Opinion ID: 437447
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Conspiracies

Text: 205 The jury found each defendant to have participated in one or more civil conspiracies designed to deprive plaintiffs of their First Amendment rights by disrupting their organizations and impeding their associations with other persons. One conspiracy was alleged to exist within MPD, a second was alleged between MPD and the FBI, and the third allegedly existed within the FBI. We will first consider the two conspiracies involving the MPD. 206 A civil conspiracy is defined as an agreement between two or more people to participate in an unlawful act or a lawful act in an unlawful manner. See Halberstam v. Welch, 705 F.2d 472, 477 (D.C.Cir.1983); Hampton v. Hanrahan, 600 F.2d 600, 620-21 (7th Cir.1979), modified on other grounds, 446 U.S. 754, 100 S.Ct. 1987, 64 L.Ed.2d 670 (1980). An express agreement among all conspirators is not necessary. A plaintiff ... need not prove that each participant in a conspiracy knew the 'exact limits of the illegal plan or the identity of all participants therein.'  Hampton, 600 F.2d at 621 (quoting Hoffman-LaRoche, Inc. v. Greenberg, 447 F.2d 872, 875 (7th Cir.1971)). The conspirators must share the general conspiratorial objective, but they need not know all the details of the plan ... or possess the same motives. Id. Thus, to demonstrate the existence of a conspiratorial agreement, it simply must be shown that there was 'a single plan, the essential nature and general scope of which [were] known to each person who is to be held responsible for its consequences. Id. (quoting Hoffman-LaRoche, Inc. v. Greenberg, 447 F.2d 872, 875 (7th Cir.1971)). To make the conspiracy actionable, there must also be an overt act in furtherance of the object of the conspiracy that injures plaintiff in his person or property or, in a section 1985(3) action, which deprives him of having or exercising any right or privilege of a citizen of the United States. 207 The District defendants argue, first, that they engaged only in lawful intelligence-gathering and therefore did not agree among themselves to do an unlawful act or a lawful act by unlawful means. 145 Second, they argue, the evidence failed to demonstrate the existence of an MPD-FBI joint conspiracy. 146 Without concluding that no such conspiracies existed, we agree with defendants that there was not enough evidence for the jury to conclude that the individual MPD defendants shared the general conspiratorial objective of intentionally disrupting plaintiffs' First Amendment rights, either among themselves or with the FBI. No evidence linked to any individual MPD defendant warrants even an inference of unlawful motive in carrying out routine law enforcement activity. 208 According to the District defendants, the record reveals only that they engaged in the collection of intelligence data for law enforcement purposes, such as planning for security and crowd control at future demonstrations, by means of physical surveillance and informants. This process, they explain, not only is lawful, but also was recommended by the Kerner Commission as a means to anticipate and prepare for civil disorder. 147 In addition, they concede, they occasionally obtained intelligence by electronic surveillance. We do not agree, and MPD does not seriously argue, 148 that the record is devoid of evidence that any District officers engaged in activities disruptive of the plaintiffs' activities protected by the First Amendment. We put aside such evidence for the moment, however, because we agree with the District that no evidence indicates any individual MPD defendant initiated or approved these actions. We turn our attention instead to evidence of the activities in which the individuals engaged. 209 Our review of the record leads us to the conclusion that the individual activities of the MPD defendants were in all relevant respects 149 consistent with the recommendations of the Kerner Commission and other law enforcement task forces, and did not support an inference of their participation in an unlawful conspiracy. The task forces either suggested or endorsed the framework by which the MPD defendants operated--from the establishment of the Intelligence Division as it existed in the relevant time period, to the information-gathering procedures it utilized, to the exchange of information with other law enforcement agencies. For example, the Kerner Commission reported on the absence of accurate information both before and during a disorder and recommended that police departments develop means to obtain adequate intelligence for planning purposes: 210 An intelligence unit staffed with full-time personnel should be established to gather, evaluate, analyze, and disseminate information on potential as well as actual civil disorders. It should provide police administrators and commanders with reliable information essential for assessment and decisionmaking. It should use undercover police personnel and informants, but it should also draw on community leaders, agencies, and organizations in the ghetto. 211 Kerner Commission Report, note 147, supra, at 269. Plaintiffs' response is to detail evidence of incidents in which informants acted as agents provocateurs, but without linking the enumerated disruptive activities to any individual defendant. Nor is plaintiffs' response surprising: the record simply lacks any evidence that the MPD defendants participated in, or knew about any conspiracy to disrupt, as opposed to a conspiracy to learn about plaintiffs' protest activities. 150 We decline to hold that the individual defendants' positions in the MPD hierarchy alone permit an inference that each named defendant knew about and set in motion the disruptive activities of other MPD officers. 212 We are equally at a loss to find any evidence that the MPD defendants engaged in a conspiracy with the FBI to infringe plaintiffs' rights. To be sure, as plaintiffs argue, [e]vidence of a pattern of mutually supportive activity over a period of time provides a reasonable basis for inferring that the parties are engaged in a common pursuit. 151 However, when the only evidence of such mutually supportive activity is conversation and the exchange of intelligence information--a form of cooperation expressly endorsed by presidential task forces at the time 152 --it simply is not reasonable to infer unlawful activity. Absent some evidence that the individual MPD defendants knew about COINTELPRO, 153 or engaged in disruptive activities on their own to complement those of the FBI, or in any other way violative of First Amendment rights went beyond the limits of proper intelligence-gathering, we cannot permit an inference of unlawful motive. 