United States v. Gordon

158 F. Supp. 207, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2410
District Court, N.D. Illinois·Decided December 19, 1957·No. No. 57 CR 296·Published·Cited by 1 cases

Opinion

CAMPBELL, District Judge.

The defendant was indicted April 24, 1957, for failure to submit to induction at Chicago, Illinois, on November 23, 1956, in violation of Section 12, Universal Military Training and Service Act of 1948, Section 462, Title 50 Appendix, United States Code Annotated.

The defendant was arraigned on June 4, 1957, and entered a plea of not guilty. On September 17, 1957, the defendant served a subpoena duces tecum on Robert Tieken, United States Attorney, and Richard D. Auerbach, Agent in Charge of the Chicago Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which required the production of “complete secret investigative report made by the agent or agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and used by Thomas J. Cavanagh, Hearing Officer of the Department of Justice, in conducting a hearing and making his report on the conscientious objections of Roy Albert Gordon, the defendant * * * which was also used by the Department of Justice in making the recommendations to the Appeal Board.” The Government, on September 24, 1957, moved to quash the subpoena.

The defendant is a Selective Service registrant who has made a claim to conscientious objector classification. This claim was denied by his local board, and he appealed.

Pursuant to Section 6(j), Universal Military Training and Service Act, Section 456(j), Title 50 Appendix, the Federal Bureau of Investigation conducted an investigation of the defendant’s background. A résumé of its report was given to the defendant. The hearing officer had use of both the original Federal Bureau of Investigation report and the résumé. The hearing officer accorded the defendant a hearing, after which he submitted his report and recommendation to the Department of Justice.

The Department of Justice in turn submitted its recommendation, together with a copy of the résumé, to the defendant’s Appeal Board, which then denied the conscientious objector classification sought by the defendant. The Federal Bureau of Investigation report was not submitted to the Local Board or to the Appeal Board.

For his claim to the production of the F.B.I. report defendant relied principally on Jencks v. United States, 353 U.S. 657, 77 S.Ct. 1007, 1 L.Ed.2d 1103. That decision must now be read in the light of Section 3500, Title 18 U.S.C.A., which provides in part:

“(a) In any criminal prosecution brought by the United States, no statement or report in the possession of the United States which was made by a Government witness or prospective Government witness (other than the defendant) to an agent of the Government shall be the subject of subpoena, discovery, or inspection until said witness has testified on direct examination in the trial of the case.”

Defendant contends that the summary of the F.B.I. report transmitted by the Department of Justice to the Appeal Board, was in effect a witness against the defendant. The short answer to that contention, assuming for the moment that defendant’s characterization of the summary is correct, is that that witness has not yet “testified on direct examination in the trial of the ease.”

[210]*210However, defendant’s contentions go deeper. Defendant cites United States v. Nugent, 346 U.S. 1, 73 S.Ct. 991, 97 L.Ed. 1417; Gonzales v. United States, 348 U.S. 407, 75 S.Ct. 409, 99 L.Ed. 467; and Simmons v. United States, 348 U.S. 397, 75 S.Ct. 397, 99 L.Ed. 453, for the well settled proposition that a claimant to a conscientious objector classification, who appeals from an adverse decision of his local board, and thus sets in motion the procedures of Section 6(j) Universal Military Training and Service Act, is entitled to a “fair résumé” of the F.B.I. report at his hearing before an officer of the Department of Justice.

In United States v. Nugent, 346 U.S. 1, 73 S.Ct. 991, 97 L.Ed. 1417, while the Court recognized the right to a “fair résumé” of the F.B.I. report, it squarely denied the claim that Section 6(j) is unconstitutional if interpreted as not entitling claimants to the production of the report itself.

Defendant seeks to avoid the impact of this decision by pointing to the fact that the Nugent case, and subsequent decisions of the Supreme Court interpreting it, did not involve the particular claim which he advances here — namely, that he is entitled to the F.B.I. report at his trial for willfully refusing to submit to induction.

Defendant maintains that he cannot determine whether the résumé of that report furnished to him, and made available to the Appeal Board, was “fair” as required by United States v. Nugent, unless he can see the report. The recognition of the right to a “fair résumé” of the F.B.I. report in Nugent and the other cases cited plainly cannot be interpreted as a recognition of the right to test the fairness of such résumé by inspection of the report itself, for the latter right was expressly denied in Nugent. Some other meaning, therefore, must be given to the requirement that the résumé be “fair.”

Under the procedures provided by Congress for the determination of claims to conscientious objector classification, in Section 6(j), the intervention of the Department of Justice comes only on appeal from an adverse decision by the local draft board. The Department of Justice is required, after an appropriate inquiry, to give the claimant a hearing and thereafter to submit its recommendation to the Appeal Board.

Bearing in mind the essential features of the procedure outlined above, it is clear that the requirement that the claimant be furnished with a “fair résumé of the investigation report” at his hearing, means that he must have adequate opportunity to meet the case which is made against him on his appeal. The case which is made against him on his appeal is not necessarily the case which is made against him in the investigation report. The Appeal Board is not, as a rule, furnished the investigation report; it is, as a rule, and it was in this case, furnished with a résumé (a copy of that with which the claimant is furnished) and with the recommendation of the Department of Justice based on the investigation and on the hearing.

If the résumé does not correctly reflect adverse information contained in the F.B.I. report the claimant loses some opportunities to persuade the Justice Department to give him a favorable recommendation before the Appeal Board. But an unfavorable recommendation by the Justice Department does not of itself require the Appeal Board to affirm the local board’s decision. Section 10(b) (3), of the Universal Military Training and Service Act, provides that the decisions of the local draft board “shall be final.” It also provides that the decisions of the appeal boards “shall be final.” In Estep v. United States, 327 U.S. 114, 66 S.Ct. 423, 90 L.Ed. 567, the Court construed the word “final” to permit a very limited scope of judicial review, in prosecutions for willful refusal to submit to induction.

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United States v. Gordon, 158 F. Supp. 207, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2410 (N.D. Ill. 1957).

158 F. Supp. 207 (United States v. Gordon) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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