While a state criminal prosecution and a state administrative
proceeding for revocation of his license were pending against
respondent, he brought this suit in a Federal District Court to
enjoin a state officer and certain federal officers from testifying
in either proceeding about incriminating statements elicited from
respondent while he was being illegally detained and interrogated
by the federal officers. The state officer had been present during
part of the interrogation, but had not participated therein.
Finding that the incriminating statements had been procured by the
federal officers in violation of Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure
5(a), the Court granted the injunction against them and the state
officer. Only the state officer sought review in this Court.
Held: the injunction against the state officer was
improvidently granted.
Stefanelli v. Minard, 342 U.
S. 117, followed.
Rea v. United States,
350 U. S. 214,
distinguished. Pp.
371 U. S.
392-401.
293 F.2d 368 reversed.
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case draws in question the propriety of the issuance of a
federal injunction restraining petitioner, a state officer, from
giving evidence in a pending state criminal prosecution and a state
administrative proceeding.
The facts, as found by the two lower courts, are as follows.
About 8:30 one Saturday morning in September,
Page 371 U. S. 393
1959, federal Customs officers observed respondent, a hiring
agent and longshoreman licensed by the Waterfront Commission of New
York Harbor, enter a deserted pier, carry out a cardboard carton,
and place it in a car parked at the pier entrance. The officers,
who were concerned about the recent frequency of thefts,
particularly of liquor, in the New York waterfront area, followed
respondent's car for a short distance, and then ordered him to
stop. A search of the automobile revealed that the cardboard carton
contained only empty soda bottles, but that the glove compartment
contained a number of spark plugs and windshield wipers, some of
which were stamped "Made in England." Respondent was asked whether
he had obtained any liquor from the piers, and he admitted that he
had six or eight bottles at home which he had purchased from
members of ships' crews who, in turn, he said, had bought them from
ships' stores.
The agents then took respondent into custody; he was brought to
the Customs office, denied permission to use the telephone, and
questioned until shortly before 11 a.m. During this period, he
signed a document consenting to a search of his home by the Customs
officers, who had told him that the consent form was unnecessary,
since they already had enough information to warrant a search, but
that he might as well sign it to save them trouble. He had at first
refused to sign such a consent without consulting a lawyer. The
agents then drove respondent to his home in New Jersey, and,
without a search warrant, gave it a thorough search, which
uncovered some 75 bottles of liquor, a Stenorette tape recording
machine made in West Germany, and various other items of apparent
foreign origin, such as perfumes, linens, costume jewelry, etc.
These articles, thought to have been illegally acquired, were
brought back to Customs headquarters in New York, where, starting
about 4 p.m., respondent was again questioned.
Page 371 U. S. 394
By this time, the Waterfront Commission, a bi-state agency of
New York and New Jersey [
Footnote
1] which worked in close cooperation with the Customs Service
in matters of law enforcement on the waterfront, had been informed
of respondent's arrest, and two Commission detectives were present
when the interrogation resumed. Petitioner Cleary was one of these
detectives. After respondent had revealed that he maintained a tool
room in the basement of an apartment house in New York, petitioner
and a Customs officer accompanied respondent to this tool room, but
nothing suspicious was discovered, and they returned to Customs
headquarters at 5:45 p.m.
After he had been told that he did not have to make a statement,
respondent was sworn and interrogated by Customs officers in the
presence of a Customs Service reporter, who recorded the questions
and answers verbatim. Petitioner was present, and could have
participated in the questioning, though he did not do so. [
Footnote 2] Respondent admitted that,
with the exception of a few items that he had purchased from crew
members, most of the articles seized at his home had been taken by
him from piers where he worked. He also said that he had taken the
Stenorette tape recorder from a lighter moored at one of the piers.
At 7:30 p.m., respondent was released.
No charges were lodged against respondent by the federal
authorities. But, a month later, he was arrested by the New York
City police on a charge of grand larceny for the theft of the
Stenorette tape recorder, and, shortly thereafter, the Waterfront
Commission temporarily suspended his licenses as hiring agent and
longshoreman. The criminal charge was subsequently reduced to
petit
Page 371 U. S. 395
larceny and scheduled for trial in the Court of Special Sessions
of New York City. A hearing looking to the revocation of
respondent's licenses was deferred by the Waterfront Commission
pending the outcome of the criminal case.
After the petit larceny charge had been set for trial,
respondent instituted the present action in the United States
District Court for the Southern District of New York seeking to
enjoin the federal Customs officers and petitioner from using in
evidence any of the seized property or his incriminating statement,
and from testifying with respect thereto, in the state criminal
trial or Waterfront Commission proceeding. He also sought return of
the seized property. [
Footnote
3] The basis for the action was the claim that the seized
property and the incriminating statement were the products of
illegal conduct on the part of the federal officers.