154 We therefore conclude that individual MPD defendants could not reasonably have been found to know of, or participate in, an unlawful scheme along with the FBI. 213 Evidence of disruptive activity by persons other than the individual defendants is present, however, and requires us to consider whether a jury reasonably might infer that the District participated either in an internal MPD conspiracy or in one with the FBI. As to the latter, we must decide whether the flow of information back and forth, coupled with evidence of efforts to impede plaintiffs' rights, permits an inference that the District and unnamed defendants worked with the FBI toward a common goal, even if the communication on its own does not suffice. Evidence of such disruptive practices includes the following: 214 --MPD undercover informer Ann Kolego Markovich infiltrated the Antiwar Union, an antiwar group that worked with the Peoples Coalition for Peace and Justice, another antiwar group with which Mr. Pollock was affiliated. According to the evidence, Kolego Markovich acted as an agent provocateur and urged others to commit violent acts during meetings and demonstrations planned by the Antiwar Union and the PCPJ. See II J.A. 789-94 (testimony of Carol Cullum); II J.A. 752-53 (testimony of Richard Pollock). At trial, Kolego Markovich denied this activity; the jury found that she was liable on the merits in some instances but that claims against her were barred by the statute of limitations. 215 --At an ECTC demonstration planned by plaintiffs Abbott and Booker, a demonstrator urged the crowd to disregard instructions given by Mr. Abbott--whom the demonstrator called a sell-out artist, phony, coward--and march to an off-limits area where police were waiting. About 200 people did so, resulting in numerous arrests. Mr. Abbott later found out that the demonstrator was Jan Francis, an MPD officer. See II J.A. 804-06 (testimony of Reginald Booker); II J.A. 910-14 (testimony of Sammie Abbott). 216 --Immediately before a major demonstration, MPD informers were told to smash the duplicating equipment of peace groups to render it inoperable. See III J.A. 1393-94 (transcript of MPD hearings). 217 --The day before another rally, a New Mobe office worker known as Steve Wilcox wrote two bad checks to the telephone company; thereafter he disappeared. As a result, Mr. Bloom and his colleagues had to scramble to raise enough cash to cover the phone bills and avoid disruption of telephone service. See II J.A. 721-29 (testimony of Helen Anne Gurewitz); II J.A. 696-98 (testimony of Abe Bloom). All defendants denied that Mr. Wilcox worked for the FBI or MPD. 218 These and other like incidents conceivably could have sufficed to permit a jury to infer that an agreement existed among certain persons within MPD to disrupt plaintiffs' activities--although not that any defendant knew about or participated in it. When different people shown to be in contact with one another act at different times in a similar and facially illegitimate manner, an inference of prior agreement might be quite plausible. See Halberstam, 705 F.2d at 481 ([M]utally supportive activity by parties in contact with one another over a long period suggests a common plan.). However, these scattered events surely do not permit an inference that an official policy, custom, ordinance, regulation or decision of the municipality caused such incidents, as is required to hold a municipality liable under the Supreme Court's decision in Monell v. Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658, 98 S.Ct. 2018, 56 L.Ed.2d 611 (1978). There is no indication that the municipality impliedly or tacitly approved, authorized or encouraged such conduct by its employees, see Turpin v. Mailet, 619 F.2d 196, 201 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 1016, 101 S.Ct. 577, 66 L.Ed.2d 475 (1980), or that any person of sufficient seniority that his or her edicts or acts may fairly be said to represent official policy, Monell, 436 U.S. at 694, 98 S.Ct. at 2037, ordered such activities. Plaintiffs have failed to tie the incidents described above either to an official District policy, to an unofficial governmental custom, or to any official with policy-making authority, see Rookard v. Health and Hospitals Corp., 710 F.2d 41, 45 (2d Cir.1983). Indeed, we have found those supervisory MPD officers whom plaintiffs have identified not to have been shown to have participated in any conspiracy. We thus are left with a handful of scattered incidents, occurring over a period of years, aimed at a wide array of persons, which are allegedly attributable to low-level MPD officers and informants. From such scant evidence, neither an inference of official policy nor unofficial custom is warranted. 219 Similarly, exchanges of information and constant communication between particular persons within MPD and the FBI, coupled with patterns of similar activity on their part, might have sufficed to permit an inference of a joint conspiracy--although, again, not that any defendant knew about or participated in it. After considering several civil conspiracy cases, we recently observed that since in most cases the court will have to infer a conspiracy from indirect evidence, it must initially look to see if the alleged joint tortfeasors are pursuing the same goal--although performing different functions--and are in contact with one another. Halberstam, 705 F.2d at 481 (construing Davidson v. Simmons, 203 Neb. 804, 280 N.W.2d 645 (1979), and Peterson v. Cruickshank, 144 Cal.App.2d 148, 300 P.2d 915 (1956)). But, again, even if such activities occurred among some District employees, that fact does not permit an inference that they were taken pursuant to a District policy. We therefore conclude that the evidence simply did not suffice to permit the jury to conclude that the District participated in any conspiracy that might have existed within the MPD, or between certain persons in MPD and the FBI. 220 The FBI conspiracy need not detain us. There was evidence that each FBI defendant knew about, and actively participated in unlawful COINTELPRO activities. See Discussion section VI(B), infra. The essence of a civil conspiracy is participation in a common and unlawful plan whose goals are known to all members--even if all parties are not privy to each individual act taken in furtherance of the scheme. The evidence here undoubtedly sufficed to permit the jury to conclude that such a conspiracy existed within the FBI, and that the FBI defendants were participants in it. At the same time, we find insufficient evidence that these defendants participated in any conspiracy with persons in MPD and reverse judgments against them arising out of that alleged joint MPD-FBI scheme.