Lane v. Franks (13-483)

argument 13-483

Lane v. Franks

Supreme Court of the United States 55 min 5 speakers 8 chapters transcribed 4 days ago official recording ↗

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What is the First Amendment issue at the heart of Lane v. Franks?

Naveed A. Singh 0:00

Morning in case 13483, Lane versus Franks. Mr. Singh? Mr. Chief Justice, it may please the court. Petitioner Mr. Edward Lane alleges that respondent Steve Franks fired him in retaliation for his testimony before a federal grand jury and district court on a matter that is undisputedly a public concern, the misconduct of a state legislator. Petitioner testified about events that he learned while working, but the testimony itself was not a part of his job responsibilities. This Court should hold that Petitior's testimony implicates the First Amendment because he spoke as a citizen on a matter of public concern. To further hold that this was clearly established in 2009 when Respondent Franks fired him.

Naveed A. Singh 0:43

Those holdings follow from a long line of this Court's precedents, which establishes that the First Amendment applies to all public employee speech on matters of public concern, except when the employee speaks pursuant to his official duties. The remainder of the case, including the application of the Pickering balancing test and respondents' other defenses, can all be addressed on remand. This Court can also leave for another day the question of whether a public employee who testifies in court but pursuant to his official responsibilities would be protected. The way the case is shaken out in the briefing, the principal point of contention has become whether the fact that petitioner learned the facts about which he testified at work is sufficient to deprive his testimony of protection.

Naveed A. Singh 1:28

But for decades — JUSTICE

Samuel A. Alito 1:30

BREYER- What if the person who testified had the definite job responsibility of investigating possible corruption in the agency? Suppose that person was something like an inspector general. Would the testimony be within the scope of the person's job duties?

Naveed A. Singh 1:50

I think it would depend on the circumstances of the particular case, and that would be the exact next question, because the responsibility to investigate by itself does not necessarily also include the responsibility to testify. And so in certain cases, you could imagine where there's an internal investigator whose job is to deal with issues internally and that wouldn't be covered by job responsibilities, but there may be other cases in which that investigator also regularly testifies. In this case, there's no dispute that my client's responsibility was to manage the staff of his department and therefore to deal with issues that arose, but there's also no dispute that he was never expected to testify in court and that this testimony was all the result of a subpoena and

Naveed A. Singh 2:33

issued by a Federal Court in response to requests from Federal prosecutors. And so I think that that case gets us towards the harder question that this Court doesn't have to decide

Samuel A. Alito 2:43

in this case. Well, just to follow up on that, could there ever be a situation in which a government employee's testimony is within the scope of that employee's duties if the employee does not testify on behalf of his employer? I think that there is. If the employee is subpoenaed by the opposite side, then you would say that's enough. That makes the testimony outside the scope of the employee's responsibilities.

Naveed A. Singh 3:12

I think that would be strong evidence. In Garcetti v. Ceballos, this Court articulated the scope of an employee's duties and determination whether an employee is acting in the scope of those duties. is a practical inquiry, and so it would vary considerably case to case. I think the fact of a subpoena is strong evidence that when an employee testifies, he's not doing so because it's his job to do so. There's a separate and very strong obligation. But again, that's really just a minor

Elena Kagan 3:38

issue. So I think you're — let's use the quintessential example, police officers or lab technicians. Generally, they're called by the prosecutor. but occasionally they're called by defense attorneys. So when are they immunized and when are they not? When are they acting within the scope of their duties and when are they not?

Naveed A. Singh 3:58

Your Honor, in those cases, I think there would be an argument that in every case they're acting in the scope of their duties, if you consider the practical circumstances that give rise to that testimony.