The District Court granted such relief, limited however, to the
property seized at respondent's home, to the incriminatory
statement made following his arrest, and to testimony respecting
these matters. [
Footnote 4] It
held that the search and seizure at respondent's home violated Rule
41(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure [
Footnote 5] in that it had
Page 371 U. S. 396
been made without a search warrant, and that his incriminating
statement had been procured in violation of Rule 5(a) of those
Rules, [
Footnote 6] in that
respondent had not been taken before a United States Commissioner
within a reasonable time after his arrest, and was also "the result
. . . of the illegal search and seizure." In consequence of these
illegalities, an injunction against the federal officers was
thought to follow. An injunction against petitioner was deemed
necessary to make the injunction against the federal officials
effective.
189 F.
Supp. 237. The Court of Appeals affirmed by a divided vote. 293
F.2d 368. Since the use of federal equity power in the premises
presented important questions touching upon federal-state
relationships in the realm of state criminal prosecutions, we
brought the case here. 368 U.S. 984.
Accepting for present purposes the holdings of the two lower
courts with respect to the conduct and enjoinability of the federal
officers, we nevertheless conclude that the injunction against this
petitioner was improvidently issued. [
Footnote 7]
Page 371 U. S. 397
Courts of equity traditionally have refused, except in rare
instances, to enjoin criminal prosecutions. This principle "is
impressively reinforced when not merely the relations between
coordinate courts, but between coordinate political authorities,
are in issue."
Stefanelli v. Minard, 342 U.
S. 117,
342 U. S. 120.
It has been manifested in numerous decisions of this Court
involving a State's enforcement of its criminal law.
E.g.,
Pugach v. Dollinger, 365 U. S. 458;
Douglas v. City of Jeannette, 319 U.
S. 157;
Watson v. Buck, 313 U.
S. 387;
Beal v. Missouri Pac. R. Co.,
312 U. S. 45. The
considerations that have prompted denial of federal injunctive
relief affecting state prosecutions were epitomized in the
Stefanelli case, in which this Court refused to sanction
an injunction against state officials to prevent them from using in
a state criminal trial evidence seized by state police in alleged
violation of the Fourteenth Amendment:
"[W]e would expose every State criminal prosecution to
insupportable disruption. Every question of procedural due process
of law -- with its far-flung and undefined range -- would invite a
flanking movement against the system of State courts by resort to
the federal forum, with review, if need be, to this Court, to
determine the issue. Asserted unconstitutionality in the impaneling
and selection of the grand and petit juries, in the failure to
appoint counsel, in the admission of a confession, in the creation
of an unfair trial atmosphere, in the misconduct of the trial court
-- all would provide ready opportunities, which conscientious
counsel might be bound to employ, to subvert the orderly, effective
prosecution of local crime in local courts. To suggest these
difficulties is to recognize their solution."
342 U.S. at
342 U. S.
123-124.
Page 371 U. S. 398
The two courts below recognized the validity of these
considerations, but thought that injunctive relief was nonetheless
required by
Rea v. United States, 350 U.
S. 214. In that case, the accused had been indicted in a
federal court, and had moved for an order under Rule 41(e) of the
Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure suppressing the use in evidence
of certain narcotics seized under a search warrant invalid on its
face. The District Court granted the motion. Despite the order,
however, one of the federal officers who had secured the search
warrant caused the accused to be rearrested and charged, in a state
court, with possession of the same narcotics in violation of a
state statute, and threatened to make the State's case by his
testimony based on the evidence seized under the illegal federal
warrant. The accused then moved in the Federal District Court to
enjoin the federal agent from testifying in the state proceeding.
This Court, invoking its "supervisory powers over federal law
enforcement agencies" (
id. at
350 U. S.
216-217), reversed the denial of an injunction and
directed that the requested relief be granted in order to prevent
frustration of the Federal Rules under which suppression had been
ordered. [
Footnote 8] Both
lower courts in the present case evidently took
Rea to
mean that federal officers transgressing the Federal Rules of
Criminal Procedure may always be enjoined from utilizing their
ill-gotten gains in a state criminal prosecution against the victim
or from directly or indirectly passing them along to state
authorities for such use. [
Footnote
9]
We need not, however, determine in this instance the correctness
of the lower courts' broad reading of the
Rea
Page 371 U. S. 399
case,
cf. Wilson v. Schnettler, 365 U.
S. 381, on the basis of which the federal officers here
were enjoined. [
Footnote 10]
For, in any event,
Rea does not support the injunction
against this petitioner, a state official. The Court in
Rea was at special pains to point out that the federal
courts were not there "asked to enjoin state officials nor in any
way to interfere with state agencies in enforcement of state law,"
350 U.S. at
350 U. S. 216,
and further that "[n]o injunction is sought against a state
official,"
id. at
350 U. S. 217. The opinion is barren of any suggestion
that any inroads on
Stefanelli were intended.
