Undercover Investigations

Question 1

What are Confidential Informants (CIs)?

Answer 1

Confidential Informants (CIs) are people who work undercover for law enforcement to gather information about felonious criminal activities.

Question 2

What are some of the reasons that Confidential Informants are viewed as unreliable?

Answer 2

1. Criminals
2. Motivated to lie
3. Reliability, Accountability, Control
4. Double Dealing
5. Payments
6. Subject to Cross-Examination and Discovery

Question 3

What is the rule from United States v. Hoffa?

Answer 3

“The Fourth Amendment does not protect ‘a wrongdoer’s misplaced belief that a person to whom he voluntary confides his wrongdoing will not reveal it.’”

Question 4

What is the rule from United States v. White?

Answer 4

There is no difference if the person you voluntarily confide in records the conversation or not because you have no reasonable expectation of privacy either way.

Question 5

What is the rule from United States v. Longoria?

Answer 5

Use of a foreign language doesn’t create a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Question 6

What is Entrapment?

Answer 6

Entrapment is a complete defense to a criminal offense.

Question 7

When was Entrapment first recognized?

Answer 7

Entrapment was first recognized in Sorrells v. United States.

Question 8

What are the two approaches to Entrapment?

Answer 8

1. Subjective Entrapment
2. Objective Entrapment

Question 9

What is Subjective Entrapment?

Answer 9

Subjective Entrapment is when law enforcement pressures the defendant to commit the offense against his or her will.

Question 10

What is Objective Entrapment?

Answer 10

Objective Entrapment is when law enforcement would cause a “reasonable law-abiding person” to commit the offense.

Question 11

What difference does Subjective vs. Objective Entrapment make?

Answer 11

If there is Subjective Entrapment, evidence of the defendant’s criminal record is admissible to prove predisposition to commit the offense.

If there is Objective Entrapment, evidence of the defendant’s criminal record is inadmissible to prove predisposition to commit the offense.

Question 12

What is the two part test for Subjective Entrapment?

Answer 12

1. Inducement: Did the Government induce the Crime?
2. Was the Defendant predisposed to commit the crime?

Question 13

What are examples of inducement?

Answer 13

Appeals to friendship

Compassion

Promises of extraordinary economic or material gain or sexual favors

Assistance in carrying out the crime

Question 14

What is not an example of an inducement?

Answer 14

A simple offer to sell or purchase drugs is a ‘mere offer’ and does not constitute an inducement.

Question 15

How do you show predisposition of the defendant to commit the crime?

Answer 15

Predisposition is shown with evidence of other crimes (prior offenses), knowledge of and experience with the criminal activity (language, tools, etc.).

Question 16

What is the Objective Test for Entrapment?

Answer 16

The requisite level of outrageousness could be reached only where government conduct is so fundamentally unfair as to be ‘shocking to the universal sense of justice.’

Question 17

What are some examples of this level of outrageousness?

Answer 17

1. Intimidation and threats against the defendant’s family.
2. Calling the defendant everyday and then threatening them.
3. Engaging in forceful solicitation and dogged insistence until the defendant capitulates.
4. Playing upon the defendant’s sympathy for informant’s narcotic experience and withdrawal symptoms.
5. Repeated suggestions that worked on when defendant lost job and needed money.
6. Told defendant agent was suicidal and needed money.