Opinion ID: 203234
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: United States Attorneys' Manual

Text: The district court agreed with the defendants that they had not been provided a meaningful opportunity to present mitigating evidence before the government filed the Notice, as required by the United States Attorneys' Manual (Manual). The Manual contains guidelines for determining whether to seek the death penalty. United States Attorneys' Manual §§ 9-10.010-10.190. These are widely known as the death penalty protocols. Under the death penalty protocols, defense counsel must be provided a reasonable opportunity to present mitigating evidence to the United States Attorney before he or she makes a recommendation whether to seek the death penalty. Id. at § 9-10.050. If the United States Attorney recommends seeking the death penalty, the Capital Review Committee also reviews the case and makes a recommendation. Id. at § 9-10-120. The Committee can also review, on its own initiative, any case in which the United States Attorney recommends against seeking the death penalty. [10] Id. This procedure culminates in recommendations to the Attorney General, who decides whether to seek the death penalty. The Manual then in force provided that counsel shall be provided an opportunity to present mitigating evidence to the Capital Review Committee. [11] And the section entitled Review of Recommendations Not to Seek Death Penalty warns that [n]o decision to seek the death penalty shall be made without affording defense counsel an opportunity to present evidence and argument in mitigation. . . . Id. at § 9-10.055. We need not consider whether counsel had such an opportunity here. The Manual by its terms makes those procedures mandatory. But the first page of that manual warns that the guidelines do not create any rights. The Manual provides only internal Department of Justice guidance. It is not intended to, does not, and may not be relied upon to create any rights, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law by any party in any matter civil or criminal. Nor are any limitations hereby placed on otherwise lawful litigative prerogatives of the Department of Justice. United States Attorneys' Manual, § 1.100. As the district court acknowledged, we have held that similar Department of Justice guidelines, not mandated by statute or the constitution, do not confer substantive rights on any party. United States v. Craveiro, 907 F.2d 260, 264 (1st Cir.1990). Other Circuits have held the same to be true of the Manual. See United States v. Lee, 274 F.3d 485, 493 (8th Cir.2001) (United States Attorneys' Manual not enforceable by individuals); Nichols v. Reno, 124 F.3d 1376, 1376 (10th Cir.1997) (defendant has no protectable interest in enforcement of death penalty protocols); United States v. Myers, 123 F.3d 350, 355-56 (6th Cir.1997) ([A] violation by the government of its internal operating procedures, on its own, does not create a basis for suppressing . . . grand jury testimony.); United States v. Gillespie, 974 F.2d 796, 800-02 (7th Cir.1992); United States v. Busher, 817 F.2d 1409, 1411-12 (9th Cir. 1987). While some administrative regulations do create rights in third parties, see United States ex rel. Accardi v. Shaughnessy, 347 U.S. 260, 267, 74 S.Ct. 499, 98 L.Ed. 681 (1954), those governing prosecutors enjoy greater flexibility because the exercise of prosecutorial discretion is a core executive constitutional function, United States v. Armstrong, 517 U.S. 456, 465, 116 S.Ct. 1480, 134 L.Ed.2d 687 (1996). We conclude that a violation of the Manual, by itself, would not give rise to the sanction imposed here. We are reluctant to interfere with internal prosecutorial measures by elevating internal guidelines to the level of a guarantee to defendants. Our reluctance stems from a respect for the separation of powers, and also from practical concerns. If the government were to be punished for violations of its own internal guidelines, it would be more likely to write less exacting guidelines, or none at all. Because we determine that a simple violation of the Manual does not create a basis for dismissing the Notice, we decline to reach the issue of whether these facts constitute a breach of the death penalty protocols. We therefore express no opinion about whether four days' notice of a meeting held before the appointment of learned counsel would constitute a reasonable opportunity, nor do we consider whether AUSA Bazán's invitation to submit mitigating information and argument after the meeting would have cured such a defect, if one existed. This is not to say that a finding of systemic violation of the Manual or of prosecutorial misconduct in failure to abide by the Manual could never give rise to any sanction. It is only to say that, standing alone, the government's failure to follow the procedures set forth in the Manual cannot serve as the basis for the sanction imposed here. We have, when confronted with the violation of a policy which does not justify a case-related judicial sanction and yet which appears immune to expressions of judicial dissatisfaction, indicated that we will refer such violations to the Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility, and require of that Office a report concerning the steps the Department proposes to take to police its internal policy guidelines and to discipline those of its employees who choose not to follow them. United States v. Pacheco-Ortiz, 889 F.2d 301, 310-11 (1st Cir.1989) (per curiam).