It is no answer to say, as the Court of Appeals did, that this
petitioner "is not being enjoined in his capacity as a state
official, but as a witness invited to observe illegal activity by
federal agents," 293 F.2d at 369. For it is abundantly clear that
the petitioner was present at these occurrences precisely and only
because of his official connection with the Waterfront Commission.
The District Court expressly found that it was "[t]he Waterfront
Commission," not petitioner, which "had been informed of
[respondent] Bolger's detention," 189 F. Supp. at 244, and that
petitioner "was present at the questioning [of Bolger] as a
representative of the Waterfront Commission,"
id. at
255.
Nor can the injunctive relief against this petitioner find
justification in the rationale that it was required in order or
make the injunction against the federal officers effective. Such
relief as to him must stand on its own bottom. We need not decide
whether petitioner's status as a state official might be ignored
had it been shown that he had misconducted himself in this affair,
that he had been utilized by the federal officials as a means of
shielding
Page 371 U. S. 400
their own alleged illegal conduct, or that he had received the
evidence in direct violation of a federal court order. Here, the
District Court found that petitioner was not a factor in the
federal investigation, [
Footnote
11] and that his presence there was simply
"the result of the commendable cooperation between the Customs
Service and the Commission, who were both concerned with law
enforcement on the waterfront."
189 F. Supp. at 255. [
Footnote 12] On this record, the upshot of the matter is
that, insofar as this state official is concerned, nothing in
Rea justifies disregard of the teachings of
Stefanelli. Nor is the vitality of the principles on which
the latter case rested sapped by this Court's decision in
Mapp
v. Ohio, 367 U. S. 643,
overruling Wolf v. Colorado, 338 U. S.
25, which had refused to extend to the States the
exclusionary rule of
Weeks v. United States, 232 U.
S. 383. For, in denying the injunctive relief there
sought,
Stefanelli expressly laid to one side any possible
impact of
Wolf. 342 U.S. at
342 U. S.
119-120.
The withholding of injunctive relief against this state official
does not deprive respondent of the opportunity for federal
correction of any denial of federal constitutional rights in the
state proceedings. To the extent that such rights have been
violated,
cf., e.g., Mapp v. Ohio,
Page 371 U. S. 401
supra, he may raise the objection in the state courts
and then seek review in this Court of an adverse determination by
the New York Court of Appeals. To permit such claims to be
litigated collaterally, as is sought here, would, in effect,
frustrate the deep-seated federal policy against piecemeal
review.
To the extent that respondent's claims involve infractions
merely of the Federal Criminal Rules, we need not decide whether an
adverse state determination upon such claims would be reversible
here.
Cf., e.g., Gallegos v. Nebraska, 342 U. S.
55. For, in any event, we do not think that an
injunction against this state official is justified in the
circumstances of this case. Assuming that such relief was properly
granted here as to the federal officials in the exercise of federal
court supervisory power over them, we consider that a supplementing
injunction should not issue against a state official at least
where, as here, there is no evidence of a purpose to avoid federal
requirements and the information has not been acquired by the state
official in violation of a federal court order. Such direct
intrusion in state processes does not comport with proper
federal-state relationships.
We conclude that the injunction as to this petitioner should not
have been granted, and that the judgment of the Court of Appeals
must accordingly be
Reversed.
[
Footnote 1]
See De Veau v. Braisted, 363 U.
S. 144.
[
Footnote 2]
The other Waterfront Commission detective, Machry, had
apparently left the scene at an earlier stage. He was not joined as
a defendant in the present action.
[
Footnote 3]
Respondent also instituted a second federal action against the
Waterfront Commission and its members, seeking to enjoin the use of
the same evidence in the license revocation proceeding. That suit
was dismissed by the District Court, and is not involved here.
[
Footnote 4]
The District Court held that respondent's arrest and the search
of his automobile by the federal agents were not illegal, and also
denied return of any of the property seized at respondent's home on
the premise that it was contraband. Neither of those determinations
is before us.
[
Footnote 5]
Rule 41(a):
"
Authority to Issue Warrant. A search warrant
authorized by this rule may be issued by a judge of the United
States or of a state, commonwealth or territorial court of record
or by a United States commissioner within the district wherein the
property sought is located."
[
Footnote 6]
Rule 5(a):
"
Appearance before the Commissioner. An officer making
an arrest under a warrant issued upon a complaint or any person
making an arrest without a warrant shall take the arrested person
without unnecessary delay before the nearest available commissioner
or before any other nearby officer empowered to commit persons
charged with offenses against the laws of the United States. When a
person arrested without a warrant is brought before a commissioner
or other officer, a complaint shall be filed forthwith."
See McNabb v. United States, 318 U.
S. 332.
[
Footnote 7]
It should be noted that respondent did not allege in his
complaint that the matter in controversy exceeded the sum or value
of $10,000, or that diversity of citizenship existed.
