Opinion ID: 2995545
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Merits of the Government’s Motions in

Text: Limine Appellants next argue that the trial judge erred in granting the government’s motions in limine. The appellants desired to present evidence of the affirmative defense of necessity to the jury. In Bailey, the Supreme Court announced that a defendant was not entitled to claim a defense of necessity or duress unless he could demonstrate that given the imminence of the threat, violation of [the law] was his only reasonable alternative. 444 U.S. at 411. Appellants contend that the trial judge erred in ruling that the test set forth in Bailey required them to demonstrate that they faced an imminent threat of death or serious bodily harm in order to advance a justification defense. Appellants further contend that, even if the Bailey Court required them to demonstrate imminence, the trial judge erred in ruling that the facts set forth in their offers of proof were insufficient to allow them to advance their proposed defense. Appellants’ initial claim, that the trial judge committed error in requiring them to demonstrate that they feared an imminent threat, urges us to adopt a rule stating that imminence is not an essential element of the lesser-evil defenses. According to appellants’ theory, lesser-evil defenses should be available to defendants who can establish either that they face an imminent threat of serious bodily harm or that they reasonably believe they have no legal alternatives to violating the law. In support of their theory, appellants read United States v. Bailey and this court’s precedent following Bailey to suggest that imminence was one factor which could be considered in an analysis of whether ’reasonable alternatives’ were available, but that it was not a necessary element of a justification defense. But the appellants cleverly misread the Supreme Court’s doctrine in Bailey and go on to misapply our precedent that relies upon Bailey. The Supreme Court held that escaped convicts were not entitled to an instruction on the defense of necessity or duress because the convicts did not immediately turn themselves in once they had escaped. In so holding, the Court noted that once the inmates had escaped, they no longer faced an imminent threat at the hands of allegedly abusive guards. Bailey, 444 U.S. at 416-17. We have repeatedly and unquestioningly held that a defendant claiming a defense of necessity or duress must establish that he was under imminent fear of death or serious bodily harm. See, e.g., United States v. Jocic, 207 F.3d 889, 892 (7th Cir. 2000); United States v. Salgado- Ocampo, 159 F.3d 322, 326 (7th Cir. 1998); United States v. Haynes, 143 F.3d 1089, 1090 (7th Cir. 1998); United States v. Elder, 16 F.3d 733, 738 (7th Cir. 1994); United States v. Schulte, 7 F.3d 698, 699-700 (7th Cir. 1993). We decline appellants’ invitation to revisit this long line of precedent and reaffirm our holding that a criminal defendant seeking to invoke a justification defense must, as a condition precedent, establish that he faced an imminent threat and had no reasonable legal alternatives to avoid that threat. Appellants, nevertheless, contend that they did face an imminent threat and that they did avail themselves of all legal alternatives. They argue that prison officials were unresponsive to the concerns they expressed regarding racial tensions in the cells and that their requests for racially segregated housing were denied. They further argue that they believed that any recourse through other channels-- prison grievances being one example--would have been fruitless, and indeed might have further exacerbated the danger they faced. Despite appellants’ creative characterization of the threat they faced, none of the appellants alleged anything remotely resembling an imminent threat. Instead, they made only vague and conclusory allegations about the state of USP-Marion and their generalized fears regarding future threats. We have noted in the past that future or later and imminent are opposites. Salgado-Ocampo, 159 F.3d at 327; Haynes, 143 F.3d at 1090. In this case, Kolb alleged primarily that he was assaulted by a black prisoner in December 1995 and February 1997, the latter more than two years prior to his possession of the knife in this case. Kolb further alleged that he had heard of attacks involving white and black inmates and that he feared the possibility that he might be moved to a unit in the prison where he might fear for his safety because he might be housed with or near black inmates as opposed to being housed in an all-white environment. Tokash made similar allegations, complaining that he was a victim of racially motivated assaults in 1996 and 1997, again more than two years prior to his possession of the knife in this case. Usher, unlike Kolb and Tokash, failed to allege that he was ever a victim of racially motivated assaults, though he does complain that he feared being moved to an environment where he might be subjected to racially motivated assaults. Appellants’ allegation notwithstanding, we note again that prisons are inherently dangerous places and are inhabited by violent people, but that does not mean that all persons housed in a federal penitentiary, even one filled with the most dangerous prisoners of the land, face an imminent threat of physical assault. See Haynes, 143 F.3d at 1091; United States v. Sotelo, 94 F.3d 1037, 1040 (7th Cir. 1996). If fear of potential future violence were the