Court Opinion

ID: 9475348
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:24:25.033804+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:39.576381
License: Public Domain

McKAY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I agree with parts II, III and IV of the court’s opinion. However, I cannot be consistent with the Supreme Court authority and, at the same time, agree with the majority’s handling of the Sixth Amendment issue. Therefore, I must respectfully dissent from part I of the opinion and the result obtained in this case.
After the defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel had attached, Mr. Nave, who was incarcerated in a detention facility along with the defendant, saw an opportunity to get some help in obtaining a favorable place for his long-term imprisonment. On his own initiative, according to his account, Mr. Nave summoned to his cell federal officials who were preparing the case against the defendant. There he reported a conversation in which the defendant indicated that he was looking for an alibi. Mr. Nave proposed that he would obtain information from the defendant which would be useful to the prosecution in defendant’s upcoming trial, if they would inform the probation service, the presentence service and the judge that he was assisting the *1019government on Mr. Taylor’s case and speak to the judge about his place of incarceration. In direct exchange for that offer, the government agents agreed to tell the authorities that he had cooperated, but they would not guarantee that Mr. Nave would be put in a preferred place of incarceration. The government agents, after having reached this understanding with Mr. Nave, placed the defendant in Mr. Nave’s cell to facilitate the scheme.
The record is incomplete regarding Mr. Nave’s efforts to gather information from the defendant, but we do know that Mr. Nave and the defendant thereupon had “a conversation about a couple of bank rob-beries____” Record, supp. vol. 1, at 147 (emphasis added). In answer to the question, “And where did those conversations take place?” Mr. Nave replied, “In my cell in the Oklahoma City Jail.” Id. (emphasis added). When the prosecutor asked, “What I want you to do is to tell the jury the substance of that conversation,” id. (emphasis added), Mr. Nave recited at length the incriminating information on which much of this prosecution rests. Though Mr. Nave said, “I didn’t pump him for anything,” he added, “The conversation, I never initiated the conversation. The conversation was brought to me.” Id. at 162 (emphasis added). Nowhere in the record is there any indication that the government, which knew that defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel had attached, instructed Mr. Nave not to elicit or encourage information in circumvention of that right.
To this whole line of questioning, counsel for defendant objected, saying: “To which we will object, your Honor, as being no proper predicate laid. This gentleman apparently has gone to work for the government at that point.” Record, supp. vol. 1, at 147. He further objected, “Repeat— again, your Honor, we will object to the verbatim of any conversation held by this man while he was under the supervision of the government.” Id. While the majority makes much of counsel’s alleged failure to raise specifically the issue, in light of the facts in this case, the objection could have been on no ground other than the Sixth Amendment violation. It is not necessary for counsel to give an essay on the basis of the objection. In my view, it was sufficient for him to indicate that he was objecting because Mr. Nave was an agent of the government. See United States v. Cummiskey, 728 F.2d 200, 205 (3d Cir.1984), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1005, 105 S.Ct. 1869, 85 L.Ed.2d 162 (1985).
Because the objection was adequate, two matters remain to be considered. The first concerns the question of the relationship between Mr. Nave and the government when he undertook to have “conversations” with the defendant. In its opinion, the majority focuses its analysis on its determination that the government promised Mr. Nave no consideration for his efforts. The notion of consideration, however, is misplaced in this Sixth Amendment context when discussing agency. It is perfectly clear from reading the facts of such cases as Kuhlmann v. Wilson, — U.S. -, 106 S.Ct. 2616, 91 L.Ed.2d 364 (1986); Maine v. Moulton, — U.S.-, 106 S.Ct. 477, 88 L.Ed.2d 481 (1985); United States v. Henry, 447 U.S. 264, 100 S.Ct. 2183, 65 L.Ed.2d 115 (1980); and Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 12 L.Ed.2d 246 (1964), that all that is required for agency in this context is that the informer, for whatever motivation, seek the information from the defendant pursuant to an understanding reached between the informer and the investigating officers. Nothing in the Supreme Court’s opinions establishes that whether an informant is an agent turns on whether the police offer the informant consideration. Indeed, according to Moulton, even “knowing exploitation by the State of an opportunity to confront the accused without counsel being present is as much a breach of the State’s obligation not to circumvent the right to the assistance of counsel as is the intentional creation of such an opportunity.” 106 S.Ct. at 487. The Supreme Court’s disregard for archaic notions of consideration is consistent with much of contract law, in which the requirement of considera*1020tion has been eliminated. See, e.g., Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 90 (1981); U.C.C. § 2-205 (1977).
