Opinion ID: 202665
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Misprision of Felony—Was There Plain Error?

Text: 53 The prosecution has articulated the elements of the offense as follows: 54 In the instant case, the offense of conviction, misprision of felony, requires proof that: 1) the principal committed and completed the alleged felony; 2) defendant had full knowledge of that fact; 3) defendant failed to notify the authorities; and 4) defendant took steps to conceal the crime. 55 See Cefalu, 85 F.3d at 969 (citing Ciambrone, 750 F.2d at 1417; United States v. Baez, 732 F.2d 780, 782 (10th Cir.1984)). Caraballo has not materially contested this formulation, and we accept it arguendo. 56 This is an unusual case in that Caraballo had several overlapping roles. First, he had full knowledge, both before and after, of a crime. Second, he was a participant in that crime and not a mere witness. Third, although he did initially notify authorities, he did not provide authorities with his full knowledge of the drug conspiracy despite requests that he do so. Fourth, he was not a mere member of the public but was a police officer. Each of these roles factors into the analysis. 57 Applying the plain error test, we ask whether Caraballo's proposed construction—that a partial truthful disclosure cannot be an affirmative act and an affirmative act is required—is compelled by the language of the statute itself, construction of the statute in light of the common law, or binding judicial construction of the statute. We hold that Caraballo has not met his burden of showing there was an error which was plain, for several basic reasons. In doing so, we do not make any ruling on the merits of the issues discussed under the misprision statute. 58 First, while this court and the Supreme Court may someday adopt the majority rule in the circuits that an affirmative act is required for a misprision offense, there is now no binding precedent to that effect. Caraballo does not argue otherwise. None of our misprision cases has adopted Caraballo's proposed rule. Further, in United States v. Vazquez-Alomar, 342 F.3d 1, 2 (1st Cir.2003), we suggested that a federal prisoner had violated 18 U.S.C. § 4 when he did not inform federal authorities that he had engaged in telephone conversations with others about crimes. Consequently, there can be no plain error. Thus, we need not resolve the greyer areas of what constitutes an affirmative act. Secondly, we cannot say there is plain error because the government articulates a new theory, not accepted, but not rejected by any court, based on Caraballo's obligations as a police officer. The theory has some support at English common law. 59 Caraballo's argument that there was plain error is not proven by the language of the statute itself. Misprision of felony is defined at 18 U.S.C. § 4: 60 Whoever, having knowledge of the actual commission of a felony cognizable by a court of the United States, conceals and does not as soon as possible make known the same to some judge or other person in civil or military authority under the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both. 61 The underlying felony in this case was the drug conspiracy charged in Cr. No. 01-613. At issue is whether the facts alleged satisfy the statutory terms conceals and does not as soon as possible make known. 62 The dictionary definitions of conceal and concealment do not prove Caraballo's claim. The Oxford English Dictionary refers to both a common usage of keeping secret of any information and a legal usage of intentional suppression of truth. 3 Oxford English Dictionary 647 (2d ed.1989). Black's Law Dictionary defines the primary meaning of concealment as [t]he act of refraining from disclosure[, especially] an act by which one prevents or hinders the discovery of something. Black's Law Dictionary 306 (8th ed.2004). Neither source compels only one reading of the term conceals in 18 U.S.C. § 4. 63 Nor does the common law background of the statute compel Caraballo's reading. The statute at issue derives from a common law offense. Misprision of felony was a crime under English common law, dating back centuries. Sykes v. Dir. Pub. Prosecutions, [1962] A.C. 528, 555 (H.L.) (U.K.) (stating that misprision of felony has been an offence for the last 700 years or more, though not always under that name); C.W. Mullis, Comment, Misprision of Felony: A Reappraisal, 23 Emory L.J. 1095, 1095 (1974) (noting that [t]he offense of failing to report a felony was first labeled `misprision' by Sir William Staun[]ford in 1557). 64 Congress, in 1790, enacted a federal misprision statute which is essentially the same as 18 U.S.C. § 4 today. See Act of Apr. 30, 1790, § 6, 1 Stat. 113. There are some differences, however, between the English common law doctrine and how the federal statute has been interpreted in the United States. See C.M. Curenton, Comment, The Past, Present, and Future of 18 U.S.C. § 4: An Exploration of the Federal Misprision of Felony Statute, 55 Ala. L.Rev. 183, 183-84, 186 (2003); Mullis, supra, at 1098-99, 1101-04. 65 At English common law, [e]ver since the days of hue and cry, it [was] the duty of a man, who kn[ew] that a felony ha[d] been committed, to report it to the proper authority so that steps [could] be taken to apprehend the felon and bring him to justice. Sykes, [1962] A.C. at 555. Accordingly, Staunford in 1557 defined misprision as follows: Misprision . . . is properly when anyone learns or knows that another has committed treason or felony, and he does not choose to denounce him to the King or to his Council, or to any magistrate, but conceals his offense. Id. at 557. In light of this history, Lord Denning of the House of Lords pronounced that a person accused of misprision of felony need not have done anything active: but it is his duty by law to disclose to proper authority all material facts known to him relative to the offence. Id. at 563. Lord Guest, for his part, observed that he could not find in the numerous institutional writers who have defined [misprision of felony] . . . any statement that active steps of concealment are required to constitute the offence. Id. at 572. 