Opinion ID: 441634
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Mistake of Law Defense

Text: 133 Defendants contend that the district court erred in refusing to give their proposed jury instruction allowing them a defense for reasonable good faith reliance on apparent authority, based on their alleged mistaken belief that Hanratty had apparent authority to sanction their gun-running activities. We conclude that the court properly refused to give the instruction since defendants had failed to demonstrate a basis warranting submission of this requested charge to the jury. 134 It is well settled that ignorance of the law or mistake as to the law's requirements is not a defense to criminal conduct. See, e.g., United States v. International Minerals & Chemical Corp., 402 U.S. 558, 563, 91 S.Ct. 1697, 1700, 29 L.Ed.2d 178 (1971); Lambert v. California, 355 U.S. 225, 228, 78 S.Ct. 240, 242, 2 L.Ed.2d 228 (1957); United States v. Gregg, 612 F.2d 43, 51 (2d Cir.1979). The mistake that defendants advance here as an excuse for their criminal activities--their reliance on Hanratty's purported authority--is an error based upon a mistaken view of legal requirements and therefore constitutes a mistake of law. See United States v. Barker, 546 F.2d 940, 946 (D.C.Cir.1976). 135 There are few exceptions to the mistake of law rule. There is an exception for legitimate reliance on an official interpretation of law. See, e.g., Cox v. Louisiana, 379 U.S. 559, 85 S.Ct. 476, 13 L.Ed.2d 487 (1965); United States v. Mancuso, 139 F.2d 90 (3d Cir.1943). There is also an exception for responding to a police officer's call for assistance in making unlawful arrests or searches. See People v. Weiss, 276 N.Y. 384, 12 N.E.2d 514 (1938). The traditional exceptions have no application to the present case, however, and defendants urge us to adopt the reasoning of United States v. Barker, supra, which they say extended the exception for reliance on official authority to apply where the defendants have relied in good faith on an individual who does not have actual authority to permit the proscribed activity. We do not read the Barker opinions so broadly, and we do not believe the present case fits within the formulations there set forth. 136 Barker involved defendants who had been recruited to participate in an allegedly top-secret national security operation aimed at foreign agents leaking intelligence information and led by E. Howard Hunt, whom defendants knew first hand to be a long-time CIA agent then employed in the White House. Defendants' convictions were reversed, and the case was remanded for a new trial, by a 2-1 vote, with Judges Merhige and Wilkey in the majority. Those two judges agreed that the defendants might have a valid defense based on an exception to the mistake of law rule, but they disagreed on the parameters of the exception. 137 Judge Merhige recognized only the traditional exception to the mistake of law doctrine for reasonable reliance on a conclusion or statement of law issued by an official charged with interpretation, administration, or enforcement in the relevant legal field. 546 F.2d at 955 (opinion of Merhige, J.). Judge Wilkey's opinion proposed instead to recognize a defense based on reliance on apparent authority, requiring a showing of both (1) facts justifying [the defendants'] reasonable reliance on Hunt's apparent authority and (2) a legal theory on which to base a reasonable belief that Hunt possessed such authority. 546 F.2d at 949 (opinion of Wilkey, J.) (emphasis in original). Since Judge Leventhal dissented altogether, the exception espoused by Judge Wilkey received but one vote and cannot be viewed as the rationale of the court. 138 We decline to adopt Judge Wilkey's view that a defendant may be exonerated on the basis of his reliance on an authority that is only apparent and not real. Even were we to agree with that view, however, we could not conclude that the defendants in the present case met the test Judge Wilkey set forth since they presented neither facts nor a legal theory that would make their alleged reliance justifiable. The only evidence presented by defendants to justify their reliance on Hanratty's apparent authority is their testimony that Hanratty represented himself to be a CIA agent and showed Duggan and Megahey a white laminated card with Central Intelligence Agency printed on it, and their testimony that Sloan had checked Hanratty out. No objective evidence was presented regarding Hanratty's purported CIA claim and there was no corroboration of defendants' claims about Hanratty's alleged assertions. The defendants knew Hanratty for only three weeks before they began dealing with him, they lacked personal knowledge of his claimed status, and they sought no independent verification that he was a CIA agent. 139 Nor was any reasonable legal basis shown for defendants' professed belief that Hanratty had authority to sanction such plainly unlawful activity as international trafficking in firearms and explosives. Indeed, Megahey acknowledged, on cross-examination, that he was aware that CIA operatives had been sought on criminal charges, despite their CIA background, for engaging in the same conduct the defendants attributed to Hanratty. 140 In sum, we agree with the district court that the defendants failed to establish that they were entitled to a jury instruction on any defense based on an exception to the general principle that a mistake of law is no defense. 141