Opinion ID: 150812
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: count 10conspiracy

Text: Count 10 alleges Hodges, Burke, and Paulk engaged in a conspiracy to violate Rehberg's constitutional rights under the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments. A person may not be prosecuted for conspiring to commit an act that he may perform with impunity. Jones, 174 F.3d at 1289 (citations omitted). A prosecutor cannot be liable for conspiracy to violate a defendant's constitutional rights by prosecuting him if the prosecutor also is immune from liability for actually prosecuting the defendant. Rowe, 279 F.3d at 1282. And a witness's absolute immunity for testifying prevents any use of that testimony as evidence of the witness's membership in an unconstitutional conspiracy prior to his testimony. Id. ; Mastroianni, 173 F.3d at 1367. Rehberg's conspiracy allegations do not enlarge what he alleged previously in his complaint. This opinion has already explained why Hodges, Burke, and Paulk receive absolute or qualified immunity for all of the conduct alleged in Counts 6 and 8 and why Hodges receives absolute immunity for the retaliatory prosecution in Count 7. Rehberg cannot state a valid conspiracy claim by alleging the Defendants conspired to do things they already are immune from doing directly. The only portion of Count 7 that remains is Rehberg's retaliatory prosecution claim against Paulk alone. The intracorporate conspiracy doctrine bars conspiracy claims against corporate or government actors accused of conspiring together within an organization, preventing Rehberg's claim that Paulk conspired to initiate a retaliatory prosecution. Dickerson v. Alachua County Commission, 200 F.3d 761, 767 (11th Cir.2000) ([I]t is not possible for a single legal entity consisting of the corporation and its agents to conspire with itself, just as it is not possible for an individual person to conspire with himself); Denney v. City of Albany, 247 F.3d 1172, 1190 (11th Cir.2001) (applying intracorporate conspiracy doctrine to city, city fire chief, and city manager). Rehberg has not alleged that Paulk conspired with anyone outside of the District Attorney's office. See Denney, 247 F.3d at 1191 (the only two conspirators identified ... are both City employees; no outsiders are alleged to be involved). The conspiracy occurred only within a government entity, and thus the intracorporate conspiracy doctrine bars Count 10 against Paulk. The district court erred in not dismissing Count 10.