In any event, even in a routine contracts case the request for special consideration from the judge about a place of incarceration and a promise to give the good word is more than sufficient consideration either under an academic or a practical view of that notion. Here the government provided such consideration when it agreed to perform a service for the informer and deliberately placed the defendant in his cell in order to carry out this nefarious circumvention of known Sixth Amendment rights. Thus, I conclude that Mr. Nave acted as an agent of the government when he extracted incriminating information from the defendant.
The second matter is determining whether the informer acted only passively or actively in carrying out this scheme to obtain information from the defendant. The only conceivable ground preventing reversal simply on the basis of Moulton is any implications which might be drawn from Kuhlmann v. Wilson, where the Court stated that
a defendant does not make out a violation of [his Sixth Amendment] right simply by showing that an informant, either through prior arrangement or voluntarily, reported his incriminating statements to the police. Rather, the defendant must demonstrate that the police and their informant took some action, beyond merely listening, that was designed deliberately to elicit incriminating remarks.
106 S.Ct. at 2630. Kuhlmann makes clear that once the police have set about to deliberately bypass Sixth Amendment rights they may be excused if they carefully instruct their informer to avoid precipitating the incriminating statements and if their informer follows those instructions. In my view, once the government has entered into an agreement that may circumvent a defendant’s right to counsel, it has the burden to show by a preponderance of evidence that it instructed the informer to be passive and that he followed those instructions. However, Kuhlmann does not save the government’s deliberate circumvention of the defendant’s Sixth Amendment rights for two reasons.
First, although the facts in Kuhlmann are somewhat similar to those in this case, it is clear that the Supreme Court relied on 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) (1982) to reach its factual determination that the informer did not elicit any information from the defendant. That section provides that state court findings of fact are binding on federal courts in habeas corpus actions. In Kuhl-mann there was an express state court finding that the informant was instructed only to listen to the defendant, that he followed that instruction, and that the defendant’s statements to the informer were spontaneous and unsolicited. However, the facts of our case stand in stark contrast to those judicially established in Kuhlmann. Absolutely no instructions were given to restrain Mr. Nave from soliciting, encouraging or otherwise inducing statements by the defendant. Indeed, all this record reveals is that Mr. Nave and the defendant had “a conversation” pursuant to the prior understanding with the police that the informer would use the joint celling as an opportunity to gather information. Neither finding nor fact suggests that the informer was instructed to avoid eliciting or encouraging statements.
Second, it is clear that Kuhlmann recognizes that Moulton and its predecessors are binding law. 106 S.Ct. at 2629. In Moulton the police did not arrange the meeting between the defendant and the informer. Indeed, the meeting had been arranged before the police approached the informer. The police became aware of the already-planned meeting while reaching an agreement with the informer to have him record conversations with the defendant. Furthermore, in Moulton the government officials instructed the informant “to be himself,” “act normal,” and “not interrogate” the defendant. 106 S.Ct. at 488 n. 14.
Nevertheless, the Court held that the informer’s conversation violated the de*1021fendant’s Sixth Amendment rights. As the Kuhlmann Court described the illegal conduct in Moulton, “[B]ecause of the relationship between the defendant and the informant, the informant’s engaging the defendant ‘in active conversation about their upcoming trial was certain to elicit’ incriminating statements from the defendant____ Thus, the informant’s participation in this conversation was ‘the functional equivalent of interrogation.’ ” 106 S.Ct. at 2630 (citations omitted). The Court further explains in Moulton that "the Sixth Amendment is violated when the State obtains incriminating statements by knowingly circumventing the accused’s right to-have counsel present in a confrontation between the accused and the state agent.” 106 S.Ct. at 487.
In my view, the Moulton test has been met. When Mr. Nave engaged the defendant in active conversation designed to obtain incriminating evidence, the defendant’s right to counsel was violated. This violation of Sixth Amendment rights is not trivial. The testimony of this informer was central to an otherwise flimsy case. Without that testimony the defendant very likely would have been acquitted.
In conclusion, the agency analysis as employed by the majority will not bear scrutiny. The Moulton line of cases makes abundantly clear that the facts of this case establish a violation of Sixth Amendment rights. An attempt to avoid this violation on the ground that the objection was inadequate simply ignores the fact that the objection could have been based on nothing other than Sixth Amendment grounds and was repeatedly and timely made. Thus, I would reverse the decision of the trial court.