Millbrook v. United States (11-10362)
argument 11-10362Millbrook v. United States
Supreme Court of the United States
1h 0m
4 speakers
8 chapters
transcribed 6 days ago
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What does the FTCA’s law‑enforcement proviso say about “officer” versus “employee”?
We'll hear argument first this morning in Case 11-10362, Millbrook v. United States. Mr. Paoletti, the letter.
Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court, the plain language of Section 2680H's law enforcement proviso waives sovereign immunity in clear, precise, and unambiguous terms. It extends the waiver to any claim for one of the six enumerated torts committed by a federal investigative or law enforcement officer acting within the scope of his or her employment. And it defines investigative or law enforcement officer as any officer of the United States who is, quote, empowered by law, unquote, to carry out searches, seizures, or arrests.
Would that include, say, a meat inspector? There's a wide range of federal employees that have arrest or search or seizure.
The proviso doesn't say any employee of the United States who is authorized to carry out a search, seizure, or arrest. It used the term any officer of the United States. And I believe that the term officer carries some water here. If we look at a spectrum of individuals who have powers, for example, to carry out searches, we can envision, on the one hand, very traditional core law enforcement officers. Let's take a DEA officer who can carry out arrests, do searches and seizures, is authorized to use force. At the other end of the spectrum, we have something like a meat inspector or an OSHA inspector who may have a limited ability to carry out searches and But these are searches that are in really a law enforcement capacity, an administrative capacity as opposed to a core law enforcement capacity.
So the government raises the argument, and we think it's a plausible interpretation, that by using the term officer rather than any employee of the United States, that there was some limiting factor imported into the statute there by the statute's plain language. And I would trust my colleague from the Solicitor General's office to map the boundaries of that. I would say that in any case, a correctional officer, who are the individuals who are involved here in committing the complaint of acts, certainly falls much closer to core law enforcement on that spectrum than to the administrative side.
As a general matter, first in the States and then in the Federal Government, is a correctional officer, prison guard, usually deemed to be a peace officer?
Yes. In many States that use the term peace officer in the statutes defining a peace officer for things, for example, authorizing the use of force or authorizing the carriage of weapons in Many states, it's not uniform, but many states include correctional officers within that ambit. The federal government typically does not use the term peace officer in its statutes, but if you look at federal statutes that use the term law enforcement officer, which is the very term that's used in subsection H, many, many of those other statutory schemes expressly include correctional officers. So, for example, for purposes of civil service pay, for purposes of death benefits, of retirement benefits. That doesn't prove that they're law enforcement officers.
that that's not the test for officer, how much you're paid. The test is whether you exercise significant authority under the laws of the United States. That's a pretty fuzzy line, but I'm not sure that a prison guard exercises significant authority under the laws of the United States.
I would think in the context of the prison, it's hard to imagine how a prison guard could exercise any more authority than they do. In addition to their correctional function, Prison correctional officers are essentially the police force for the prison. They are charged with maintaining order and they're charged with enforcing the laws of the United States within the confines of the prison. And indeed, in some specified cases, outside the prison walls. For example, they're explicitly authorized under Section 3050 of Title 18 of the U.S. Code not just to carry out arrests in prison for violations of the federal law both by visitors and by prisoners but
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What does the FTCA’s law‑enforcement proviso say about “officer” versus “employee”?
0:01–9:03
2
How do correctional officers fit into the definition of investigative or law‑enforcement officers?
9:03–17:14
3
Why do some justices argue that “scope of employment” should limit the waiver, not the officer’s status?
17:14–26:00
4
What is the significance of the three enumerated torts (arrest, search, seizure) in the waiver analysis?
26:00–32:55
5
How might a broad reading of the proviso affect future prison‑litigation and congressional intent?
32:55–39:42
6
Do agencies like OSHA, EPA, or the Forest Service count as law‑enforcement officers under the statute?
39:42–45:50
7
What do the justices say about the “two‑hat” problem for officers who have both security and law‑enforcement roles?
45:50–53:55
8
Why do the parties disagree on whether the text or policy should drive the interpretation of the waiver?
53:55–1:00:37