## Facts

- Fokker Services B.V., a Dutch aerospace services company, voluntarily disclosed to U.S. authorities that it engaged in transactions violating U.S. sanctions and export-control laws, including sales to customers in Iran, Sudan, and Burma.
- A multi-year investigation identified 1,147 transactions generating about $21 million in unlawful revenue.
- The government and Fokker entered an 18-month deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) tied to a one-count information charging conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).
- Under the DPA, Fokker agreed to cooperate, implement a compliance program, and pay about $21 million in fines and penalties; the government agreed to seek dismissal of the information if Fokker complied.
- To prevent the Speedy Trial Act (STA) clock from running during the deferral period, the parties jointly moved to exclude time under 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(2).
- The district court denied the joint motion, reasoning that the DPA was too lenient and faulting the government for not charging individual officers.

## Issues

1. Whether 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(2) authorizes a district court to reject a DPA because it views the government’s charging decisions or negotiated conditions as insufficiently severe.
2. Whether separation-of-powers limits an Article III court’s ability to second-guess executive charging and dismissal decisions in the DPA context, including by withholding approval needed for STA exclusion.
3. Whether mandamus is an appropriate remedy to correct a district court’s refusal to exclude time based on disagreement with prosecutorial discretion.

## Decision

- The D.C. Circuit granted mandamus and vacated the district court’s denial of the § 3161(h)(2) motion.
- The court directed the district court to grant the joint motion to exclude time and to implement the DPA for STA purposes.
- The court held that the district court exceeded its authority by rejecting the DPA based on its view that the agreement and charging decisions were too lenient and should have included individual prosecutions.

## Legal Principles

- Criminal charging decisions—whether to bring charges, whom to charge, which charges to bring, and whether to dismiss—are core executive functions; courts generally may not override those determinations.
- Under § 3161(h)(2), a district court’s “approval” role is limited to determining whether deferral-related delay serves the statute’s stated purpose of allowing the defendant to demonstrate good conduct, not to evaluating the adequacy of negotiated sanctions or charging breadth.
- Reading § 3161(h)(2) to permit broad judicial supervision of DPAs would raise separation-of-powers concerns by enabling courts to veto charging choices indirectly.
- The limited judicial role under § 3161(h)(2) is consistent with the narrow function of “leave of court” under Rule 48(a), which primarily guards against harassment or impropriety rather than allowing courts to impose their own charging preferences.
- Mandamus is warranted where a district court’s refusal effectively blocks the executive’s lawful exercise of charging discretion and the statutory limits on judicial authority are clear.

## Conclusion

The D.C. Circuit held that a district court may not use the Speedy Trial Act’s approval requirement to reject a deferred prosecution agreement based on disagreement with the government’s charging decisions or the perceived leniency of the DPA, and it ordered the district court to grant the parties’ joint motion to exclude time under § 3161(h)(2).


United States v. Fokker Servs. B.V., 818 F.3d 733 (D.C. Cir. 2016)