Attorney Arrested Over Murder Plot Loses Civil Rights Appeal

A North Dakota attorney who was arrested under charges of criminal conspiracy in a murder plot failed to convince a federal appeals court to revive his civil rights lawsuit alleging his constitutional rights were violated.

The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit Thursday affirmed a district court’s decision against attorney Henry H. Howe on a claim alleging violation of his Fourth Amendment rights. Credibility of the information received against Howe wouldn’t have impacted the issuing of an arrest warrant for him, the court said.

Howe was arrested in 2014 based on information received by a Grand Forks Narcotics Task Force informant that he was involved in a plot to commit the murder of a witness in another trial, the opinion stated. The evidence included wire-recorded conversations from meetings attended by the informant, Steve Anderson, according to the opinion. The Task Force was aware that the informant had a history of prior convictions including forgery, bigamy, check forgery, theft by false representation, and theft by swindle.

According to the opinion, agent Delicia Glaze didn’t include Anderson’s criminal history in the affidavit submitted with a complaint charging Howe with criminal conspiracy to commit murder.

After Howe was charged, his attorney investigated Anderson. The investigation revealed that Anderson had previously made false murder-for-hire allegations to Minnesota and Nebraska law enforcement officials. With this information, the charges against Howe were dismissed.

Howe alleged the arrest warrant was “based upon deliberate falsehood or reckless disregard for the truth,” in violation of his Fourth Amendment rights. He argued that Anderson’s known fraud-related crimes cast doubt on the credibility of the information he provided.

The court disagreed, stating that the evidence supporting a plot to murder included the recorded statements, the Task Force’s surveillance activities, and a motive for the plotted murder.

“A corrected affidavit disclosing Anderson’s prior fraud-related crimes of which Glaze was aware still would have provided the issuing judicial officer probable cause to issue the arrest warrant,” Judge James B. Loken wrote for the court.

The Task Force agents didn’t have a constitutional duty to further investigate Anderson’s credibility after establishing probable cause to arrest Howe, the court said. There was no evidence suggesting the agents were aware of Anderson’s prior murder-for-hire allegations when the warrant affidavit was submitted, the court said.

“An agent does not violate a clearly established constitutional right by omitting information from a warrant application that he does not actually know,” Loken stated.

Judges Michael J. Melloy and Jonathan A. Kobes joined the opinion.

The case is Howe v. Gilpin, 8th Cir., No. 22-1860, 4/20/23.