See
28 U.S.C. §§ 1331, 1332. Nor did he allege that the District Court
had jurisdiction to enjoin petitioner incidental to its supervisory
power over federal law enforcement agencies,
cf. Rea v. United
States, 350 U. S. 214,
350 U. S. 217,
or that 28 U.S.C. § 1343, conferred jurisdiction. But, in view of
our determination that equitable power should not have been
exercised with respect to this petitioner, it is not necessary to
resolve the questions whether the complaint stated a cause of
action as to him or whether federal jurisdiction existed or was
adequately invoked.
See Stefanelli v. Minard, 342 U.
S. 117,
342 U. S.
120.
[
Footnote 8]
Rule 41(e) provides that the material suppressed "shall not be
admissible in evidence at any hearing or trial."
[
Footnote 9]
The Court of Appeals was also disposed to think that the
propriety of the District Court's injunction was not affected by
this Court's decision in
Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.
S. 643, which came down after this case had left the
District Court.
[
Footnote 10]
None of the federal officers involved in this action has sought
review in this Court. And, for reasons stated in this opinion,
there is otherwise no need for determining the propriety of the
injunction as to them in order to dispose of the case before
us.
[
Footnote 11]
"In the case at bar, the wrongful activities were all those of
federal officers, and were conducted or directed by them. All that
was done during the period of unlawful detention, and particularly
the taking of the incriminating statement from Bolger, was being
done on behalf of the United States. Cleary was merely a witness to
them."
189 F. Supp. at 256.
[
Footnote 12]
We attach no significance to the District Court's remark that
petitioner's "presence might have been an additional inducement to
Bolger to answer questions more freely" (189 F.Supp. at 255),
because Bolger, when originally picked up by the federal officers,
had exhibited concern about the possible effect of his
transgressions on his longshoreman's license. The record is barren
of any evidence indicating that petitioner was brought into the
situation for the purpose of intimidating Bolger, or that he in
fact did so.
MR. JUSTICE GOLDBERG, concurring in the result.
I concur in the result. I cannot, however, join the Court's
opinion, because I do not find it necessary, in the present
circumstances, to pass upon the question whether
Rea v. United
States, 350 U. S. 214, may
ever support an injunction against a state official who has
received evidence illegally obtained by federal officers, even
though
"there is no evidence of a purpose to avoid federal
requirements
Page 371 U. S. 402
and the information has not been acquired by the state official
in violation of a federal court order."
For me, consideration of that question is obviated by the
commendably broad reading which the New York Court of Appeals has
given this Court's decision in
Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.
S. 643. [
Footnote 2/1]
Because I strongly adhere to the principle, stated with clarity in
Stefanelli v. Minard, 342 U. S. 117,
342 U. S. 120,
that the considerations governing whether a federal equity court
should exercise its power here
"touch perhaps the most sensitive source of friction between
States and Nation, namely, the active intrusion of the federal
courts in the administration of the criminal law for the
prosecution of crimes solely within the power of the States,"
I would avoid granting of injunctive relief in cases such as
this where, because there is a substantial likelihood that the
state courts will exclude the evidence at issue, such relief is not
essential to vindication of an overriding federal policy governing
conduct of federal officers. The virtual certainty of exclusion in
the New York criminal proceedings and the likelihood of exclusion
in the state administrative proceedings satisfy me that denial of
the injunction here will not encourage federal officers to engage
in illegal conduct. Thus, deterrence of such illegality, the
consideration which in substantial part underlay the decision in
Rea, is not a determining factor here, and there is no
need to grant injunctive relief to effectuate that policy.
In stating my position, I rely on the New York Court of Appeals'
announced view that it regards
Mapp as extending to the
"fruit of the poisonous tree," a holding arrived at on facts
similar to those involved here.
People v. Rodriguez, 11
N.Y.2d 279, 286, 229 N.Y.S.2d 353, 357, 183 N.E.2d 651, 653-654
Page 371 U. S. 403
(1962). It therefore appears that New York will exclude all the
evidence here in question in the pending criminal proceedings. With
reference to the Waterfront Commission hearing, I am well aware
that the New York Court of Appeals has as yet taken no position on
the applicability of Mapp in civil and administrative proceedings,
[
Footnote 2/2] and that, indeed,
the effect of the Fourth Amendment in civil cases in the federal
courts is not totally settled. [
Footnote 2/3] However, in view of the encouragingly
constructive approach of the New York courts to application of the
Mapp decision, and of the "
quasi-criminal"
character of the pending Waterfront Commission proceedings, I
nevertheless take the view, based upon
Stefanelli, that
the orderly way to proceed in this case is for New York to pass
upon respondent's claims first.
The Court's opinion states that,
"To the extent that respondent's claims involve infractions
merely of the Federal Criminal Rules, we need not decide whether an
adverse state determination upon such claims would be reversible
here."
