Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-97-03073/USCOURTS-caDC-97-03073-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Angelo Valentino Garces
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 20, 1997 Decided January 20, 1998 

No. 97-3073

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

ANGELO VALENTINO GARCES, A/K/A LOLO,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia 

(No. 96cr00269-01)

Jonathan Zucker, appointed by the court, argued the cause 

and filed the briefs for appellant.

Pamela S. Satterfield, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the 

cause for appellee. With her on the brief were Mary Lou 

Leary, U.S. Attorney, John R. Fisher, Thomas C. Black, and 

Brenda Baldwin-White, Assistant U.S. Attorneys.

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Before: WALD, WILLIAMS and RANDOLPH, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge WILLIAMS.

Concurring opinion filed by Circuit Judge RANDOLPH.

WILLIAMS, Circuit Judge: Angelo Valentino Garces was 

convicted of violating 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), which makes it a 

crime for a convicted felon to possess a gun and ammunition. 

In this appeal he challenges the admission of a car key and 

related testimony. Officers found the key in a pair of pants 

during a search of Garces's residence pursuant to a lawful 

warrant and used it to open a green and white Cadillac 

parked outside the residence and owned by Garces's aunt. In 

the car, which they searched with the aunt's express written 

consent, they found the gun and ammunition giving rise to the 

charge. At trial the government offered the key (among 

other things) to link Garces to the contraband.

The key was not among the items described in the warrant. 

And its seizure did not fall within the "plain view" exception 

to the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement, says 

Garces, because the officers lacked probable cause to think it 

evidence of a crime until after they had searched the car. 

Thus, he says, seizure of the key was illegal.

Because the only reasonable reading of the aunt's consent 

to search the car is that it included consent to use the key, we 

affirm.

* * *

On July 24, 1996 officers of the FBI and Washington 

Metropolitan Police Department went to Garces's house with 

a warrant for his arrest for the murder of Thomas Johnson, 

and a warrant for search of the premises. The warrant 

permitted them to search for and seize various items that 

they had probable cause to believe were evidence or instrumentalities of the murder:

an auto-loading pistol and ammunition, a black mask, a 

dark colored rain slicker and documentation (mail, telephone bills, news clippings) demonstrating connections 

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between Mr. Garces and decedent, Johnson, which is [sic] 

evidence of the crime of murder.

The police entered Garces's home and found him sleeping on 

the couch. Though he initially gave a false name, Garces 

identified himself when confronted by an officer who knew 

him; the officers arrested him and removed him from the 

premises. The police then conducted the search. Two officers, FBI Agent Bamel and another, went to the basement, 

where they found a pair of camouflage pants neatly folded on 

a chair. They searched the pockets of the pants and found an 

identity card belonging to Garces and a key on a nylon key 

chain, together with a photo of a young girl who turned out to 

be Garces's daughter. The photograph of the key in the 

record gives it the appearance of a car key, apparently to a 

General Motors car though not necessarily a Cadillac. Agent 

Bamel took the key and key chain and went upstairs and gave 

them to the "seizing officer," Agent Bedford, who in turn 

gave the key to Agent Buckley. Meanwhile, upstairs the 

police found a green camouflage rain coat and a black mask in 

the coat pocket, which they seized.

During the search the officers noticed a green 1970 Cadillac 

with a white roof parked outside. (Tr. 1/6/97, p. 35.) The 

officers phoned to find out who owned the car, and found it 

registered in the name of a Sophia Garces, shown in the 

registration as living at the same residence. Sophia Garces, 

appellant's aunt, was in fact on hand. Agent Buckley asked 

for her consent to search the car. She gave express written 

consent to a search, and also told the officers that Angelo 

Garces, known to her as Lolo, sometimes drove the car. (Tr. 

1/6/97, pp. 64-66.) The validity of Sophia Garces's consent is 

not challenged here.