66 Nor has the Supreme Court adopted Caraballo's reading. The Court, in Roberts v. United States, 445 U.S. 552, 100 S.Ct. 1358, 63 L.Ed.2d 622 (1980), 6 discussed the obligations of citizens not to conceal crimes, first as a matter of common law and then as defined and enforced through 18 U.S.C. § 4. As Roberts stated: 67 Concealment of crime has been condemned throughout our history. The citizen's duty to raise the `hue and cry' and report felonies to the authorities, Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U.S. 665, 696, 92 S.Ct. 2646, 33 L.Ed.2d 626 (1972), was an established tenet of Anglo-Saxon law at least as early as the 13th century. 2 W. Holdsworth, History of English Law 101-102 (3d ed.1927); 4 id., at 521-522; see Statute of Westminster First, 3 Edw. 1, ch. 9, p. 43 (1275); Statute of Westminster Second, 13 Edw. 1, chs. 1, 4, and 6, pp. 112-115 (1285). The first Congress of the United States exacted a statute imposing criminal penalties upon anyone who, having knowledge of the actual commission of [certain felonies,] shall conceal, and not as soon as may be disclose and make known the same to [the appropriate] authority. . . . Act of Apr. 30, 1790, § 6, 1 Stat. 113. Although the term misprision of felony now has an archaic ring, gross indifference to the duty to report known criminal behavior remains a badge of irresponsible citizenship. 68 445 U.S. at 557-58, 100 S.Ct. 1358 (alterations in original) (footnote omitted). Roberts made explicit that 18 U.S.C. § 4 can be applied where, as here, the witness to the crime is a participant himself in the underlying criminal activities, subject to Fifth Amendment concerns 7 : 69 This deeply rooted social obligation is not diminished when the witness to crime is involved in illicit activities himself. Unless his silence is protected by the privilege against self-incrimination . . ., the criminal defendant no less than any other citizen is obliged to assist the authorities. 70 Id. at 558, 100 S.Ct. 1358. Putting constitutional concerns aside momentarily, the statutory text applies to whoever meets its criteria, and does not necessarily exclude participants in crimes. 8 71 Still, in Caraballo's favor is the fact that neither the common law crime nor the statute was meant to punish in every instance every person who knows of a crime but does not report it. In 1822, Chief Justice Marshall noted, It may be the duty of a citizen to accuse every offender, and to proclaim every offense which comes to his knowledge; but the law which would punish him in every case for not performing this duty is too harsh for man. Marbury v. Brooks, 20 U.S. (7 Wheat.) 556, 575-76, 5 L.Ed. 522 (1822). Further, it is clear that misprision of felony cannot be read so broadly as to make a criminal of anyone who, as the victim of a crime or faced with a criminal threat, resisted a . . . suggestion that the police be called. United States v. Rakes, 136 F.3d 1, 5 (1st Cir.1998). The scope of the obligations imposed by the statute is an important issue in today's society where police investigations are often hampered by codes of silence and fearful refusal by witnesses to cooperate. Those issues are beyond the scope of this opinion. 72 Rather, Caraballo's argument turns on judicial construction of the statute; since we have not yet adopted the construction he urges, there is no plain error. However, we do not foreclose later adoption of such a construction. Caraballo particularly stresses the fact that many courts have interpreted the conceals and does not as soon as possible make known language as requiring an affirmative act of concealment. See, e.g., United States v. Goldberg, 862 F.2d 101, 104 (6th Cir.1988); United States v. Davila, 698 F.2d 715, 717 (5th Cir.1983); United States v. Sampol, 636 F.2d 621, 653 (D.C.Cir.1980); Daddano, 432 F.2d at 1124; Lancey v. United States, 356 F.2d 407, 410 (9th Cir.1966); Neal v. United States, 102 F.2d 643, 646 (8th Cir. 1939); Bratton v. United States, 73 F.2d 795, 797-98 (10th Cir.1934) (citing United States v. Farrar, 38 F.2d 515, 517 (D.Mass.), aff'd on different grounds, 281 U.S. 624, 50 S.Ct. 425, 74 L.Ed. 1078 (1930)). 73 Whether it is a proper construction of the statute to require an affirmative act of concealment has been questioned. Mullis, supra, at 1104 (The possibility that such a requirement was originally intended by Congress is rather slim, since, by the date of the statute's first enactment [in 1790], such a requirement had never before been applied to the crime. It is much more reasonable to conclude that Congress intended `conceal and' to signify a conscious and intentional non-disclosure.). 74 Caraballo argues that, in any of his capacities, he did not conceal the drug conspiracy. Rather, he disclosed it, and his refusal to provide the additional requested information cannot be punished as an act of concealment. 9 Caraballo relies on a series of cases holding that mere silence does not qualify as an act of concealment. See Goldberg, 862 F.2d at 105-06; Johnson, 546 F.2d at 1227; Lancey, 356 F.2d at 410; Neal, 102 F.2d at 650; Bratton, 73 F.2d at 798. But mere silence cases do not necessarily help him. Caraballo did not remain merely silent. He affirmatively sought out federal agents to make partial disclosure, but then declined to provide requested information. 75 Caraballo places special emphasis on Ciambrone, a Ninth Circuit case. Ciambrone is not a mere silence case, but a partial disclosure case. The defendant in Ciambrone truthfully, but only partially, disclosed his knowledge about a counterfeiting operation to a Secret Service agent. 