485 U.S. 58, 108 S. Ct. 883, 99 L. Ed. 2d 54 (1988)
In 1984 and 1985, petitioner Keith Mathews was employed by the Small Business Administration in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he administered the agency's 8A Program providing aid to small businesses.1 Midwest Knitting Mills participated in the program, and its president James DeShazer dealt primarily with Mathews.2
In October 1984, DeShazer complained to a government customer that Mathews had repeatedly requested loans from him.3 The FBI then recruited DeShazer to assist in an investigation.4 Under FBI surveillance, DeShazer offered Mathews a loan that, according to DeShazer, Mathews had previously requested.5 Two months later DeShazer met Mathews at a restaurant and gave him the money.6 Mathews was immediately arrested and charged under 18 U.S.C. § 201(g) with accepting a gratuity in exchange for an official act.7
Before trial, Mathews filed a motion in limine to raise an entrapment defense, but the District Court denied it on the ground that Mathews refused to admit all elements of the charged offense.8 At trial the government presented testimony from DeShazer and tape recordings of conversations about the loan.9 Mathews testified that he accepted the money as a personal loan unrelated to his official duties and that he and DeShazer were friends who had previously exchanged personal loans.10
After the close of evidence Mathews moved for a mistrial based on the denial of the entrapment instruction.11 The District Court again refused the instruction and the jury convicted Mathews.12 The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the District Court's ruling.13 The Supreme Court granted certiorari to address the conflict among the circuits on the availability of the entrapment instruction.14
Whether a defendant in a federal criminal prosecution who denies commission of the crime may nonetheless have the jury instructed, where the evidence warrants, on the affirmative defense of entrapment?15
A defendant is entitled to an instruction as to any recognized defense for which there exists evidence sufficient for a reasonable jury to find in his favor.16 The entrapment defense consists of two related elements: government inducement of the crime and a lack of predisposition on the part of the defendant to engage in the criminal conduct.17
Yes. Mathews denied that he accepted the loan in exchange for an official act.18 He testified that the transaction was a personal loan from a friend.19 Yet the trial evidence included DeShazer's testimony that he offered the loan under FBI direction after Mathews had repeatedly requested loans.20
There were also tape recordings of conversations discussing the loan.21 These facts supplied a basis from which a reasonable jury could find both government inducement and Mathews's lack of predisposition. This satisfied the rule that permits an entrapment instruction whenever sufficient evidence exists even if the defendant denies one or more elements of the offense.22 The District Court and Seventh Circuit therefore erred by conditioning the instruction on Mathews's admission of all elements of the charged crime.23
Mathews was entitled to the entrapment instruction despite denying commission of the crime.24
Related opinions on this issue
Justice Brennan joined the Court's opinion.25 He wrote separately to note that he had previously joined or written four opinions dissenting from this Court's holdings that the defendant's predisposition is relevant to the entrapment defense.26 His differences with the Court had been based on statutory interpretation and federal common law, not on the Constitution.27
Were he judging on a clean slate, he would still be inclined to adopt the view that the entrapment defense should focus exclusively on the Government's conduct.28 Nevertheless he bowed to stare decisis and joined the judgment and reasoning of the Court.29
Justice Scalia concurred in the judgment.30 In his view the defense of entrapment will rarely be genuinely inconsistent with the defense on the merits.31 When genuine inconsistency exists its effect in destroying the defendant's credibility will suffice to protect the interests of justice.32
He reasoned that findings of inordinate government inducement plus lack of predisposition will almost inevitably produce a conclusion of causality.33 The formal inconsistency alleged by the government is unnecessary to the social policy fostered by the defense.34 He added that any genuine nonformal inconsistency is self-penalizing through destruction of the defendant's credibility.35
No special prophylactic rule is justified for entrapment.36
Joined by Justice Blackmun
Justice White dissented, joined by Justice Blackmun.37 The entrapment defense is a relatively limited defense.38 It is only available to a defendant who has committed all the elements of a proscribed offense.39
Allowing a defendant who testifies he did not commit the elements to simultaneously claim entrapment invites perjury and jury confusion.40 The defense is plausible only if the accused is lying.41 Neither the Constitution nor any statute or rule compels the result.42
The risk of perjury is greater in criminal trials where the stakes are higher.43