Taking the Long View on the Governor’s Indictment

One way to stir up excitement and interest in public law is to get a grand jury indictment of a sitting Texas Governor – it’s the sort of thing that happens every 97 years or so, and it certainly gets people’s attention. And one cannot help but enjoy a bit of schadenfreude when the target of such an indictment happens to be a former Aggie cheerleader who has made a career of Louisiana-style cronyism while espousing appallingly bad political ideas in order to attract support from people who thought George W. Bush was too cerebral.

But I have to reluctantly agree with a number of legal critics that the indictment (http://www.scribd.com/doc/236935338/Rick-Perry-Indictment-via-KXAN) is a stretch, based on the history of the criminal statutes that the prosecutor has relied upon.

Governor Perry was indicted on two criminal counts, as follows:

I. COUNT NUMBER ONE – First Degree Felony – Abuse of Official Capacity

The first count (Abuse of Official Capacity) is a daring interpretation of Section 39.02 of the Texas Penal Code, which criminalizes (1) a public servant’s (2) intentional or knowing (3) misuse of government property under the servant’s control (4) when done with the intent to harm another person. Here’s the statute in question: http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/Docs/PE/htm/PE.39.htm#39.02

The indictment alleges that (1) Governor Perry (a public servant) (2) intentionally or knowingly (3) threatened to withhold around $7.4 million in government funds (i.e., the government property) that had been appropriated by the Legislature for the Travis County District Attorney’s Office, in order to (4) harm the Travis County District Attorney. The “intentional or knowing misuse” in this case is alleged to be the politically vindictive veto of the budget line item in the General Appropriations Act passed by the 2013 Texas Legislature.

This criminal charge doesn’t seem particularly sporting or cricket at first glance, given that the Governor’s innate and reflexive political vindictiveness has never been deemed anything other than a moral outrage before now. Why is this veto so special as to merit criminal prosecution when none of Perry’s other vetoes ever led to criminal charges?

I suspect that the prosecutor’s argument will be that this particular veto is different because (1) it was not a veto of a policy statement or change in the law, but a veto that functioned to intentionally misdirect statutorily mandated and previously earmarked State money, and that (2) this veto was the explicit execution of the Governor’s clear and plainly-stated threat to punish the voters and taxpayers of Travis County in retaliation for the Travis County D.A.s refusal to resign her elected office, and was self-interested political payback with a dual motive, because the veto not only would have punished Travis County voters, but would also have shut down the very Public Integrity Unit that is responsible for investigating crimes of official misconduct committed by Texas public officials.

(A brief explanation as to why the Travis County D.A. has jurisdiction over crimes of official misconduct may be in order for some visitors. The State of Texas is regarded as having it’s official “home” in Austin, Texas, which is in Travis County. Crimes of official misconduct are regarded as crimes committed against the State of Texas – the State is therefore the victim, and because the State “lives” in Austin, the Travis County D.A. has jurisdiction over these crimes, even when committed by officials anywhere else in Texas. By law, the State pays the cost of this extra statewide investigative work that gets imposed on the Travis County government, given that the extra work is burdensome (most counties don’t have to conduct statewide investigations) and is imposed as an incidental consequence of the county’s political geography).

Why is this crime a first degree felony?

Like a lot of property-related offenses, this crime has a range of punishments depending on the value of the misused State property in question. Because the vetoed legislative appropriation was for (a lot) more than $200,000, and that level of money determines the severity of the offense, this specific indictment is alleging the commission of a first degree felony. That’s the kind of indictment that can knock stories about Ebola epidemics and Justin Bieber’s comeback tour right off the front page of the paper.

II. COUNT NUMBER TWO – Third Degree Felony – Coercion of Public Servant

(News sources I’ve seen have indicated that the second count is described as a third-degree felony, which indicates that the prosecutor’s intent is to argue that Governor Perry threatened to commit a felony. That’s because unless the charge is enhanced by the assertion that the Governor’s threatened act (vetoing the budget line item) is a felony, this would be a Class A Misdemeanor).

The second count is an equally audacious application of Section 36.03 of the Texas Penal Code (http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/Docs/PE/htm/PE.36.htm#36.03), which criminalizes the (1) use of coercion (2) by a person to (3) influence, or attempt to influence (4) a public servant (5) in a specific exercise or specific performance of that public servant’s official duty or (6) to violate the public servant’s known public duty.

