasons, the district court's refusal to permit the admission of Pan Am's oral waiver evidence--on government authorization, mistake of law, and state of mind grounds--does not constitute a sufficient basis for the granting of a new trial.