Opinion ID: 795902
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Deliberately Destroying Exculpatory Evidence

Text: 27 The Amended Complaint alleges that the ADAs violated Yarris's Fourteenth Amendment rights when they deliberately destroyed . . . highly exculpatory information. 6 (Am.Compl.¶ 92.) Although we have not directly addressed whether prosecutors are absolutely immune from claims based on the destruction of exculpatory evidence, we have denied absolute immunity where a plaintiff alleged that a prosecutor knowingly failed to preserve exculpatory evidence. See Henderson v. Fisher, 631 F.2d 1115, 1120 (3d Cir.1980) ( per curiam ). We have also observed that courts have been unwilling to extend absolute immunity to a prosecutor's alleged perjury or destruction of evidence when not closely connected to an ongoing criminal prosecution. Davis v. Grusemeyer, 996 F.2d 617, 630 n. 28 (3d Cir.1993); but see Heidelberg v. Hammer, 577 F.2d 429, 432 (7th Cir.1978) (prosecutor absolutely immune from suit claiming that he destroyed and falsified evidence). 28 We believe that destroying exculpatory evidence is not related to a prosecutor's prosecutorial function. Unlike decisions on whether to withhold evidence from the defense, decisions to destroy evidence are not related to a prosecutor's prosecutorial function. As our late colleague Judge Becker aptly observed in Wilkinson v. Ellis, 484 F.Supp. 1072, 1083 (E.D.Pa.1980): 29 [O]nce the decision is made not to furnish evidence to the defense, no additional protectible prosecutorial discretion is involved in deciding to dispose of it, and . . ., while deciding not to furnish the prosecution's evidence to the defense may be an act of advocacy, throwing the evidence away is not such an act. 30 Accordingly, the ADAs are not entitled to absolute immunity from suit for constitutional violations caused by their alleged deliberate destruction of exculpatory evidence. 31