I, like the Court, do not reach this issue, but I so conclude
because of my stated belief that New York will, under
Mapp, likely exclude all the evidence in question here, a
possibility which, for me, because of my firm belief in the
principles of
Stefanelli v. Minard, supra, is sufficient
to make the granting of injunctive relief here an unwise exercise
of federal power. Whether it would be similarly excludable in such
state proceedings were respondent's claims premised solely upon
federal officers'
Page 371 U. S. 404
misbehavior in contravention of the Federal Rules of Criminal
Procedure is a question which this Court has not decided. [
Footnote 2/4] There is a strong interest,
which many decisions of this Court reflect,
e.g., McNabb v.
United States, 318 U. S. 332;
Mallory v. United States, 354 U.
S. 449, in ensuring compliance by federal officers with
rules having the force of federal law, designed to safeguard the
rights of citizens charged with criminal acts. Whether the
Supremacy Clause of the Constitution compels state courts to
enforce that interest by excluding evidence obtained by federal
officers in violation of the Federal Criminal Rules, including
reverse "silver platter" situations wherein illegally procured
evidence has been handed over to state officers, will warrant
serious consideration in an appropriate case. We need not and
therefore do not decide that question here.
[
Footnote 2/1]
See, e.g., People v. Loria, 10 N.Y.2d 368, 223 N.Y.S.2d
462, 179 N.E.2d 478 (1961);
People v. O'Neill, 11 N.Y.2d
148, 227 N.Y.S.2d 416, 182 N.E.2d 95 (1962);
People v.
Rodriguez, 11 N.Y.2d 279, 229, N.Y.S.2d 353, 183 N.E.2d 651
(1962).
[
Footnote 2/2]
Compare Bloodgood v. Lynch, 293 N.Y. 308, 56 N.E.2d 718
(1944),
with Sackler v. Sackler, 16 A.D.2d 423, 229
N.Y.S.2d 61 (2d Dept. 1962).
[
Footnote 2/3]
Compare Rogers v. United States, 97 F.2d 691 (C.A.1st
Cir. 1938),
United States v. Butler, 156 F.2d 897
(C.A.10th Cir. 1946),
and United States v. Physic, 175
F.2d 338 (C.A.2d Cir. 1949),
with United States v. One 1956
Ford Tudor Sedan, 253 F.2d 725 (C.A.4th Cir. 1958).
[
Footnote 2/4]
Nothing in
Gallegos v. Nebraska, 342 U. S.
55, which did not involve activities of federal officers
in violation of the Federal Criminal Rules, decides that
question.
MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE concurs,
dissenting.
I would agree with the judgment of the Court if we had here
nothing but a question concerning the use of evidence obtained in
violation of the Fourth Amendment. That question can now be raised
in the state prosecution as a result of
Mapp v. Ohio,
367 U. S. 643. My
difficulties stem from a flagrant violation by federal officers of
Rule 5(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and the
threatened use of the fruits of that violation by a state official
in state cases. If the Court, as is strongly suggested, makes
unreviewable here any adverse state determination on that claim,
the only opportunity to correct the abuse of federal authority is
here and now.
Page 371 U. S. 405
Federal customs agents suspected that thefts of liquor were
occurring on the New York waterfront. Two agents stopped respondent
Bolger on suspicion of theft at about 8 a.m. on Saturday, September
12, 1959. Their search of Bolger's car produced only a couple of
windshield wipers and six spark plugs stamped "made in England,"
items that easily could have been purchased in New York. But, in
response to the agents' questioning, Bolger admitted that he had at
his home several bottles of liquor purchased from seamen. On the
basis of this information, the agents arrested Bolger at 9 a.m.
Instead of taking him before a Commissioner as required by Rule
5(a), Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, they took him to
headquarters for further questioning. There, after refusing his
request to consult a lawyer and by employing trickery, the agents
got Bolger to consent to a search of his home. The ensuing search,
conducted at about 11 a.m., produced several items tending to
incriminate Bolger. Upon returning to headquarters, further
questioning produced damaging statements from him. Petitioner
Cleary, an investigator for the Waterfront Commission of New York
Harbor, was present at this later questioning at the invitation of
the federal agents. Though he did not participate in this
questioning, he was free to do so.
No federal prosecution was ever brought against Bolger. New
York, however, instituted both a criminal prosecution and an
administrative proceeding to revoke his license as a hiring agent.
Bolger brought suit in the Federal District Court to enjoin the
federal agents and Cleary from producing any of the material seized
from him or testifying as to any of his statements in either of the
state proceedings.
The District Court granted the relief requested with respect to
all statements obtained after 11 a.m., at which time a Federal
Commissioner was in his office a few blocks
Page 371 U. S. 406
from headquarters, and also all evidence obtained at Bolger's
home. It held that the statements obtained both prior to and after
the search were in violation of Rule 5(a), and that the search and
seizure violated both the Fourth Amendment and Rule 41(a).
189 F.
Supp. 237. The District Court relied on
Rea v. United
States, 350 U. S. 214,
insofar as the federal agents were concerned, and it added that, if
the remedy did not extend to Cleary, whom it characterized as a
"human recorder," federal agents would be free to flout the
strictures imposed on them by
Rea and the Federal Rules.
