Opinion ID: 186119
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Subject Requirement

Text: While the whole of Lewinsky’s fees will be disallowed for failure to meet the ‘‘but for’’ requirement of the Act, we would not reach that question if she did not qualify under the subject requirement for at least a portion of those fees. As we have noted frequently in the past, the Act does not define ‘‘subject,’’ but our precedents establish that for purposes of the fee reimbursement provision a subject of an IC’s investigation is a person whose conduct is within the scope of the independent counsel’s investigation and TTT who knew at the time of 7 incurring the fees sought in the petition that his conduct was within that scope in such a fashion that the independent counsel might reasonably be expected to point the finger of accusation at him. In re North (Applications of Shields and Gruner), 53 F.3d 1305, 1307 (D.C. Cir., Spec. Div., 1995) (per curiam) (citations and internal punctuation omitted). Both the IC and the Attorney General, for whose comments on the Lewinsky application we are grateful, agree that Lewinsky was a subject for a part of the time for which she claims fees. That portion of the time begins with our grant of jurisdiction on January 16, 1998, and extends through July 28, 1998, the date on which the OIC granted her transactional immunity. Although she claims that she was a subject and entitled to reimbursement until February 12, 1999, the date on which President Clinton was acquitted in the impeachment trial, we disagree. After the grant of transactional immunity, it was no longer reasonable to expect that the IC might point the finger of accusation at her. As we have previously stated, ‘‘as a general proposition TTT an immunized witness will no longer be a ‘subject.’ ’’ In re North (Dutton Fee Application), 11 F.3d 1075, 1079 (D.C. Cir., Spec. Div., 1993) (per curiam). Lewinsky contends that her case falls outside this ‘‘general proposition.’’ In support of her argument, she relies on our decision in In re North (Cave Fee Application), 57 F.3d 1117 (D.C. Cir., Spec. Div., 1995) (per curiam), which held that the fee petitioner therein retained ‘‘subject’’ status even after being granted use immunity because such immunity did not protect him from being prosecuted as a result of information independently derived from other witnesses, id. at 1120. Lewinsky claims that she too did not lose her subject status after being granted transactional immunity, arguing that ‘‘she remained a subject because her immunity was conditional and she remained under continuous threat of prosecution.’’ In support of this argument, Lewinsky asserts that regardless of her immunity, she could still be prosecuted for giving false testimony or for speaking publicly about the case. She further claims that the IC threatened to withdraw her immu- 8 nity if she did not cooperate with the impeachment proceedings of the House of Representatives. According to Lewinsky, her immunity agreement was ‘‘far more demanding, being conditioned on a set of unusual requirements, and contained far more dire consequences for Ms. Lewinsky than the immunity agreement in Cave.’’ She sums up her argument here by claiming that for her ‘‘there remained a realistic possibility that she could become a defendant even after the grant of immunity.’’ We disagree. The petitioner in Cave had obtained only a grant of use immunity pursuant to the Federal Use Immunity Statute, 18 U.S.C. § 6002. Such a grant ‘‘confers immunity only against the use of testimony compelled under the immunizing order; ‘it does not confer transactional immunity under which the witness could not be prosecuted at all for the transactions about which he testifies.’ ’’ Id. at 1120 (quoting Dutton, 11 F.3d at 1078–79). The OIC in this case granted Lewinsky transactional immunity which prevented the OIC from prosecuting her so long as she abided by the terms of her immunity agreement. Therefore, as of the time she signed the agreement, her status was that of witness, not potential defendant. In Dutton, we held that even the grant of use immunity is generally sufficient to remove the reasonable likelihood of prosecution. On the special facts of the Cave application we held that a reasonable possibility of prosecution remained even in the face of the use immunity. In the case of transactional immunity it is highly unlikely, if not impossible, that the recipient, such as Lewinsky, would ever be prosecuted absent some act totally within her own control in breach of the immunity agreement. Therefore, only the earlier portion of Lewinsky’s fees are considered for reimbursement. However, for reasons set forth infra, even those fees do not survive analysis under the ‘‘but for’’ test.