United States v. Armstrong

Supreme Court of United States
517 U.S. 456 (S.Ct. 1996) (1996)

ELI5:

Rule of Law:

To be entitled to discovery on a claim of selective prosecution based on race, a criminal defendant must produce some credible evidence that similarly situated defendants of other races could have been prosecuted, but were not.

Facts:

For three months, agents from the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and the Inglewood Police Department infiltrated a suspected crack distribution ring using confidential informants.
On seven separate occasions, informants purchased a total of 124.3 grams of crack from respondents Christopher Lee Armstrong, Robert Rozelle, and others.
The informants witnessed the respondents carrying firearms during the drug sales.
Following the investigation, agents searched a hotel room where the sales had occurred, arresting Armstrong and Aaron Hampton.
In the hotel room, agents discovered more crack cocaine and a loaded firearm.
The remaining respondents were later arrested as part of the same distribution ring.
All of the respondents indicted in the case are black.

Procedural Posture:

Respondents were indicted in the United States District Court for the Central District of California on federal drug and firearms charges.
In the District Court, respondents filed a motion for discovery or dismissal of the indictment, alleging they were selected for prosecution because they are black.
The District Court granted the discovery motion and ordered the Government to provide information on its prosecution criteria and data on similar cases.
The Government's motion for reconsideration was denied by the District Court.
After the Government refused to comply with the discovery order, the District Court dismissed the indictment.
The Government appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, where a three-judge panel reversed the District Court.
The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit then reheard the case en banc and affirmed the District Court's dismissal.
The United States petitioned the Supreme Court for a writ of certiorari, which was granted.

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Issue:

To obtain discovery on a claim of selective prosecution based on race, must a defendant provide some evidence that the government has declined to prosecute similarly situated suspects of other races?

Opinions:

Majority - Chief Justice Rehnquist

Yes. To obtain discovery on a selective-prosecution claim, a defendant must make a threshold showing that the government has failed to prosecute similarly situated suspects of other races. A selective-prosecution claim intrudes upon the executive branch's prosecutorial discretion, which is presumed to be regular and is afforded significant deference. To overcome this presumption, a claimant must demonstrate that the prosecutorial policy had both a discriminatory effect and was motivated by a discriminatory purpose. The court holds that to establish the discriminatory effect element, the claimant must show that similarly situated individuals of a different race were not prosecuted. Therefore, to be entitled to discovery in support of such a claim, the defendant must produce some evidence of this essential element. The evidence presented by the respondents—a study showing all 24 crack cases from the local public defender's office involved black defendants, along with anecdotal affidavits—was insufficient because it failed to identify any similarly situated individuals of other races who were known to prosecutors but were not charged.

Dissenting - Justice Stevens

No. While the respondents' evidence was not sufficient to prove their claim, the District Judge did not abuse her discretion in concluding the showing was sufficiently disturbing to require some response from the government. The dissent argues that the District Court has inherent power to supervise the prosecutors appearing before it. This supervision is especially warranted given the context of crack cocaine prosecutions, which feature: (1) extremely high penalties compared to powder cocaine, (2) significant disparities between federal and state sentences, and (3) a troubling racial pattern of enforcement where the brunt of these severe penalties falls heavily on black defendants. The evidence of a conspicuous racial pattern, combined with affidavits from legal professionals, was enough to justify the District Court's decision to order a limited inquiry, even if the defendants could not yet name specific, non-prosecuted white offenders.

Concurring - Justice Souter

Justice Souter joined the Court's opinion but limited his agreement with its interpretation of Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 16 solely to its application in this specific case.

Concurring - Justice Ginsburg

Justice Ginsburg joined the Court's opinion, emphasizing that she viewed the holding as a narrow one. She understood the Court to be deciding only that Rule 16(a)(1)(C)'s reference to the 'defendant's defense' does not encompass selective prosecution claims, and not as foreclosing the Rule's application to other contexts, such as affirmative defenses unrelated to the merits of the case.

Concurring - Justice Breyer

Justice Breyer concurred in the judgment but disagreed with the majority's narrow interpretation of Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 16, arguing that 'defendant's defense' should be read broadly to include claims like selective prosecution. However, he concluded that the respondents' discovery request should be denied on other grounds. He reasoned that the respondents failed to satisfy the Rule's requirement that the requested material be 'material' to their defense, because their failure to find any instances of non-prosecuted, similarly situated white individuals meant they had not made the necessary threshold showing of materiality.

Analysis:

This decision establishes a significant barrier for defendants alleging selective prosecution, creating what is often described as a catch-22. By requiring defendants to produce evidence that similarly situated individuals of other races were not prosecuted—often the very information contained exclusively in government files—the ruling makes it extremely difficult to obtain the discovery needed to prove the claim. The case reinforces the strong presumption of regularity afforded to prosecutorial decisions and prioritizes the protection of executive discretion over facilitating judicial inquiry into potential constitutional violations in charging decisions. This standard has made selective prosecution claims exceptionally difficult to advance beyond the pleading stage.

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