United States v. Price

• Decision Date: 28 March 1966
• Docket Number: Nos. 59,60,s. 59
• Parties: UNITED STATES, Appellant, v. Cecil Ray PRICE et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

383 U.S. 787

86 S.Ct. 1152

16 L.Ed.2d 267

UNITED STATES, Appellant,

v Cecil Ray PRICE et al.

Nos. 59, 60.

Argued Nov. 9, 1965.

Decided March 28, 1966.

[Syllabus from pages 787-788 intentionally omitted]

ThurgoodMarshall, Sol. Gen., for appellant.

H. C. Mike Watkins, Meridian, Miss., for appellees.

Mr. Justice FORTAS delivered the opinion of the Court.

These are direct appeals from the dismissal in part of two indictments returned by the United States Grand Jury for the Southern District of Mississippi. The indictments allege assaults by the accused persons upon the rights of the asserted victims to due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment. The indictment in No. 59 charges 18 persons¹ with violations of 18 U.S.C. § 241 (1964 ed.). In No. 60, the same 18 persons are charged with offenses based upon 18 U.S.C. § 242 (1964 ed.). These are among the so-called civil rights statutes which have come to us from Reconstruction days, the period in our history which also produced the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution.

The sole question presented in these appeals is whether the specified statutes make criminal the conduct for which the individuals were indicted. It is an issue of construction, not of constitutional power. We have no doubt of 'the power of Congress to enforce by appropriate criminal sanction every right guaranteed by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.' United States v. Williams, 341 U.S. 70, 72, 71 S.Ct. 581, 582, 95 L.Ed. 758.²

The events upon which the charges are based, as alleged in the indictments, are as follows: On June 21, 1964, Cecil Ray Price, the Deputy Sheriff of Neshoba County, Mississippi, detained Michael Henry Schwerner, James Earl Chaney and Andrew Goodman in the Neshoba County jail located in Philadelphia, Mississippi. He released them in the dark of that night. He then proceeded by automobile on Highway 19 to intercept his erstwhile wards. He removed the three men from their automobile, placed them in an official automobile of the Neshoba County Sheriff's office, and transported them to a place on an unpaved road.

These acts, it is alleged, were part of a plan and conspiracy whereby the three men were intercepted by the 18 defendants, including Deputy Sheriff Price, Sheriff Rainey and Patrolman Willis of the philadelphia, Mississippi, Police Department. The purpose and intent of the release from custody and the interception, according to the charge, were to 'punish' the three men. The defendants, it is alleged, 'did wilfully assault, shoot and kill' each of the three. And, the charge continues, the bodies of the three victims were transported by one of the defendants from the rendezvous on the unpaved road to the vicinity of the construction site of an earthen dam approximately five miles southwest of Philadelphia, Mississippi.

These are federal and not state indictments. They do not charge as crimes the alleged assaults or murders. The indictments are framed to fit the stated federal statutes, and the question before us is whether the attempt of the draftsman for the Grand Jury in Mississippi has been successful: whether the indictments charge offenses against the various defendants which may be prosecuted under the designated federal statutes.

We shall deal first with the indictment in No. 60, based on § 242 of the Criminal Code and then with the indictment in No. 59, under § 241. We do this for ease of exposition and because § 242 was enacted by the Congress about four years prior to § 241.³ Section 242 was enacted in 1866; § 241 in 1870.

I. No. 60.

Section 242 defines a misdemeanor, punishable by fine of not more than $1,000 or imprisonment for not more than one year, or both. So far as here significant, it provides punishment for 'Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any inhabitant of any State * * * to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States * * *.'

