Opinion ID: 562088
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Private Citizens and the Hobbs Act's Official Right Prong

Text: 21 Extortion requires obtaining of property ... by wrongful use of actual or threatened force, violence, or fear, or under color of official right. 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1951(b)(2) (1988). Clarence McClain was at all relevant times a private citizen, yet he was accused of attempting extortion using, among other means, color of official right. By instructing the jury on this theory, the district court took one side in the debate that apparently simmers among this circuit's trial courts: can a private citizen ever be convicted of committing extortion through obtaining property under the color of official right? Compare United States v. Freedman, 562 F.Supp. 1378 (N.D.Ill.1983) (official right prong cannot apply to private citizens) and United States v. Gonzales, 620 F.Supp. 1143 (N.D.Ill.1985) (same) with United States v. Phillips, 586 F.Supp. 1118 (N.D.Ill.1984) (official right prong can apply to private defendant if victim reasonably believed defendant wielded governmental power). 22 We have in our cases drawn a clear distinction between extortion through threat or putting in fear and extortion under color of official right. While the fear prong of the Hobbs Act applies only to cases in which an actual threat has been made (whether explicit or implicit), a defendant can commit extortion under color of official right if he merely accepts bribes, solicited or not. Holzer, 816 F.2d at 310. Accord United States v. Davis, 890 F.2d 1373 (7th Cir.1989), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 1165, 107 L.Ed.2d 1068 (1990); United States v. Balzano, 916 F.2d 1273 (7th Cir.1990). Holzer (where an implicit threat was found) involved a public official; nevertheless it is clear from our cases that extortion through fear can be committed by private persons. See United States v. Burke, 781 F.2d 1234, 1244 (7th Cir.1985); United States v. Arambasich, 597 F.2d 609, 610 (7th Cir.1979). Hence, the statute's language should be read to show Congress' understanding that a public official is in a position such that unsolicited bribes are indistinguishable from money received after threat of harm. But private persons, as a general rule, do not visibly wield the same power as public officials. Thus private citizens generally would encounter more difficulty in extorting property without threats. Usually a private person will have to make known to his victim his intent to injure, as well as his ability to carry out his intent, unless money or other benefit is forthcoming. In private person cases, therefore, prosecution under the fear prong is available, and the government may not ordinarily have a basis for resorting to the official right theory. Of course, our analysis does not apply, for example, to a private person actually masquerading as a public official, cf. United States v. Rindone, 631 F.2d 491, 495 (7th Cir.1980) (public official can extort money for permit beyond control of his office, so long as victim has a reasonable belief that he could affect issuance), nor does it grant private persons immunity from official right suits when they act in coordination with public officers, see United States v. Margiotta, 688 F.2d 108, 130-33 (2d Cir.1982) (head of local Republican Party convicted for official right violation through 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2(b), causing government official to violate Hobbs Act). 23 The argument against this view is that persons can maintain such a vise-like grip on power, even without office, that prosecution under the official right prong should be permissible. But despite this argument, we think the distinction earlier drawn is supported both by the statute and the history of enforcement under the Hobbs Act. Congress made this distinction clear in the plain wording of the statute, which sets off under color of official right from the other means of extortion. As we have previously noted, use of the disjunctive in its recital of extortionate conduct evinces Congress' intent to maintain the broad common-law definition of extortion when carried out by public officials. United States v. Crowley, 504 F.2d 992, 994-95 (7th Cir.1974); cf. United States v. Nardello, 393 U.S. 286, 289, 89 S.Ct. 534, 536, 21 L.Ed.2d 487 (1969) (describing in dictum trend in legislation to broaden common law extortion proscriptions to private persons who obtain property by means of force, fear or threats). Unlike at common law, statutory extortion through threats or putting in fear could be carried out by private persons or public officials, but extortion by bribery would remain illegal only for public officials. Nor does this construction render the clause under color of meaningless. No one has the right, guaranteed by any office he occupies, to extort money from others. Thus to prohibit extortion merely through official right would have been to outlaw the impossible and to provide a seamless but absurd defense for any official who merely claims he was acting beyond the scope of his official powers. The qualifier under color of was required for the statute to proscribe the intended conduct. 