Court Opinion

ID: 9455758
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 19:32:23.585791+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:43.382496
License: Public Domain

LAY and HEANEY, Circuit Judges
(dissenting).
This court holds today that the exercise of the privilege against self-incrimination, although no longer directly *109punishable under Marchetti-Grosso,1 is nevertheless subject to sanction.
Here the government used the defendants’ exercise of their Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination as the sole 2 basis for obtaining evidence to convict them. When the evidence was used (post Marchetti-Grosso), a “sanction” was thus effected against users of the privilege. The privilege is too sancrosanct to be so easily eluded and abused.
An individual’s failure to register or pay the tax to avoid self-incrimination should not provide the direct avenue to obtain evidence to prosecute on other charges. Whether the government prosecutes for failing to pay the tax, or seizes evidence to prosecute under other criminal laws for such failure, makes little difference. In each instance it renders a penalty in response to a defendant’s exercise of his Fifth Amendment rights. Whether it does so by direct or indirect means should be immaterial. If defendants’ privilege not to register or pay the tax may serve as the basis of obtaining evidence for state or federal authorities to proceed on other charges, the dilution of the privilege has been accomplished, and the rationale of Marchetti and Grosso has been rendered meaningless. Today’s holding means that the government has found the effective way to punish a defendant for exercising the privilege. The Hobson choice still exists. The recognition of this “whipsaw” effect is the true significance of Judge Kaufman’s opinion in Silbert v. United States, 282 F.Supp. 635, 647 (D.Md.1968)3 The identical question was faced by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court where Mr. Justice Roberts speaking for the full court in Commonwealth v. Katz, 429 Pa. 406, 240 A. 2d 809, 811 (1968), said:
“We therefore believe that if a federal prosecution based upon violations of sections 4411 and 4412 (and evidence seized to prove these violations) would infringe the accused’s privilege against self-incrimination and if this privilege applies to the states, then a state prosecution based upon the same evidence seized by federal officers would equally violate that privilege. Were the rule otherwise, the Marchetti decision and its conclusion that prosecutions for violations of the federal statutes here involved run afoul of the fifth amendment could be easily eroded if state prosecutions based upon evidence seized by federal officers searching for violations of the now unconstitutional statutes were permitted. Whether this evidence is used in state or federal court, the evil is identical — an accused’s failure to register and pay the tax, as well as evidence seized to prove this failure, becomes the basis of a criminal prosecution violative of the fifth amendment. Certainly, after Marehetti, the *110evidence used to convict appellants could not be constitutionally admitted in a federal court; were we to admit it, we believe that an identical constitutional violation would be committed.”4
The fact that the evidence seized is not itself self-incriminating is irrelevant to the discussion. In setting aside a conviction for contempt of court arising from the lawful exercise of the privilege the Supreme Court observed:
“The Fourteenth Amendment secures against state invasion the same privilege that the Fifth Amendment guarantees against federal infringement— the right of a person to remain silent unless he chooses to speak in the unfettered exercise of his own will, and to suffer no penalty, as held in [Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U.S. 78, 29 S.Ct. 14, 53 L.Ed. 97] Twining, for such silence.” (Emphasis ours.) Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U.S. 1, 8, 84 S.Ct. 1489, 1493, 12 L.Ed.2d 653 (1964).
See also Hoffman v. United States, 341 U.S. 479, 71 S.Ct. 814, 95 L.Ed. 1118 (1951).
In Griffin v. California, 380 U.S. 609, 85 S.Ct. 1229, 14 L.Ed.2d 106 (1965), the Court considered the effect of a state prosecutor’s comments that the defendant’s silence was evidence of guilt. The Supreme Court observed:
“For comment on the refusal to testify is a remnant of the ‘inquisitorial system of criminal justice,’ Murphy v. Waterfront Comm’n, [of New York Harbor], 378 U.S. 52, 55, 84 S.Ct. 1594, 12 L.Ed.2d 678, which the Fifth Amendment outlaws. It is a penalty imposed by courts for exercising a constitutional privilege. It cuts down on the privilege by making its assertion costly.” (Emphasis ours.) Id. at 614, 85 S.Ct. at 1232.
See also Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967).
The entire theme of subsequent decisions has demonstrated that the substance of the constitutional privilege is *111cannibalized if individuals may be punished for exercising it. In Spevack v. Klein, 385 U.S. 511, 87 S.Ct. 625, 17 L.Ed.2d 574 (1967), involving a disbarment proceeding of a lawyer who refused to produce financial records and to testify at the inquiry, the Supreme Court observed:
“In this context ‘penalty’ is not restricted to fine or imprisonment. It means, as we said in Griffin v. California, 380 U.S. 609, 85 S.Ct. 1229, 14 L.Ed.2d 106, the imposition of any sanction which makes assertion of the Fifth Amendment privilege ‘costly.’ ” Id. at 515, 87 S.Ct. at 628.
And quoting from Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 634-635, 6 S.Ct. 524, 29 L.Ed. 746, the Court in Spevack added:
“ ‘It is the duty of courts to be watchful for the constitutional rights of the citizen, and against any stealthy encroachments thereon.’ ”
See also Uniformed Sanitation Men Ass’n, Inc. v. Commissioner of Sanitation, 392 U.S. 280, 88 S.Ct. 1917, 20 L.Ed.2d 1089 (1968); Slochower v. Board of Higher Education, 350 U.S. 551, 76 S.Ct. 637, 100 L.Ed. 692 (1956).
Although made in a different context, the words of Mr. Justice Frankfurter in Nardone v. United States, 308 U.S. 338, 60 S.Ct. 266, 84 L.Ed. 307 (1939), are pertinent here.
“To forbid the direct use of methods thus characterized but to put no curb on their full indirect use would only invite the very methods deemed ‘inconsistent with ethical standards and destructive of personal liberty.’ ” Id. at 340, 60 S.Ct. at 267.
We need not perform any balancing act of weighing effects of a lawful search vis-a-vis an assertion of the privilege against self-incrimination. It remains fundamental that any significant encroachment on the freedom to exercise the privilege cannot receive sustenance under the law.5
The majority justifies applying a sanction to the defendants’ exercise of the privilege here because the evidence in question was obtained by a legal search. They urge that evidence legally seized for one offense may be lawfully used for prosecution of another. While this is a correct statement of the law in other contexts, it is not valid here.6 *112The arguments alleging violations of the Fourth and Fifth Amendments are not equivalent in the present context. Cf. Schmerber v. California, supra. The majority’s Fourth Amendment analysis fails to come to grips with the fact that a sanction has been applied to the defendants’ lawful exercise of the Fifth Amendment privilege.
The argument that the lawful search erases the “compulsory” aspect in the production of the evidence seized 7 concerns itself with the nature of the evidence seized rather than with the subsequent sanction applied. The gravamen of the harm is that the defendants were forced to choose between providing evidence to prosecuting authorities by registration and payment of the tax or by failing to register and pay the tax, subjecting themselves to a search of their premises. The compulsion thus came prior to the search and not from the search itself. There would be no harm, under this compulsion if the evidence seized was never used. However, in the instant case, the penalty for refusing to incriminate themselves came thereafter in the use of the evidence in prosecution under § 1952 and not from any incrimination arising from the evidence being lawfully seized.
One further observation should be offered. The government urged in Marchetti that the federal statute- be enforced and that the privilege be protected by placing restriction upon the use of the evidence obtained. Cf. Murphy v. Waterfront Comm’n of New York Harbor, 378 U.S. 52, 84 S.Ct. 1594, 12 L.Ed. 2d 678 (1964). The Supreme Court reasoned, however, that such a rule would impair state prosecutions by possibly tainting the use of evidence otherwise lawfully seized. The Court observed that it would be too onerous a burden upon a state to always demonstrate that the evidence it had otherwise legally seized was not based upon information obtained as a consequence of a defendant’s registration or payment of the tax. 390 U.S. at 59, 88 S.Ct. 697, 19 L.Ed.2d 889. With the rejection of the argument of restricted use, the government now seeks here to completely enervate the Supreme Court’s holding by contending that the evidence obtained as a direct consequence of noncompliance may be used to prosecute defendants under other laws, regardless of how tainted the evidence may be. In our judgment, such circumlocution degrades the dignity of an individual’s Fifth Amendment rights.

