Opinion ID: 465022
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Use of FBI Agents to Serve Subpoenas

Text: 146 The Act provides that judicial council subpoenas shall be served in the manner provided in Rule 45(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. 28 U.S.C. Sec. 332(d)(1). That Rule states, A subpoena may be served by the marshal, by his deputy, or by any other person who is not a party and is not less than 18 years of age. Furthermore, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3052 specifically empowers agents of the FBI to serve subpoenas. We can perceive no imaginable separation-of-powers obstacle to the Committee's service of its subpoenas in a manner wholly consistent with those provisions. Appellants have suggested that service should instead have been effected by a United States Marshal, but United States Marshals, no less than FBI representatives, are executive officers within the Department of Justice. 28 U.S.C. Secs. 561-76; 28 C.F.R. Sec. 0.1. 25 147 Appellants also claim that service by FBI agents violated the confidentiality requirements of the Act, section 372(c)(14), in that it revealed to those agents the identity of persons subpoenaed by the Committee. Even assuming that the Committee's decision to use FBI agents to serve subpoenas is reviewable in this court despite section 372(c)(10) (which precludes judicial review of certain orders and determinations under the Act), such a narrowly limited breach of confidentiality is necessary if Committee subpoenas are to be served at all. This manner of service, therefore, offends no statutorily protected rights of appellants. 148