Opinion ID: 1367509
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Outrageous Government ConductWhere Is Due Process?

Text: Despite the obdurate support of the subjective definition of entrapment, by normally five of the nine members of the United States Supreme Court, its philosophic idiosyncracies and operational invalidity have been strenuously attacked by most commentators and in many state court decisions. In order to fend off the most extreme improvidences of the subjective test, the due processoutrageous governmental conduct doctrinewas developed as an additional principle. This adaptation understood predisposition might exist in the mind of the suspect, but the entrapping activity conducted by law enforcement was completely outrageous. It is important to understand that the due process, outrageous conduct, principle is correlative to the subjective rule in those jurisdictions. The outrageous conduct principle is semi-meaningless, except when considered in application in the federal courts, to escape the obvious societal invalidity of the subjective rule theory of anything goes. Like the casual discard of outrageous governmental conductdue processapplied by the majority in this present decision, the adaptation has seldom been found in conjunction with the subjective doctrine to be strenuously protective of the defendant, State v. Agrabante, 73 Haw. 179, 830 P.2d 492 (1992), apparently from a fear of a sub rosa application of objective causality. United States v. Payne, 962 F.2d 1228 (6th Cir.), cert. denied ___ U.S. ___, 113 S.Ct. 306, 121 L.Ed.2d 229 (1992); United States v. Warren, 747 F.2d 1339 (10th Cir.1984). The due process approach was applied in United States v. Twigg, 588 F.2d 373 (3rd Cir. 1978), by consideration of fundamental fairness. See also United States v. West, 511 F.2d 1083 (3rd Cir.1975) and Greene v. United States, 454 F.2d 783 (9th Cir.1971). The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals has, however, considered the viability of the outrageous conduct defense with comment that there was no circuit court known to have denied the viability of the defense. With a comprehensive list of citations, the Tenth Circuit noted: Notwithstanding the lack of a clear holding on outrageous conduct by the Supreme Court, most of the circuits, including this one, have recognized the viability of the outrageous conduct defense. See, e.g., United States v. Jacobson, 916 F.2d 467, 469 (8th Cir.1990) (en banc), rev'd on other grounds, ___ U.S. ___, 112 S.Ct. 1535, 118 L.Ed.2d 174 (1992); United States v. Nichols, 877 F.2d 825, 827 (10th Cir.1989); United States v. Simpson, 813 F.2d 1462, 1464-65 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 898, 108 S.Ct. 233, 98 L.Ed.2d 192 (1987); United States v. Arteaga, 807 F.2d 424, 426 (5th Cir.1986); United States v. Kelly, 707 F.2d 1460, 1468 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 464 U.S. 908, 104 S.Ct. 264, 78 L.Ed.2d 247 (1983); United States v. Capo, 693 F.2d 1330, 1336 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 460 U.S. 1092, 103 S.Ct. 1793, 76 L.Ed.2d 359, modified on other grounds sub nom. United States v. Lisenby, 716 F.2d 1355 (11th Cir.1983); United States v. Myers, 692 F.2d 823, 837 (2d Cir.1982), cert. denied, 461 U.S. 961, 103 S.Ct. 2438, 77 L.Ed.2d 1322 (1983); United States v. Jannotti, 673 F.2d 578, 607 (3d Cir.) (en banc), cert. denied, 457 U.S. 1106, 102 S.Ct. 2906, 73 L.Ed.2d 1315 (1982); United States v. Johnson, 565 F.2d 179, 182 (1st Cir.1977), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 1075, 98 S.Ct. 1264, 55 L.Ed.2d 780 (1978); United States v. Quintana, 508 F.2d 867, 878 (7th Cir.1975). We know of no circuit that has denied the viability of this defense. United States v. Mosley, 965 F.2d 906, 909 (10th Cir.1992). In its review of the case law involving the outrageous defense, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, in assessing its usage, separated out pervasive facts, including: (a) excessive government involvement in creating the prosecuted crime; (b) creating a new crime compared to involvement in ongoing criminal enterprise; (c) putting people in business and setting up crime by providing supplies and expertise for the illegal activity; (d) inducement and deceit; and (e) coercion. Mosley, 965 F.2d at 910-12. It is interesting that the agent in Mosley was the same individual apparently involved in the Pinedale and Lyman stings and who was convicted of a criminal offense (misdemeanor) for the aggravated assault which he committed in Montana. Although Mosley was unsuccessful, in regard to an outrageous conduct defense, the Mosley tests, including bargain price coercion, specifically fit the facts of how Rivera came to be intertwined with the offense for which he was convicted. Comparably, in Payne, 962 F.2d 1228, the court advanced a four point test for outrageous conduct analysis. The first factor appraises the current need for law enforcement to provide the kind of governmental conduct involved. The second factor considers whether the criminal enterprise pre-existed the undercover investigation. The third factor considers whether the governmental agent directed or controlled the enterprise, and the fourth factor tests the impact of the law enforcement activity on the commission of the crime. Under the factual circumstances that existed in this case, it is apparent that the enterprise created and operated by the Jackson police failed on all four tests. However, like recognition accorded in most cases, the majority accords a subjective analysis to a subjective concept with a conclusion that this entrapment program was not outrageous. Explanations of why this is so are conveniently hidden in semantics and undisclosed reasoning. The due process, outrageous conduct, concept has no real office in conjunction with the objective test because that test examines conduct of the government in first analysis. [9]