. Marchetti v. United States, 390 U.S. 39, 88 S.Ct. 697, 19 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968) and Grosso v. United States, 390 U.S. 62, 88 S.Ct. 709, 19 L.Ed.2d 906 (1968).

. It is peculiarly significant here that the basis of the affidavit leading to the search alleged violation of only 26 U.S.C.A. § 7203 and related sections. Probable cause for a search under 18 U.S.C.A. § 1952 was not alleged, as it had been in DiPiazza v. United States, 415 F.2d 99 (6 Cir. 1969), cited in the majority opinion. (See appellant’s supplemental brief, page 8, relying upon “Defendant’s Exhibits No. 12 and No. 16, Appendix P. 38a and 43a, Cause No. 18593-18594, Sixth Circuit.”) Allegation of a § 1952 violation within the affidavit materially distinguishes the instant facts.

. Judge Kaufman’s reasoning in Silbert (282 F.Supp. 635) is dismissed by the majority on the rationalization that he is attempting to apply Marchetti-Grosso retroactively in a Fourth Amendment context. We respectfully submit this misconstrues his concern over the encroachment upon the exercise of the defendants’ Fifth Amendment rights. The sanction in Silbert, as here, was not at the time of the search but in the use of the evidence seized in a subsequent criminal prosecution. Retroactivity of Marchetti-Grosso is not an issue under either the Silbert case or here since the objectional encroachment on defendants’ Fifth Amendment rights comes after the decision of Marchetti-Grosso.

