Also known as: extra-judicium · out of court · extrajudicial
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
An action or statement occurring outside of judicial proceedings or court authority. The phrase identifies conduct that takes place beyond the formal bounds of adjudication and therefore falls outside the protections and constraints that attach to in-court activity.
Judge Harlan agreed to deliver the keynote address at a local charity gala. When the event organizer asked him to comment on a pending case involving the charity's tax status, Harlan declined and instead limited his remarks to the organization's general mission. The judge's decision preserved the precedence of his judicial duties over the extrajudicial appearance.
Attorney Patel, who was litigating a high-profile contract dispute for Evergreen Bank, held a televised press conference two weeks before trial. Patel named potential witnesses and asserted that the opposing party had falsified documents. The statements were extrajudicial and created a substantial likelihood of prejudicing the upcoming proceeding.
Judge Ellison signed a contract to write a memoir about her pre-bench career. She submitted the manuscript to her publisher without referencing any pending or recently concluded cases. The writing constituted an extrajudicial activity that the Code permitted because it did not interfere with judicial duties or invite frequent disqualification.
Elise Everly filed suit against Empire Logistics alleging discriminatory hiring practices. Empire moved to dismiss on the ground that Everly lacked standing because she had never applied for a position. Counsel's out-of-court investigation yielding those facts constituted conduct extra judicium and therefore received no judicial-immunity protection.
After a federal jury acquitted Edgar Evers of civil-rights violations, state prosecutors filed parallel charges arising from the same events. Evers moved to enjoin the state proceeding, arguing that counsel's extrajudicial public statements had tainted the new forum and required dismissal.
John Harris, Jr., was indicted in a California state court charged with violation of the California Penal Code §§ 11400 and 11401, known as the Criminal Syndicalism Act. He then filed a complaint in the Federal District Court asking that court to enjoin District Attorney Evelle J. Younger of Los Angeles County from prosecuting him. Harris alleged that the prosecution and the presence of the Act inhibited him in the exercise of his rights of free speech and press guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Jim Dan and Diane Hirsch, members of the Progressive Labor Party, intervened as plaintiffs claiming that the prosecution of Harris would inhibit them from peacefully advocating the program of their party to replace capitalism with socialism. Farrell Broslawsky, an instructor in history at Los Angeles Valley College, also intervened claiming that the prosecution made him uncertain whether he could teach about the doctrines of Karl Marx or read from the Communist Manifesto as part of his classwork. None of the intervenors had been indicted, arrested, or threatened with prosecution. A three-judge Federal District Court convened pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2284 held that it had jurisdiction and power to restrain the District Attorney from prosecuting. The court held that the State's Criminal Syndicalism Act was void for vagueness and overbreadth in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments. It accordingly restrained the District Attorney from further prosecution of the pending action against Harris, as reported at 281 F. Supp. 507 (1968). Younger appealed directly to the Supreme Court pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1253. At the time the federal suit was filed, Harris was actually being prosecuted by California for a violation of the Criminal Syndicalism Act. The intervenors claimed only that they felt inhibited by the Act and the pending prosecution of Harris, without alleging any threat of prosecution against themselves.
Police questioned Elliot Edmonds at the station house for several hours without providing Miranda warnings. Edmonds made incriminating statements that the government later sought to introduce at trial. The statements were extrajudicial and therefore subject to separate constitutional scrutiny.
Petitioner Dickerson was indicted for bank robbery, conspiracy to commit bank robbery, and using a firearm in the course of committing a crime of violence. Before trial, Dickerson moved to suppress a statement he had made at a Federal Bureau of Investigation field office on the grounds that he had not received Miranda warnings before being interrogated. The District Court granted his motion to suppress, and the Government took an interlocutory appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. That court reversed the District Court's suppression order. It agreed that petitioner had not received Miranda warnings before making his statement but held that 18 U.S.C. § 3501 governed the admissibility of the statement. The Fourth Circuit concluded that Miranda was not a constitutional holding and that Congress could therefore have the final say on admissibility. Two years after Miranda was decided, Congress enacted 18 U.S.C. § 3501, which provides that a confession shall be admissible in evidence if it is voluntarily given and directs the trial judge to consider specified factors in determining voluntariness. Because of the importance of the questions raised by the Court of Appeals' decision, the Supreme Court granted certiorari.
The rule reaches any lawyer who is participating or has participated in the investigation or litigation of a matter. It therefore covers statements made after a case has concluded if the lawyer's prior involvement creates a substantial likelihood of material prejudice to a related proceeding.
…or similar pretrial statements that declarants would reasonably expect to be used prosecutorially," Brief for Petitioner 23; "extrajudicial statements . . . contained in formalized testimonial materials, such as affidavits, depositions, prior testimony, or confessions," White v. Illinois , 502 U. S. 346, 365 (1992) (Thomas,…
…the Confrontation Clause applies only to testimonial hearsay and suggested that testimonial statements include, inter alia , extrajudicial statements made to police during police interrogations. The Court
…facts,’ and ‘conclusions’ ...”). Under the relaxed pleading standards of the Federal Rules, the idea was not to keep litigants out of court but rather to keep them in. The merits of a claim would be sorted out during a flexible pretrial process and, as appropriate, through the crucible of trial. Swierkiewicz , 534 U.S. at 514…
…police officers, witnesses, and the counsel for both sides." Id. , at 358, 359. "[T]he trial court might well have proscribed extrajudicial statements by any lawyer, party, witness, or
…we upheld a restriction on a lawyer’s speech during a criminal trial. The restriction prohibited the lawyer from making extrajudicial statements that he knew or reasonably should have known would have a “substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing” the trial. Id. , at 1075. We applied a balancing test: “When a state…
A judge may accept reasonable compensation for extrajudicial activities permitted by the Code unless acceptance would appear to a reasonable person to undermine the judge's independence, integrity, or impartiality.
Lawyers may state the claim or defense involved and information in the public record. They may not make statements that the lawyer knows or reasonably should know will be disseminated publicly and will have a substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing an adjudicative proceeding.
Yes. A lawyer who deliberately violates a sealing order and supplies confidential juror information to a third party for the purpose of influencing jury selection engages in conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice even if no juror actually sees the material.
No. Bias requiring recusal must be directed toward the parties and arise from an extrajudicial source. General views about law or public policy developed in the course of civic discourse do not by themselves require disqualification.