Government of the Canal Zone v. Michael Gilmore Scott

502 F.2d 566, 1974 U.S. App. LEXIS 6610
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedOctober 4, 1974
Docket73-3628
StatusPublished
Cited by36 cases

This text of 502 F.2d 566 (Government of the Canal Zone v. Michael Gilmore Scott) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Government of the Canal Zone v. Michael Gilmore Scott, 502 F.2d 566, 1974 U.S. App. LEXIS 6610 (5th Cir. 1974).

Opinion

WISDOM, Circuit Judge:

Michael Scott was convicted at a jury trial in the United States District Court for the District of the Canal Zone on two counts of knowingly or intentionally distributing cocaine, a controlled substance, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). 1 He appeals from that conviction on the theory that he was deprived of his Fifth Amendment right to a grand jury indictment 2 and that he was deprived of his right to an impartial jury in violation of both the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution 3 and the Jury Selection and Service Act of 1968, 28 U.S.C. § 1861 et seq. He also contends that the trial court erred in refusing to grant the jury’s request to review the defendant’s testimony during its deliberations at the close of the evidence. Finally, he alleges denial of due process and equal protection under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments because the judge who presided at his trial was not invested with tenure of office for good behavior. We find no merit to these contentions. We affirm.

I.

First, Scott contends that the Government violated his Fifth Amendment right to answer for an infamous crime only after grand jury indictment in that the Government initiated his prosecution by information rather than by indictment. Scott recognizes that the Supreme Court has held that the Fifth Amendment right to presentment or indictment by a grand jury is inapplicable to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. Hudgens v. Clark, 1964, D.Or., 218 F.Supp. 95, 96. Hurtado v. California, 1884, 110 U.S. 516, 4 S.Ct. Ill, 28 L'.Ed. 232. He argues, however, that a citizen of the United States charged with a violation of a federal law in a United States court is constitution *568 ally entitled to the benefit of grand jury. This argument disregards the territorial status of the Canal Zone, as well as the special character of the United States courts sitting in the Canal Zone.

The constitution does not require the extension of all protections of the bill of rights to territories governed by the United States. In Soto v. United States, 3 Cir. 1921, 273 F. 628, 633, the court held that indictment by a grand jury is “not among the fundamental rights which Congress in legislating for a territory not incorporated into the United States must secure to its inhabitants”. Moreover, non-citizens and citizens of the United States resident in such territories are treated alike, since it is the territorial nature of the Canal Zone and not the citizenship of the defendant that is dispositive. Chief Justice Taft stated this principle as it applied to the right to jury trial in Balzac v. Porto Rico, 1922, 258 U.S. 298, 309, 42 S.Ct. 343, 347, 66 L.Ed. 627:

The citizen of the United States living in Porto Rico cannot there enjoy a right of trial by jury under the federal Constitution, any more than the Porto Rican. It is the locality that is determinative of the application of the Constitution in such matters as judicial procedure, and not the status of the people who live in it.

This Court followed that analysis in Government of the Canal Zone v. Griffith, 5 Cir. 1972, 459 F.2d 1036:

“Appellant’s primary contention is that the Fifth- Amendment requirement that infamous crimes be tried only upon grand jury indictment should be applied in the territory of the Canal Zone. We disagree. Article IV, § 3, of the Constitution empowers Congress to make ‘all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory . . . ’ of the United
States. This constitutional provision has been specifically held to authorize Congress to dispense with grand jury indictments in the territories of the United States. See Rivera v. Government of Virgin Islands, 3 Cir., 1967, 375 F.2d 988, in which it was held that Congress could dispense with grand jury indictments in criminal trials in the territory of the Virgin Islands.” We find no compelling reason to depart from the Griffith rule.

II.

Scott’s second issue is the contention that the exclusion of military personnel from jury duty violated his rights to an impartial jury under the Jury Selection and Service Act of 1968, 28 U.S.C. § 1861 et seq., as well as the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

The argument is ingenious but unconvincing. Scott argues that the specific exemption of military personnel from jury duty under 28 U.S.C. § 1863(b)(6) 4 is permissive rather than mandatory and that the United States District Court must be guided in the exercise of its discretion by the general language of 28 U.S.C. § 1861 5 and § *569 1862. 6 Section 1861 declares that the general policy of the United States is to provide for all litigants a jury selected from a “fair cross section of the community”. Section 1862 provides that no citizen should be excluded from jury service on account of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or economic status.

We find this construction untenable in that the relevant language of Section 1863(b)(6) merely tracks the language of its predecessor section, 28 U.S.C. § 1862 (1966). 7 The earlier section was unambiguously mandatory in its exclusion of military personnel. The underlying rationale of the section was that members of such classes as military personnel were better left undisturbed at their usual occupations. The incorporation of old Section 1862 into the 1968 Act indicates a continued congressional belief in the desirability of excluding members of essential occupational classes from the obligation of jury service. More concretely, Scott’s argument must fail because it is incompatible with the provision of Section 1863(b)(6) requiring that the jury selection plan “shall provide for exemption of ... members in active service in the Armed Forces”.

The appellant also argues that the exclusion of military personnel from jury duty violates his constitutional right to an impartial jury because it removes from eligibility one element of the community and thus prevents the jury from representing “a fair cross-section of the community”.

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Bluebook (online)
502 F.2d 566, 1974 U.S. App. LEXIS 6610, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/government-of-the-canal-zone-v-michael-gilmore-scott-ca5-1974.