The indictment in No. 60 contains four counts, each of which names as defendants the three officials and 15 nonofficial persons. The First Court charges, on the basis of allegations substantially as set forth above, that all of the defendants conspired 'to wilfully subject' Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman 'to the deprivation of their right, privilege and immunity secured and protected by the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States not to be summarily punished without due process of law by persons acting under color of the laws of the State of Mississippi.' This is said to constitute a conspiracy to violate § 242, and therefore an offense under 18 U.S.C. § 371 (1964 ed.). The latter section, the general conspiracy statute, makes it a crime to conspire to commit any offense against the United States. The penalty for violation is the same as for direct violation of § 242—that is, it is a misdemeanor.⁴

On a motion to dismiss, the District Court sustained this First Court as to all defendants. As to the sheriff, deputy sheriff and patrolman, the court recognized that each was clearly alleged to have been acting 'under color of law' as required by § 242.⁵ As to the private persons, the District Court held that '(I)t is immaterial to the conspiracy that these private individuals were not acting under color of law' because the count charges that they were conspiring with persons who were so acting. See United States v. Rabinowich, 238 U.S. 78, 87, 35 S.Ct. 682, 684, 59 L.Ed. 1211.

The court necessarily was satisfied that the indictment, in alleging the arrest, detention, release, interception and killing of Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman, adequately stated as the purpose of the conspiracy, a violation of § 242, and that this section could be violated by 'wilfully subject(ing the victims) * * * to the deprivation of their right, privilege and immunity' under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

No appeal was taken by the defendants from the decision of the trial court with respect to the First Count and it is not before us for adjudication.

The Second, Third and Fourth Counts of the indictment in No. 60 charge all of the defendants, not with conspiracy, but with substantive violations of § 242. Each of these counts charges that the defendants, acting 'under color of the laws of the State of Mississippi,' 'did wilfully assault, shoot and kill' Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman, respectively, 'for the purpose and with the intent' of punishing each of the three and that the defendants 'did thereby wilfully deprive' each 'of rights, privileges and immunities secured and protected by the Constitution and the laws of the United States'—namely, due process of law.

The District Court held these counts of the indictment valid as to the sheriff, deputy sheriff and patrolman. But it dismissed them as against the nonofficial defendants because the counts do not charge that the latter were 'officers in fact, or de facto in anything allegedly done by them 'under color of law."

We note that by sustaining these counts against the three officers, the court again necessarily concluded that an offense under § 242 is properly stated by allegations of willful deprivation, under color of law, of life and liberty without due process of law. We agree. No other result would be permissible under the decisions of this Court. Screws v. United States, 325 U.S. 91, 65 S.Ct. 1031; Williams II.⁶

But we cannot agree that the Second, Third or Fourth Counts may be dismissed as against the nonofficial defendants. Section 242 applies only where a person indicted has acted 'under color' of law. Private persons, jointly engaged with state officials in the prohibited action, are acting 'under color' of law for purposes of the statute. To act 'under color' of law does not require that the accused be an officer of the State. It is enough that he is a willful participant in joint activity with the State or its agents.⁷

In the present case, according to the indictment, the brutal joint adventure was made possible by state detention and calculated release of the prisoners by an officer of the State. This action, clearly attributable to the State, was part of the monstrous design described by the indictment. State officers participated in every phase of the alleged venture: the release from jail, the interception, assault and murder. It was a joint activity, from start to finish. Those who took advantage of participation by state officers in accomplishment of the foul purpose alleged must suffer the consequences of that participation. In effect, if the allegations are true, they were participants in official lawlessness, acting in willful concert with state officers and hence under color of law.

Appellees urge that the decision of the District Court was based upon a construction of the indictment to the effect that it did not charge the private individuals with acting 'under color' of law. Consequently, they urge us to affirm in No. 60. In any event, they submit, since the trial court's decision was based on the inadequacy of the indictment and not on construction of the statute, we have no jurisdiction to review it on direct appeal. United States v. Swift & Co., 318 U.S. 442, 63 S.Ct. 684, 87 L.Ed. 889. We do not agree. Each count of the indictment specifically alleges that all of the defendants were acting 'under color of the laws of the State of Mississippi.' The fault lies not in the indictment, but in the District Court's view that the statute requires that each offender be an official or that he act in an official capacity. We have jurisdiction to consider this statutory question on direct appeal and, as we have shown, the trial court's determination of it is in error. Since each of the private individuals is indictable as a principal acting under color of law, we need not consider whether he might be held to answer as an ...