The District Court concluded,
"Cleary will be restrained not in his capacity as a state
official, but because he participated as a witness in the unlawful
acts of the federal officers acting on behalf of the United
States."
189 F. Supp. at 256.
Only Cleary appealed, and the Court of Appeals affirmed on the
authority of
Rea v. United States, supra. 293 F.2d 368. It
said that the only difference between this case and
Rea
"is the time at which the federal officials attempt to make the
results of their lawbreaking available to the state."
Id.
at 369.
I think the Court of Appeals was correct in saying that
"the
Rea case [is] ample authority for holding that the
order appealed from is not barred by 28 U.S.C. § 2283 as an
injunction to stay proceedings in a state court."
Id. at 370. The proceedings themselves are not
enjoined. Enjoining a state agent from offering as a witness
unlawfully obtained evidence has no different effect on the
"proceedings in a state court" than enjoining a federal officer. To
be sure, in
Rea, there had been an earlier suppression
order in a federal prosecution; and so it is now said that the
injunction against testifying was necessary to protect or
effectuate that suppression order. That answer proves too much, for
it would enable federal agents themselves to violate the Federal
Rules and, without fear of a federal
Page 371 U. S. 407
injunction, produce all their illegally obtained evidence in a
state prosecution.
A state agent should be enjoined from producing, as a witness in
a state court proceeding, evidence he acquired solely as a result
of federal agents' violation of the Federal Rules.
Such an injunction should issue lest federal agents accomplish
illegal results by boosting Oliver Twists through windows built too
narrow by those Rules for their own ingress.
* It is no answer
to say that the state agent was merely a nonparticipating observer,
or that Oliver Twist was an innocent child. The result produced,
viz., the Oliver Twist method of obtaining evidence in
violation of the Federal Rules, is illegal, and should not go
unchecked.
"Free and open cooperation between state and federal law
enforcement officers is to be commended and encouraged. Yet that
kind of cooperation is hardly promoted by a rule that implicitly
invites federal officers . . . [to violate the provisions of the
Federal Rules]. If, on the other hand, it is understood that the
fruit of . . . unlawful . . . [conduct] by . . . [federal] agents
will be inadmissible in a . . . [state] trial, there can be no
inducement to subterfuge and evasion with respect to federal-state
cooperation in criminal investigation"
-- to paraphrase an earlier opinion in a related area.
See Elkins v.
Page 371 U. S. 408
United States, 364 U. S. 206,
364 U. S.
221-222. Unless a federal court can enjoin a state agent
under the facts of this case, the provisions of the Federal Rules
will be subverted, and an unhealthy form of state-federal
cooperation will be encouraged.
What is involved is not an attempt by a federal court to
interject itself into a state criminal prosecution to protect a
defendant's federal rights against state infringement, as was the
case in
Pugach v. Dollinger, 365 U.
S. 458, and
Stefanelli v. Minard, 342 U.
S. 117. In both of those cases, the unlawfully obtained
evidence had been obtained by state police. Here, the evidence was
obtained by federal agents in violation of the Federal Rules. It
therefore involves no entrenchment on principles of federalism to
hold that a Federal District Court may enjoin the production of
such evidence in a state proceeding, regardless of who seeks to
introduce it. The federal courts, rather than the state courts,
have the responsibility of assuring that federal law enforcement
officers adhere to the procedures prescribed by the Federal Rules.
This responsibility cannot be met if the federal courts' power can
be thwarted by federal employment of a state Oliver Twist.
*
"It was a little lattice window, about five feet and a half
above the ground, at the back of the house, which belonged to a
scullery, or small brewing-place at the end of the passage. The
aperture was so small that the inmates had probably not thought it
worthwhile to defend it more securely, but it was large enough to
admit a boy of Oliver's size nevertheless. A very brief exercise of
Mr. Sikes's art sufficed to overcome the fastening of the lattice,
and it soon stood wide open also."
Dickens, The Adventures of Oliver Twist (N.Y., Thomas Y. Crowell
& Co.), p. 184.
MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE concurs,
dissenting.
I join in the dissenting opinion of my Brother DOUGLAS, and add
a few words in support of his conclusion.
I
The Court concedes
arguendo that it was proper to
enjoin the federal officers from testifying in state proceedings
against respondent as to the fruits of their violations of Rules 5
and 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. But, having made
this concession -- compelled, I should think, by
Rea v.
United States, 350 U.S.
Page 371 U. S. 409
214 [
Footnote 3/1] -- the Court
then excludes petitioner from the injunction:
"injunctive relief against this petitioner [cannot] find
justification in the rationale that it was required in order to
make the injunction against the federal officers effective. Such
relief as to him must stand on its own bottom."
The Court finds no "bottom," because petitioner did not himself
violate the Federal Rules or otherwise misconduct himself. This
reasoning, I submit, cannot withstand scrutiny.
