Cite as: 509 U. S. 259 (1993)
Opinion of the Court
tation of [a] witness' testimony" was entitled to absolute immunity because it was "fairly within [the prosecutor's] function as an advocate." Id., at 430, n. 32. To be sure, Burns made explicit the point we had reserved in Imbler, 424 U. S., at 430-431, and n. 33: A prosecutor's administrative duties and those investigatory functions that do not relate to an advocate's preparation for the initiation of a prosecution or for judicial proceedings are not entitled to absolute immunity. See Burns, 500 U. S., at 494-496. We have not retreated, however, from the principle that acts undertaken by a prosecutor in preparing for the initiation of judicial proceedings or for trial, and which occur in the course of his role as an advocate for the State, are entitled to the protections of absolute immunity. Those acts must include the professional evaluation of the evidence assembled by the police and appropriate preparation for its presentation at trial or before a grand jury after a decision to seek an indictment has been made.
On the other hand, as the function test of Imbler recognizes, the actions of a prosecutor are not absolutely immune merely because they are performed by a prosecutor. Qualified immunity " 'represents the norm' " for executive officers, Malley v. Briggs, 475 U. S., at 340, quoting Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 807, so when a prosecutor "functions as an administrator rather than as an officer of the court" he is entitled only to qualified immunity. Imbler, 424 U. S., at 431, n. 33. There is a difference between the advocate's role in evaluating evidence and interviewing witnesses as he prepares for trial, on the one hand, and the detective's role in searching for the clues and corroboration that might give him probable cause to recommend that a suspect be arrested, on the other hand. When a prosecutor performs the investigative functions normally performed by a detective or police officer, it is "neither appropriate nor justifiable that, for the same act, immunity should protect the one and not the other." Hampton v. Chicago, 484 F. 2d 602, 608 (CA7 1973)
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