Opinion ID: 728294
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the scope of prosecutorial immmunity

Text: Although prosecutorial immunity has a longstanding tradition in the common law, the Imbler v. Pachtman decision was the Supreme Court’s first explicit recognition that prosecutors enjoy absolute immunity from § 1983 suits for damages when they act within the scope of their prosecutorial duties. 424 U.S. 409, 420 (1976). Derivative of the immunity afforded judges, this prosecutorial, or “quasi-judicial,” immunity has been revisited and refined in numerous Court 3 No. 09-6205 Rouse v. Powdle, et al. opinions in the thirty-five years since Imbler. The Imbler Court emphasized that prosecutorial immunity is not predicated upon status, titles, or special regard for a particular branch of government. Imbler, 424 U.S. at 420. It is based, rather, on public policy considerations, particularly the concern that “harassment by unfounded litigation would cause a deflection of the prosecutor’s energies from his public duties, and the possibility that he would shade his decision instead of exercising the independence of judgment required by his public trust.” Id. at 423. In a later decision, the Court expressed the rationale supporting such immunity as follows: As public servants, the prosecutor and the judge represent the interest of society as a whole. The conduct of their official duties may adversely affect a wide variety of different individuals, each of whom may be a potential source of future controversy. The societal interest in providing such public officials with the maximum ability to deal fearlessly and impartially with the public at large has long been recognized as an acceptable justification for official immunity. Ferri v. Ackerman 444 U.S. 193, 202-03 (1979). The Court has recognized, however, that the granting of such immunity is not without its costs, noting that “unfairness and injustice to a litigant may result on occasion.” Mireles v. Waco, 502 U.S. 9, 10 (1991) (citing Bradley v. Fisher, 80 U.S. 335, 347 (1872)). This downside risk is mitigated, according to the Court, by “[v]arious post-trial procedures . . . to determine whether an accused has received a fair trial,” including “the remedial powers of the trial judge, appellate review, and state and federal post-conviction collateral remedies.” Imbler, 424 U.S. at 427. The Court has also emphasized that there remain effective checks on misconduct by prosecutors, notwithstanding their immunity from civil suits, including criminal prosecution and professional discipline. Burns v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478, 486 (1991) (citing Imbler, 424 U.S. at 429). 4 No. 09-6205 Rouse v. Powdle, et al. In view of the risk of injustice, the Supreme Court has been “quite sparing” in its recognition of the doctrine of absolute immunity, and it has declined to extend it any “further than its justification would warrant.” Id. at 486 (citing Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 811 (1982)). The Court has further constrained the reach of the doctrine in its ruling that “[t]he official seeking absolute immunity bears the burden of showing that such immunity is justified for the function in question.” Buckley v. Fitzsimmons, 509 U.S. 259, 269 (1993) (citing Burns, 500 U.S. at 486). In delineating the scope of its holding, the Imbler Court focused on whether the prosecutor’s activities at issue “were functions to which the reasons for absolute immunity apply with full force.” Imbler, 424 U.S. at 430. The Court found that prosecutorial immunity shielded a prosecutor from suit under § 1983 for conduct in “initiating a prosecution and in presenting the State’s case,” so long as that conduct is “intimately associated with the judicial phase of the criminal process.” Id. at 430, 431. The Court expressly declined to decide whether absolute immunity should also apply to other functions, such as “those aspects of the prosecutor’s responsibility that cast him in the role of an administrator or investigative officer.” Id. at 430-31. This emphasis on function has guided the Court’s discussion of absolute immunity in the many cases that have followed. In Burns, the Court reexamined the issue of immunity for prosecutorial investigations. 500 U.S. at 486 (1991). Burns “made explicit the point [the Court] had reserved in Imbler: A prosecutor’s administrative duties and those investigatory functions that do not relate to an advocate’s preparation for the initiation of a prosecution or for judicial proceedings are not entitled to absolute immunity.” Buckley, 509 U.S. at 273 (citing Burns, 500 U.S. at 494-96). The Court determined that absolute immunity did not apply to a prosecutor giving legal advice to police, on 5 No. 09-6205 Rouse v. Powdle, et al. grounds that there was no historical or common-law support for extending absolute immunity in such cases. Burns, 500 U.S. at 492. Applying the functional approach it had developed in Imbler, the Court declared that advising police in the investigative phase of a criminal case was not “intimately associated with the judicial phase of the criminal process.” Id. at 493. In reaching this conclusion, the Court underscored the rationale underlying the absolute immunity doctrine, as well as its limits: [It] is not merely a generalized concern with interference with an official's duties, but rather is a concern with interference with the conduct closely related to the judicial process. Absolute immunity is designed to free the judicial process from the harassment and intimidation associated with litigation. That concern therefore justifies absolute prosecutorial immunity only for actions that are connected with the prosecutor's role in judicial proceedings, not for every litigation-inducing conduct. Id. at 494 (internal citations omitted) (emphasis in original). Similarly, in Buckley the Court determined that a prosecutor was not entitled to absolute immunity for his alleged misconduct in a criminal investigation or for false statements made to the media during a public announcement of the indictment. 509 U.S. at 273. Central to the Court’s analysis of the former was the “difference between the advocate’s role in evaluating evidence and interviewing witnesses as he prepares for trial . . . and the detective’s role in searching for the clues and corroboration that might give him probable cause to recommend that a suspect be arrested.” Id. Echoing the Burns observation quoted above, the Court stated, “When a prosecutor performs the investigative functions normally performed by a detective or police officer, it is ‘neither appropriate nor justifiable that for the same act, immunity should protect the one and not the other.’” Id. (quoting Hampton v. Chicago, 484 F.2d 602, 608 (7th Cir. 1973)). And “[w]hen the functions of prosecutors and detectives are the same, as they were here, the immunity that protects them is also 6 No. 09-6205 Rouse v. Powdle, et al. the same.” Id. at 276. Further, the prosecutor was not entitled to absolute immunity for his actions at the press conference because he was not acting as an advocate, there was no historical tradition of immunity for this function, and qualified immunity would provide sufficient protection. Id. at 277-78. The Court also applied the Imbler functional analysis in a case addressing whether the prosecutor was acting as a witness or as an advocate when she executed an affidavit under penalty of perjury. Kalina v. Fletcher, 522 U.S. 118 (1997). The plaintiff alleged that the prosecutor made false statements of fact in an affidavit supporting an application for an arrest warrant. Id. at 129. The Court noted that the prosecutor was not required to provide the affidavit and that ethics and tradition instruct that counsel should avoid acting as both an advocate and a witness in the same proceeding. Id. at 129-30. The Court concluded that the prosecutor was not entitled to absolute immunity for performing the function of a witness. Id. at 131. The Supreme Court’s most recent analysis of prosecutorial immunity came in Van de Kamp v. Goldstein, 555 U.S. 335 (2009). The plaintiff alleged that prosecutors violated his civil rights by failing to engage in the administrative activities of instituting and adequately supervising a system of information-sharing about informants. Id. at 339, 342. This failure allegedly resulted in a Giglio3 violation at the plaintiff’s criminal trial. Id. The Court held that, while administrative in nature, the obligations at issue “necessarily require legal knowledge and the exercise of related discretion,” are 3 Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972) (requiring disclosure of promises made to government witness for their cooperation). 7 No. 09-6205 Rouse v. Powdle, et al. “intimately associated with the judicial phase of the criminal process,” and, therefore, warrant absolute immunity for the prosecutors. Id. at 862-64.