United States v. Blue
The Supreme Court reversed a trial judge's decision to throw out a tax-evasion indictment against a taxpayer who claimed earlier IRS assessment proceedings had forced him to incriminate himself.
The Court held that even if the government improperly obtained incriminating statements, the fix is to keep that evidence out of trial, not to cancel the prosecution entirely, so the case goes back for trial.
“Even if we assume that the Government did acquire incriminating evidence in violation of the Fifth Amendment, Blue would at most be entitled to suppress the evidence and its fruits if they were sought to be used against him at trial.”
The Court's core holding on the proper remedy for compelled self-incrimination.
How it got here: A federal trial court dismissed the indictment, finding Blue had been compelled to incriminate himself; the government appealed, and the Ninth Circuit certified the case directly to the Supreme Court.
The Case in Depth
What happened
The IRS suspected Ben Blue of evading personal income taxes and made emergency ("jeopardy") assessments against him, his wife, and his wholly owned corporation, seizing their assets and recording tax liens. Blue then filed petitions in Tax Court disputing the amounts owed. More than a year later, the government indicted Blue for willfully evading taxes and filing false corporate returns.
The question before the Court
If the IRS's tax proceedings forced a man to make incriminating statements, can that alone stop the government from later prosecuting him for tax crimes?
Why it matters
The ruling means people who believe the IRS or other agencies forced them to make self-incriminating statements in civil proceedings cannot use that alone to escape criminal prosecution altogether. Instead, they must fight to keep the tainted statements out of trial through suppression motions, leaving the prosecution itself intact.
What changes now
The case is sent back to the trial court so the criminal prosecution can proceed. Blue remains free to file motions to suppress any statements or evidence he believes were improperly obtained through compelled self-incrimination, and to object to their use at trial. The Supreme Court did not decide whether an actual constitutional violation occurred, leaving that and related issues for further proceedings below.
What this does not decide
The Court did not decide whether Blue's Fifth Amendment rights were actually violated by the earlier tax assessment proceedings, nor whether any particular statements were in fact compelled. It only decided that dismissal of the whole indictment was the wrong remedy even assuming a violation occurred.
Concurrences and dissents
How the Justices voted
Majority (1). Justice Harlan (author).
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court first addressed whether it had power to hear the case at all, since federal law allows the government to appeal directly to the Supreme Court only when a trial court sustains a 'motion in bar' — a ruling that permanently blocks the prosecution rather than just pausing it for a fixable defect.
- Because the trial court's dismissal would, unless reversed, forever prevent the government from prosecuting Blue on these charges, the Court treated it as a motion in bar and confirmed it had jurisdiction to hear the direct appeal.
- Turning to the substance, the Court assumed for the sake of argument that the government had improperly gathered incriminating evidence from Blue in violation of his right against self-incrimination.
- The Court explained that its past decisions creating rules to exclude illegally obtained evidence from trial have never gone so far as to bar an entire prosecution — they only keep the tainted evidence out, because banning prosecutions outright would badly damage the public's interest in punishing genuine wrongdoing.
- Applying that principle, the Court concluded that even a genuine self-incrimination violation would only entitle Blue to ask the trial court to suppress the improperly obtained statements and any evidence derived from them, not to have the whole case thrown out.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms United States v. Hark (320 U. S. 531)
Used to define when a dismissal counts as a 'motion in bar' permitting direct appeal.