If you looked at the text of the statute supplied by the Texas Legislative Council, you probably noticed the last paragraph of that law. Subsection (c) provides a blanket exception to the crime of coercion of a public servant if the person doing the coercion is the member of a governing body, and if the influence is being applied in the form of an official action taken by the member of the governing body.

Gentle readers, Section 36.03(c) is going to be a huge hurdle for the prosecution to clear, given that a veto is a decidedly official act when performed by the Governor. Admittedly, the Governor isn’t a “member” of a governing body in the usual sense – he’s not one of several people co-exercising the power of the State’s executive office. But he is the titular head of the Executive Branch, and he is authorized by the Texas Constitution to veto line item budget appropriations.

Here, the prosecutor is alleging that (1) the threat to veto funding of the Public Integrity Unit (the coercion) was used by (2) Governor Perry (a person) to (3) force (influence) (4) Rosemary Lehmberg (a public servant) to (5 or 6) resign from her elected post as Travis County D.A. (specifically exercising her official duty or violating her known public duty to continue to serve as D.A.).

Well, there was definitely a threat in there, and it was definitely applied to influence the Travis County D.A. to quit her elected office. And (at least in everyday parlance) the threat was coercive – “Quit, or else.”

“Coercion” is a defined statutory term in this context (the relevant portion of the definition is found in Section 1.07(a)(9)(F) of the Texas Penal Code. http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/Docs/PE/htm/PE.1.htm#1.07. Notice that in the context of Texas criminal law, the threat to take or withhold action as a public servant is automatically coercive.

So how will the prosecutor maneuver through the rocky shoals surrounding the second count? I imagine the prosecutor will argue that while the act of vetoing legislation is in general a sanctioned legal act of the Governor, that this specific veto was illegal (because it was a misuse of State funds), and therefore this veto can’t be described as an official act performed by the member of a governmental deliberative body. The veto itself needs to be an illegal act, because if the veto wasn’t illegal, than the threat of the veto would only have supported a Class A misdemeanor and not a felony charge.

And it’s felony charges that help get this lawsuit onto the front page of the New York Times.

III. THE ORIGINS OF THE PENAL STATUTES IN QUESTION

“Coercion of a Public Servant” and “Abuse of Official Capacity” are not new crimes – they have existed in roughly their current wording since the adoption of the 1973 Texas Penal Code, which was itself closely modeled on the 1925 Texas Penal Code (for the 1925 laws, see the State Law Library resources at http://www.sll.texas.gov/library-resources/collections/historical-texas-statutes-%281879-1925%29/1925/).

People tend to forget that Texas has used a formal penal code and associated code of criminal procedure since 1856, but even those who know about the 1856 Texas Penal Code are often unaware of how closely all the subsequent state criminal codes were modeled on the general organization and structure of the 1856 laws.

Although the 1856 Penal Code doesn’t contain crimes that are exact analogues of the “coercion” statute and the “abuse of official capacity” statute, the older law does encompass the two divisions of public crimes from whence the current statutes sprang, those divisions originally being referred to as crimes of office and crimes of public justice.

(The endlessly entertaining 1856 Penal Code (with whole sections devoted to dreadful punishments (whipping and castigation for poor demeanor or to aid in the instruction of children! Pillories and hanging for horse thievery!) and reminders of pre-Civil War barbarity (crimes associated with assisting escaped slaves! Disparate punishments for freedmen!) is available in its entirety through the Texas Legislative Reference Library, here: http://www.lrl.state.tx.us/scanned/statutes_and_codes/Penal_Code.pdf

“Abuse of Official Capacity” is, at its heart, a property crime – it is a malfeasance of office that materially affects things of value that are owned by the State. In that respect, the current crime is a descendant of extortion and misapplication of tax revenue, and related crimes such as embezzlement and theft of State land titles. One can see the statute begin to stretch and tear at the seams – it’s a property offense which is being repurposed from criminalizing the misuse of State property to punishing the vindictive use of gubernatorial veto power.

And “Coercion of a Public Servant” is, at its heart, a crime against public administration. It is a fraud or manipulation of public institutions for private ends, and shares textual DNA with crimes like bribery and perjury. From the indictment, one can also see this statute start to pucker and collapse as it is put to a new use categorizing a particular veto as a criminal act.

I’m popping up a big vat of popcorn and settling in for what should prove to be entertaining legal fireworks, no matter what the outcome may be.