. This same rationale was used by the Seventh Circuit in United States v. United States Coin & Currency Amount of $8,674.00 (Angelini-claimant), 393 F.2d 499 (7 Cir. 1968), cert. granted 393 U.S. 949, 89 S.Ct. 375, 21 L.Ed.2d 361 (1968) in a forfeiture proceeding. The Court there said:
“The only apparent purpose of 26 U. S.C. § 7302, as applied here, is to punish violators of Sections 4411 and 4412 of the Internal Revenue Code by taking away money used in committing the violations. See One 1958 Plymouth Sedan v. Com. of Pennsylvania, 380 U.S. 693, 700, 85 S.Ct. 1246, 14 L.Ed.2d 170. As a practical matter, Marehetti means that such violations are no longer punishable directly. It follows that they should not be punished indirectly through forfeiture.” 393 F.2d at 500.
See 33 Albany L.Rev. 158 (1968). In accord, United States v. $3,296.00 in Currency, 286 F.Supp. 543 (N.D.N.Y.1968) ; United States v. $125,882 in U. S. Currency, 286 F.Supp. 643 (S.D.N.Y.1968) ; United States v. One 1967 Buick Electra 225, 289 F.Supp. 642 (D.N.J.1968) ; United States v. One Philco Television, 292 F.Supp. 35 (S.D.Tex.1968) ; United States v. Riccio, 282 F.Supp. 979 (N.D.Ill.1968) ; cf. Pizzarello v. United States, 408 F.2d 579, 587 (2 Cir. 1969) (levy of jeopardy assessment). Contra: United States v. One 1965 Buick (Dean-claimant), 392 F.2d 672, on rehearing 397 F.2d 782 (6 Cir. 1968) ; United States v. Filing, 410 F.2d 459 (6 Cir. 1969) ; United States v. Yeagle, 299 F.Supp. 257 (E.D.Ky.1969). And compare Washington v. United States, 402 F.2d 3 (4 Cir. 1968). Certiorari was applied for in the Dean case on October 8, 1968, and the Washington case on December 13, 1968. These petitions are still pending before the Supreme Court.
If the ultimate decision of the Supreme Court is as the Sixth Circuit reasons, that a forfeiture proceeding is “civil” in nature (but see Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 634, 6 S.Ct. 524, 29 L.Ed. 746 (1886)), then the Dean case is clearly distinguishable from one where the evidence seized is used in another criminal proceeding. However, if the Angelini ruling of the Seventh Circuit is affirmed, the evidence seized and subsequently used in a forfeiture proceeding is a punishment and criminal in nature. Angelini would thus serve as a binding and direct precedent in support of defendants’ Fifth Amendment claims here.

. The recent case of United States v. Knox, 396 U.S. 77, 90 S.Ct. 363, 24 L.Ed.2d 275 (1969), should not provide the government any comfort. As contrasted to the defendants’ exercise of their privilege against self-incrimination in the instant case, by noncompliance with §§ 4412 and 7203, the Supreme Court in Knox makes clear that Knox’s fraudulent filing under § 4412 was “ * * * a course other than the one that the statute was designed to compel, a course that the Fifth Amendment gave him no privilege to take." (Emphasis ours.) The indictment in Knox was upheld under inapposite principles to those involved here. The Supreme Court relied upon the reasoning in Bryson v. United States, 396 U.S. 64, 90 S.Ct. 355, 24 L.Ed.2d 264 (1969), decided the same date. In Bryson the Court emphasized the language of Dennis v. United States, 384 U.S. 855, 86 S.Ct. 1840, 16 L.Ed.2d 973 which stated:
“The governing principle is that a claim of unconstitutionality will not be heard to excuse a voluntary, deliberate and calculated course of fraud and deceit. One who elects such a course as a means of self-help may not escape the consequences by urging that his conduct be excused because the statute which he sought to evade is unconstitutional. This is a prosecution directed at petitioner’s fraud. It is not an action to enforce the statute claimed to be unconstitutional.”
It is also clear that Knox dealt with the dismissal of an indictment and the Court reserved opinion as to the “compulsion” issue under Marchetti as “one that must he determined * * * at his trial.” We in no way intimate that the defendants’ indictment under § 1952 is invalid in the instant case.

. In dissenting, since we feel a reversal necessary, we need not pass upon the issue argued on rehearing that the personal papers of the defendants seized were self-incriminatory so as to constitute an illegal search under the Fourth Amendment. See Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 6 S.Ct. 524, 29 L.Ed. 746 (1886). This question, that is, “whether there are *112items of evidential value whose very nature precludes them from being the object of a reasonable search and seizure,” was left open in Warden, Md. Penitentiary, v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 303, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 1648, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967). See also Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757, 772, 86 S.Ct. 1826, 16 L.Ed.2d 908 (1966).
Por a full discussion of the relationship between the Fourth and Fifth Amendments see The Fourth and Fifth Amendments — Dimensions of an “Intimate Relationship”, 13 U.C.L.A.L.Rev. 857 (1966) ; Constitutional Law: Supreme Court Delineates the Relationship Between the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, 1967 Duke L.J. 366 (1967). Cf. Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. at 633, 6 S.Ct. 524.

. 8 Wigmore, Evidence § 2264 n. 4 (McNaughton rev. 1961).