750 F.2d at 1417. The court held that partial disclosure could not constitute misprision because if some information were offered, there could be no greater concealment of the felony than if the defendant who had knowledge of the crime had said nothing. Id. at 1418. Ciambrone required an affirmative act and implicitly held that the act of coming forward to provide information, but refusing to answer other questions, does not qualify as an affirmative act of concealment. None of the other cases cited by Caraballo adopts Ciambrone's position with respect to partial disclosures. Indeed, no federal court has followed Ciambrone in holding that a truthful, but partial, disclosure is insufficient to support a misprision conviction. 76 The Ciambrone logic, then, departs from the common law position that there is a general duty on citizens to disclose, and instead relies on a more limited rationale for the statute that misprision is concerned only with situations in which the government may be put in a worse situation or misled. 77 Caraballo admits that courts have sustained the application of the misprision statute in cases where someone with knowledge of a felony provided untruthful information. See Sampol, 636 F.2d at 656; cf. United States v. Salinas, 956 F.2d 80, 81 (5th Cir.1992). He distinguishes these cases on the facts here, on the basis that it is not alleged that he provided false information to federal agents. 78 There may be instances in which even partial truthful disclosures can be misleading. Ciambrone assumes that the government may not be misled by receipt of truthful information, even if it is incomplete, 750 F.2d at 1418, but that is not necessarily so. For example, United States v. Sessions, Nos. 00-1756, 00-1791, 2000 WL 1456903 (8th Cir. Oct.2, 2000) (unpublished decision), held that the misprision statute was satisfied where the defendant gave incomplete information to police regarding his knowledge of the [crime], at least where he gave the police partial information that was misleading. Id. at , 2000 WL 1456903. If the statute is geared toward avoiding the misleading of police, Ciambrone, 750 F.2d at 1418, it is still possible, in concept and in fact, that even a truthful but partial disclosure could conceal by misleading the government through the withholding of key information. 10 79 We cannot tell from the facts here whether the giving of partial information in this case in any way could have misled the DEA— information against Caraballo alleged only that he withheld information and the identities of co-conspirators, and did not as soon as possible make the conspiracy known to the appropriate authorities. On plain error review, even under a modified Ciambrone approach, it is defendant's burden to show that his truthful but partial disclosure was not misleading, and Caraballo has not done so. 80 The government argues, as a second theory, 11 that even if there is a requirement for an affirmative misrepresentation from an ordinary citizen, Caraballo had higher duties as a police officer. This appears to present a novel interpretation of the statute. The prosecution's theory derives from the obligations on police officers to disclose information about crimes, irrespective of whether civilians would have had such a duty. Caraballo was, at the time, a police officer who had an affirmative duty to act on information about a crime under Puerto Rican law. See P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 25, § 3102 (duty of the Puerto Rico Police is to prevent, discover, investigate and persecute crime and, within the scope of its authority, enforce obedience of the laws). 81 The prosecution argues that government officials, particularly police, who are already under an affirmative duty to report crimes, inherently conceal when they do not meet their duty to disclose. We have found no misprision cases discussing this theory. 12 82 Nonetheless, the argument, in light of the theory of law under the misprision statute to which Caraballo pled guilty, cannot be said to be plainly erroneous. Roberts itself referred to gross indifference to the duty to report and thought pertinent the development of this duty in Anglo-Saxon law. Indeed, there is some historical support in common law misprision doctrine for imposing special responsibilities on public officials. In 1628, Lord Coke in his Third Institute noted that the concealment of felonies in sheriffs, or bailiffs of liberties is more severely punished than in others. Sykes, [1962] A.C. at 558 (internal quotation marks omitted). Professor Glazebrook, although arguing for a broader view of what constituted misprision under English common law, has recognized that the term misprision in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries was thought to have been . . . especially appropriate to the misconduct of public officers. P.R. Glazebrook, Misprision of Felony—Shadow or Phantom?, 8 Am. J. Legal Hist. 189, 191, 194 (1964). As another commentator has noted, In fact, a strong case can be made that misprision should have particular applicability to public officers. Even at common law, commission of misprision appears to have been especially culpable for public officers, since they received a higher penalty for the crime than that received by ordinary citizens. Mullis, supra, at 1113 (citing W. Blackstone, 4 Commentaries 121). Because the theory is novel under the statute, it has neither been accepted nor rejected. The burden is on defendant to show that if there was any error, that error was plain. Ramirez-Benitez, 292 F.3d at 27. 83 This background buttresses our conclusion that if there was any error, it was not plain error. We stress that we do not, and need not, rule on the merits of issues pertaining to the judicial construction of the statute. The analysis could end here, but we comment briefly on the remaining prongs of the test.