11 24 Under the historical practice which bears this analysis out, influence-peddling has become a wide-spread (albeit not universally commended) art form at both the local and national level. Lobbyists and ex-officials are sought out and paid to use their influence in the government to achieve their clients' ends. When these transactions are genuinely consensual (that is, free of intimidation or coercion), they are not challenged by the government as unethical or illegal. Yet, given the distinction we drew in Holzer between fear and color of official right, an undue expansion of the color of official right concept might sweep so broadly as to implicate payments to influential lobbyists. For if consensual payment to a public official for use of his office constitutes a bribe, so too might consensual payment to an influential private lobbyist for use of her influence. And an attempt at a limiting principle--saving official right prosecutions only for private persons with a vise-like grip on public power (at least in the claimed pattern of a Clarence McClain)--might simply prohibit being too successful a lobbyist. Apparently the Supreme Court has some concern about extension of the Hobbs Act to heretofore legitimate lobbying or campaign activity. See McCormick v. United States, --- U.S. ----, ----, 111 S.Ct. 1807, 1816, 114 L.Ed.2d 307 (1991) (Whatever ethical considerations and appearances may indicate, to hold that legislators commit the federal crime of extortion when they act for the benefit of constituents or support legislation furthering the interests of some of their constituents, shortly before or after campaign contributions are solicited and received from those beneficiaries, is an unrealistic assessment of what Congress could have meant by making it a crime to obtain property from another, with his consent, 'under color of official right.' ... To hold otherwise would open to prosecution ... conduct that has long been thought to be well within the law.....). Therefore we believe that, as a general matter and with caveats as suggested here, proceeding against private citizens on an official right theory is inappropriate under the literal and historical meaning of the Hobbs Act, irrespective of the actual control that citizen purports to maintain over governmental activity. 25 As we have pointed out, McClain was actually acquitted under the official right prong of the statute, the jury having concluded that he was guilty only on a conspiracy theory. Nevertheless, he challenges the official right charge by reshaping his claim of error into an evidentiary challenge, arguing that had he not stood indicted under the official right prong, much unfairly prejudicial evidence admitted at trial would have been excluded. Specifically, McClain points to the numerous conversations in which he boasted of the influence he wielded over public officials, even Mayor Washington himself. These statements, he argues, were admitted only to prove the predicate authority for an official right conviction under the government's impermissible charge. As such, the statements were irrelevant for any proper purpose, and the prejudice that resulted from their admission constituted reversible error. 26 McClain faces a heavy burden in challenging the admission of his statements. Evidentiary decisions are for the trial judge, and we will not disturb them unless she has abused her discretion. United States v. Briscoe, 896 F.2d 1476, 1489-90 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 173, 112 L.Ed.2d 137 (1990). But even without this deference, we would agree with the trial judge's determination. Although we believe it improper to have charged McClain under the official right prong of the Hobbs Act, McClain points to nothing in the record which supports the claim that these statements were admitted only for proving his guilt under that prong. We agree with the government that the statements also supported another extortion theory it offered to the jury, extortion by putting in fear--specifically in this case, fear of economic harm. See, e.g., Balzano, 916 F.2d at 1285-86 (fear of economic harm sufficient to support Hobbs Act conviction); Holzer, 816 F.2d at 309-10 (same). Of course, even private citizens can be subject to suit under the fear prong of the Hobbs Act. Burke, 781 F.2d at 1244. Whatever the evidence might eventually show, McClain could have committed attempted extortion had he suggested to SRS that he could prevent its receipt of the contract unless it paid him. 12 Touting his own ability to control city government would be a necessary step for McClain in making this threat. Because these statements were admissible as relevant to a separate theory legitimately offered in the extortion counts, the propriety of the charge against McClain of attempting extortion through color of official right is not before us.