appropriate standard, as appellants urge us to hold, the absurd result would be that every inmate in any prison across the country could justify their possession of a weapon simply by articulating a fear of some future, possible, and generalized threat. Indeed, we have previously rejected precisely such a formulation, holding that [i]f prisoners could decide for themselves when to seek protection from the guards and when to settle matters by violence, prisons would be next to impossible to regulate. The guards might as well throw the inmates together, withdraw to the perimeter, and let them kill one another . . . . Haynes, 143 F.3d at 1091. Appellate courts are ill-equipped to consider and adopt policies and practices to maintain the safety and security of this country’s penitentiaries. Indeed, the operation of our correctional facilities is peculiarly the province of the Legislative and Executive Branches of our government, not the Judicial. Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 548 (1979). Aside from appellants’ failure to have alleged an imminent threat, they also failed to take advantage of alternative legal remedies prior to violating the law by arming themselves. It is telling that although Tokash, Kolb, and Usher claim to have brought their concerns to the USP- Marion warden and another prison official, not one of them ever filed any sort of administrative grievance, alleging that they were housed in a condition that prison officials knew to be unsafe or were being detained in an area of imminent danger. Equally telling is the fact that none of the appellants have ever requested protective custody to escape the alleged threat. Indeed, Tokash was offered protective custody following a 1997 fight and he refused such housing. Cf. Sotelo, 94 F.3d at 1040 (denying defense of duress to inmates who failed to seek protection from prison authorities). We are convinced that the trial judge properly determined that Tokash, Kolb, and Usher feared only a generalized and unspecified possible future threat and that none of them ever availed himself of other adequate and reasonable legal remedies before arming themselves. For completeness’ sake, we comment that legal terms, like imminence, can and do have different meanings in different contexts. In the context of the defense of necessity to a criminal charge of possession of a weapon in a prison, imminence means that a prisoner must demonstrate that the threat was immediate and that there was no reasonable alternative to violating the law. We observe that, in the context of the Prison Litigation Reform Act, see 28 U.S.C. sec. 1915(g), which makes an exception to the three-strikes provisions for prisoners who face an imminent danger of serious physical injury, imminent may not be so narrowly defined as we have defined it in this case. By no means do we mean to suggest that the definition of imminence in the context of a justification defense is the same as the definition of imminence in the context of the PLRA. C. Denial of Subpoena Duces Tecum & Depositions The appellants lastly challenge the trial judge’s denial of their motions for subpoenas duces tecum, which they sought in order that they might discover evidence somewhere in USP-Marion records to support their necessity defenses. The trial judge denied the motion because the information sought by the appellants was nothing but a fishing expedition and was not relevant to any available defense. Furthermore the trial judge ruled that the requested mountain of documents was an oppressive and unreasonable burden. The Supreme Court identified a four-part test to guide trial courts in the issuance of subpoenas in criminal cases pursuant to Fed. R. Crim. P. 17(c). First, the documents sought must be evidentiary and relevant. Second, the defendant must be unable through the exercise of due diligence to otherwise procure the documents reasonably in advance of trial. Third, the documents must be essential to prepare for trial. Finally, the application must be made in good faith and not intended as a general fishing expedition. United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 699-700 (1974); United States v. Ashman, 979 F.2d 469, 495 (7th Cir. 1992). It is clear that appellants have failed to meet this test. They speculated the records would document the racial tension, and inadequate remedies available at the Marion prison, as well as, repercussions following the attempt to utilize administrative procedures. The trial court, however, had ruled explicitly that the defendants were not entitled to proceed under a theory that their possession of the weapons was justified by necessity because they failed to make a threshold showing that they faced an imminent threat that necessitated disregard of the law prohibiting possession of weapons in federal penitentiaries. The appellants argue that the trial court’s ruling created a chicken or egg dilemma--that they could not establish the threshold showing of the required elements of their proposed necessity defense unless they were allowed their fishing expedition through the records of the Bureau of Prisons. But Rule 17(c) is not a discovery device to allow criminal defendants to blindly comb through government records in a futile effort to find a defense to a criminal charge. Instead, it allows only for the gathering of specifically identified documents which a defendant knows to contain relevant evidence to an admissible issue at trial. Nixon, 418 U.S. at 700; Ashman, 979 F.2d at 495.