A substantial number of 42 U.S.C. §1983 complaints allege that law enforcement officers fabricated evidence in order to frame an innocent person. The fabrication may take a wide variety of forms, including manufacturing and giving perjurious testimony, planting evidence, and doctoring scientific evidence. It’s hard to imagine more egregious government wrongdoing.
Even the most ardent originalist would likely agree that this type of governmental misconduct is unconstitutional. In fact, the U.S. Supreme Court has long held that a prosecutor’s knowing presentation of perjured testimony to secure a conviction is unconstitutional because it violates “fundamental conceptions of justice which lie at the base of our civil and political institutions,” a betrayal of “rudimentary demands of justice.”1
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