402
Opinion of the Court
§ 1001 does not criminalize simple denials of guilt to Government investigators. Both premises seem to us mistaken. As to the minor: We cannot imagine how it could be true that falsely denying guilt in a Government investigation does not pervert a governmental function. Certainly the investigation of wrongdoing is a proper governmental function; and since it is the very purpose of an investigation to uncover the truth, any falsehood relating to the subject of the investigation perverts that function. It could be argued, perhaps, that a disbelieved falsehood does not pervert an investigation. But making the existence of this crime turn upon the credulousness of the federal investigator (or the persuasiveness of the liar) would be exceedingly strange; such a defense to the analogous crime of perjury is certainly unheard of.1 Moreover, as we shall see, the only support for the "perversion of governmental functions" limitation is a statement of this Court referring to the possibility (as opposed to the certainty) of perversion of function—a possibility that exists whenever investigators are told a falsehood relevant to their task.
In any event, we find no basis for the major premise that only those falsehoods that pervert governmental functions are covered by § 1001. Petitioner derives this premise from a comment we made in United States v. Gilliland, 312 U. S. 86 (1941), a case involving the predecessor to § 1001. That earlier version of the statute subjected to criminal liability " 'whoever shall knowingly and willfully . . . make or cause to be made any false or fraudulent statements or representations, or make or use or cause to be made or used any false bill, receipt, voucher, roll, account, claim, certificate, affidavit,
1 "The government need not show that because of the perjured testimony, the grand jury threw in the towel. . . . Grand jurors . . . are free to disbelieve a witness and persevere in an investigation without immunizing a perjurer." United States v. Abrams, 568 F. 2d 411, 421 (CA5), cert. denied, 437 U. S 903 (1978). See generally 70 C. J. S. Perjury § 13, pp. 260-261 (1987).
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