In so refusing incidental relief against petitioner, surely the
Court flouts settled principles of equity. Equity does not do
justice by halves; its remedies are flexible.
"A writ of injunction may be said to be a process capable of
more modifications than any other in the law; it is so malleable
that it may be moulded to suit the various circumstances and
occasions presented to a court of equity. It is an instrument in
his hands capable of various applications for the purposes of
dispensing complete justice between the parties."
Tucker v. Carpenter, 24 Fed.Cas.No.14217 (Cir.Ct.D.Ark.
1841);
see 1 Joyce, Injunctions (1909), § 2; 1 Pomeroy,
Equity Jurisprudence (5th ed. Symons, 1941), § 114. [
Footnote 3/2] "Complete justice" has not
been
Page 371 U. S. 410
done if the fruits of the violations of federal law by federal
officers may nevertheless be used against respondent in state
proceedings by a state officer who witnessed, indeed abetted, those
violations.
The vacation of the injunction against the state officer on the
ground that he himself was not a wrongdoer wholly misconceives the
nature of equitable relief. Such relief is not punitive, but
remedial, and it is measured not by the defendant's transgressions,
but by the plaintiff's needs. Thus, to protect a trade secret,
equity will enjoin third persons to whom the secret has been
divulged if they have notice of the breach of trust.
See, e.g.,
Colgate-Palmolive Co. v. Carter Products, Inc., 230 F.2d 855,
864-865 (C.A.4th Cir.1956). Such third persons are not themselves
malefactors, any more than this state officer is; they are enjoined
in order to give the victim of the wrong effective protection. The
respondent herein is entitled to effective protection against the
federal officers' violations of federal law, which comprehends
ancillary relief against petitioner
qua witness to the
unlawful conduct. Though innocent of the federal officers'
misconduct, the state officer may not avail himself of its fruits
to the harm of respondent. I repeat: the Court errs in asserting
that the injunction against the state officer must stand on its own
bottom; such a supplemental decree is fully justified, in
accordance with the conventional principles of equity, by the
issuance of an injunction against the federal officers.
Page 371 U. S. 411
The incidental nature of the relief granted against the state
officer should dispel any fear that such relief threatens
impairment of the harmonious workings of federalism. To be sure, it
was part of the state officer's official duties to cooperate fully
with federal officers. But it was no part of his duty to abet and
facilitate federal officers' unlawful conduct. To enjoin him as a
witness to such conduct does no more than forbid him to profit from
it. In overruling the "silver platter" doctrine a few Terms ago, we
anchored our holding in the disruptive effect upon the federal
system of allowing the introduction into federal courts of evidence
unlawfully seized by state officers.
Elkins v. United
States, 364 U. S. 206,
364 U. S. 221.
Surely the converse situation is no less productive of needless
conflict. In truth, to enjoin the introduction into state courts of
evidence unlawfully seized by federal officers is to promote, not
retard, a healthy federalism.
In invoking the bogey of federal disruption of state criminal
processes, the Court relies heavily on
Stefanelli v.
Minard, 342 U. S. 117,
where it was held to be improper to enjoin the introduction in a
state criminal trial of evidence seized by state officers in
violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. But
Stefanelli is
manifestly inapt. That decision was compelled by
Wolf v.
Colorado, 338 U. S. 25, where
the Court, while confirming that the Fourth Amendment had been
absorbed into the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment,
nevertheless left the States free to devise appropriate remedies
for violations of this constitutional protection. To have
authorized the Federal District Courts to order the exclusion in
state criminal trials of evidence unlawfully obtained by state
officials would have sanctioned accomplishing indirectly what
Wolf forbade directly. But
Wolf has been
overruled in this particular.
Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.
S. 643, and the accommodation of
Wolf which
required the decision in
Stefanelli is no longer a
concern.
Page 371 U. S. 412
Moreover, the instant petitioner is not sought to be enjoined as
a state officer whose misconduct ought to be remedied by the State,
as was the case in
Stefanelli, but as a witness to the
misconduct of federal officers. The Federal Rules are not directed
at state officers, nor was this state officer found to have engaged
in conduct violative of them. Responsibility for enforcing the
Federal Rules lies precisely with the federal courts, whereas,
under the regime of
Wolf, responsibility for enforcing the
Fourteenth Amendment's right of privacy lay exclusively with the
state court. Indeed, it is in light of the difference between
violations of the Federal Rules and violations of the Fourteenth
Amendment that the
Stefanelli and
Rea decisions
emerge as perfectly consistent; and it is significant that the
author of the Court's opinion in
Stefanelli joined the
Court's opinion in
Rea.
It is also worth observing that Congress has taken pains to
specify the conditions under which a federal court shall withhold
injunctive relief in respect of a pending state court proceeding.
See 28 U.S.C. § 2283. The Court nowhere mentions this
provision, surely because its total inapplicability to the case at
hand is plain: an injunction against this state officer would not
stay the state proceedings against respondent, but only preclude
the use of certain evidence in them. Since Congress, in § 2283, set
out specific conditions for withholding federal equity relief, and
these conditions have not been met in the case at bar, I submit
that we are obligated to allow such relief to be granted in
conformity with the accepted usages of equity procedure.
II
With all respect, I cannot share the view of my Brother GOLDBERG
that relief should be denied here because the probable exclusion of
the challenged evidence, in whole or part, by the New York courts
would sufficiently serve to deter lawless conduct by federal
officers. My view is
Page 371 U. S. 413
that equitable actions grounded in violations of the Federal
Rules of Criminal Procedure should be governed by the accepted
principles of equity. Among them is the principle that an adequate
remedy at law bars equitable relief. This principle seems to me to
be applicable even where the remedy is given by the state courts,
so long as the source of the remedy is federal law.
See
Henrietta Mills v. Rutherford County, 281 U.
S. 121,
281 U. S.
126-127. I further believe that one who has an adequate
remedy by way of appeal, as well as one who has a more conventional
adequate remedy at law, is thereby disbarred from equitable relief.
1 Joyce,
supra, § 29. But, for a remedy to be adequate, it
must have more than a merely theoretical availability. If
"a court of law can do as complete justice to the matter in
controversy . . . as could be done by a court of equity, equity
will not interfere. . . . But, in order that the general principle
may apply, the sufficiency and completeness of the legal remedy
must be certain; if it is doubtful, equity may take
cognizance."
1 Pomeroy,
supra, § 176. How certain, complete, and
sufficient is the remedy by way of appeal in the instant case? My
Brother GOLDBERG concedes uncertainty as to whether the New York
courts, though they have generally interpreted
Mapp v. Ohio,
supra, will exclude all the challenged evidence involved in
this case, or whether
Mapp or any other decision of this
Court compels such exclusion. Nor is it certain that a State is
obliged to exclude evidence which is the product of violations of
the Federal Rules -- no decision of this Court has yet so held, and
Rea was premised on a contrary assumption,
see
350 U.S. at
350 U. S. 217;
Wilson v. Schnettler, supra, at
365 U. S. 391
(dissenting opinion) -- and, finally, while petitioner herein was
enjoined from testifying the state administrative proceeding
against respondent, as well as in the criminal proceeding, it has
not yet been settled whether
Mapp applies to
administrative proceedings.
Page 371 U. S. 414
Thus, to remit respondent to his remedy by appeal in the state
courts is to set him adrift on a sea of legal uncertainties, and
very possibly to deprive him, in the end, of any remedy whatever.
Since respondent's remedy by law is uncertain, conventional equity
principles require that the injunction issue against this state
officer, premised not on constitutional grounds, but on violations
of the Federal Rules by federal officers. [
Footnote 3/3]
[
Footnote 3/1]
In
Wilson v. Schnettler, 365 U.
S. 381, I joined the dissenting opinion of my Brother
DOUGLAS because I thought (and still do) that the Court was making
dangerous inroads upon the
Rea decision. Happily, the
Court in the instant case makes no suggestion that the authority of
Rea has been impaired by
Wilson. At all events,
Wilson is distinguishable from the case at bar, for here,
there was no failure to allege a violation of federal law and a
lack of an adequate remedy at law.
[
Footnote 3/2]
"The governing motive of equity in the administration of its
remedial system is to grant full relief, and to adjust in the one
suit the rights and duties of all the parties, which really grow
out of or are connected with the subject-matter of that suit. . . .
Its fundamental principle concerning parties is that all persons in
whose favor or against whom there might be a recovery, however
partial, and also all persons who are so interested, although
indirectly, in the subject matter and the relief granted, that
their rights or duties might be affected by the decree, although no
substantial recovery can be obtained either for or against them,
shall by made parties to the suit. . . . The primary object is,
that all persons sufficiently interested may be before the court,
so that the relief may be properly adjusted among those entitled,
the liabilities properly apportioned, and the incidental or
consequential claims or interests of all may be fixed, and all may
be bound in respect thereto by the single decree."
1 Pomeroy,
supra.
[
Footnote 3/3]
The Court's intimation, in
note
7 of the opinion of doubt as to the existence of federal
jurisdiction in the instant case seems to me totally unwarranted.
The Court was unanimous in
Rea as to the existence of
federal jurisdiction; the only dispute was as to the propriety of
exercising it.
See 350 U.S. at
350 U. S. 219
(dissenting opinion). To predicate federal jurisdiction in the
instant case, we need not decide whether the Federal Rules are
civil rights statutes within the intent of 28 U.S.C. § 1343(4), nor
need we resort to any other jurisdictional statute. For the federal
courts have the inherent authority to issue orders to protect their
processes, here, as in
Rea, governed by the Federal Rules
of Criminal Procedure.
See 350 U.S. at
350 U. S. 217;
Wise v. Henkel, 220 U. S. 556,
220 U. S.
558.