Agent Buckley turned the key over to Detective Rivera to 

use in searching the car. Rivera opened the car and in the 

glove compartment found some papers with Garces's name on 

them, and several cellular phones; more to the point, he 

noticed a .45 caliber Colt semi-automatic pistol under the 

front passenger seat. Rivera attempted to look in the trunk 

but could not, since it was locked and could not be opened 

even with the key from the pants. He left the items in the 

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car and then asked Sophia Garces whether there was another 

key or set of keys for the car, to which she responded no. 

(Tr. 3/12/97, p. 143.) The police then decided to have the car 

towed to an FBI lot until they could get a warrant to search 

it. When the warrant for the car was executed, the FBI 

seized the gun from under the seat and various documents 

from the glove compartment, some of which had Garces's 

prints.

At the suppression hearing Garces focused on a claim that 

the car search was illegal. But nested within that contention 

was a claim that the seizure of the key itself was illegal; that 

illegality supposedly invalidated the aunt's consent to the car 

search. (Tr. 3/7/97, pp. 21-23.) As to the key, he argued 

first that it fell outside the scope of the search warrant, and 

furthermore that it was outside the "plain view" exception to 

the warrant requirement because its incriminating nature was 

not "immediately apparent." Coolidge v. New Hampshire,

403 U.S. 443, 466 (1971). See also Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 

321, 326 (1987) (specifying that under the plain view doctrine 

the officers must have probable cause to believe that the item 

is incriminating). Here he no longer claims that illegalities in 

the key's seizure undermined the aunt's consent, only that the 

seizure of the key itself, and thus its later admission, were 

invalid.

The government also focused on the car search during the 

suppression hearing. In response to Garces's claims about 

the key, the government appeared to assert that the key's 

incriminating nature was "immediately apparent," but the 

government never clearly explained why this was so. It 

referred to evidence that the officers knew Garces used the 

Cadillac when he made an illegal threat to potential witnesses. In fact, though, the only knowledge of Garces's car 

use shown by the testimony at the suppression hearing was 

knowledge (acquired by the officers from Sophia Garces) that 

he drove it, so far as appeared, for innocent purposes. The 

judge ruled from the bench that the officers' use of the key in 

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searching the car was reasonable, given the link between 

Garces and the car. "[I]f there had been no key they could in 

due course have obtained one, and it also appears that they 

could have opened the car without a key, or they could have 

called a locksmith to make one. The consent not the key was 

the key to the solution." (Tr. 3/7/97, p. 25.) Implicitly, the 

judge seems also to have regarded as reasonable the seizure 

of the key and its introduction as evidence, for the same 

reason.

At trial the key acquired a greater significance than the 

passing attention given to it in the suppression hearing might 

have suggested. During its deliberations the jury sent back 

to the judge a query asking whether "if someone has ... sole 

control of the only key of the car, does that person have 

constructive possession of everything in the car?" (Tr. 

3/14/97 (a.m.), p. 2.) With both counsels' consent, the judge 

declined to answer; the jury convicted.

* * *

The first question is whether the key can in fact be deemed 

"seized" during the time between its discovery in the basement and the gun-revealing search of the Cadillac.1 Here we 

divide the process into two periods: the carrying of the key 

from the basement up to the "seizing officer," and then its use 

outside the house to open the car. The first was not a 

seizure. In Arizona v. Hicks, where officers who had entered 

an apartment because of exigent circumstances moved a 

stereo set enough to be able to read its serial numbers, the 

Court found no seizure (beyond that covered by their exigent 

circumstances entry), on the ground that merely moving the 

equipment around enough to spot the serial numbers did not 

__________

1 The search of the pants pockets was plainly legitimate, since 

items named in the search warrant, ammunition and documents, 

could easily have fitted inside the pants pockets. See, e.g., United 

States v. Jenkins, 901 F.2d 1075, 1082 (11th Cir. 1990); United 

States v. Martinez-Zayas, 857 F.2d 122, 133 (3d Cir. 1988).

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subject the defendant's "possessory interest" to any "meaningful interference" beyond that occasioned by the warranted 

search itself, 480 U.S. at 324-25. See also United States v. 

Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109, 113 (1984); Soldal v. Cook County,

506 U.S. 56, 61 (1992).2 Similarly, in United States v. Menon,

24 F.3d 550, 560-61 (3d Cir. 1994), the court found no seizure 

in a searching officer's carrying a document from where he 

found it to a more knowledgeable officer in the next room, 

because moving the document did not meaningfully interfere 

with the defendant's possessory interest in it any more than if 

the more knowledgeable officer had been brought to the 

document.

Although Garces's brief framed his argument about the 

movement of the key as a case of unlawful seizure, at oral 

argument he seemed to pursue the theory that it was a new 

search. He invoked Hicks's finding that the officers' movement of the stereo equipment initiated a new search because 

it exposed serial numbers not otherwise accessible, and thus 

"produce[d] a new invasion of respondent's privacy unjustified 

by the exigent circumstances." 480 U.S. at 325. But Menon

rejected an attempt by the defendant to extend Hicks, similar 

to what Garces may be claiming here. Menon argued that 

the more knowledgeable officer's review of the documents 

constituted a new search because his more complete understanding of the case's background enabled him to spot incriminating aspects of the papers imperceptible to the first officer. 

The Third Circuit denied the defendant's claim, relying on the 

concept of collective knowledge: in determining whether officers have probable cause to believe an item qualifies as 

evidence, the court must look to the aggregate knowledge of 

the searching officers. More pragmatically, the court reasoned that a contrary ruling would just force law officers to 

__________

2 Actually, the Court in Hicks said only that "the mere recording 

of the serial numbers did not constitute a seizure," 480 U.S. at 324, 

which leaves open the possibility that the separate moving of the 

equipment, which constituted a search, also constituted a seizure. 

But Justice Powell's dissent, id. at 332, confirms a reading of the 

majority's opinion that the movement of the equipment was a 

Fourth Amendment search but not a seizure.

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have the most informed officer do all the searching. 24 F.3d 

at 561-63. We agree. Thus, assuming any variation in the 

scope of the various officers' knowledge, we find neither 

search nor seizure in their carrying the key about the house 

to determine its evidentiary value.

As for the use of the key outside the house to open the 

Cadillac, we find it unnecessary to address whether this 

action represented a seizure. A warrantless seizure may be 

validated by the consent of someone with authority over the 

property, United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164, 170-71 

(1974), and, as we explain below, Sophia Garces supplied that 

consent.

Sophia Garces not only gave consent to the search of her 

car, but at the same time said that Angelo drove it. From 

Ms. Garces's statements that she owned the car driven by 

Angelo, the officers could reasonably have inferred: (1) that 

as the car's owner, Sophia Garces was the owner of a key 

which the police had found in Angelo's pants and which they 

reasonably thought would fit her car; (2) that as the car's and 

key's owner, Ms. Garces was legally capable of authorizing 

the police to use the key to search the car; and (3) that her 

consent to search the car in fact exercised that authority. 

Since Ms. Garces was the sole registered owner of the car, it 

was a fair inference that she would be the owner of any keys 

that opened it. One can, of course, imagine scenarios under 

which she might have given her nephew more than mere 

possession, e.g., some "estate for years" in the key (which 

simply means an estate for a fixed period of time), see 

Restatement (First) of Property § 19 cmt. a (1936), but in 

judging what is reasonable officers can expect property relationships to be the normal or customary ones, not the unusual 

or outré, at least until they are presented with contrary 

information. See United States v. Jenkins, 92 F.3d 430, 437 

(6th Cir. 1996). On the natural assumption that Sophia 

Garces was simply allowing Angelo the use of her car, she 

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would normally have the power to revoke her consent to his 

possession of the key. We may assume, without deciding, 

that she could not herself have lawfully burrowed into his 

trouser pockets in order to effect a transfer of possession to 

the officers. But no such burrowing was necessary; the 

officers had already lawfully secured possession of the key.

Finally, a reasonable reading of Sophia Garces's grant of 

consent was that she implicitly exercised her power to authorize use of the key to facilitate the search. Common sense 

strongly supports that inference. While the officers could 

have effected the car search by jimmying the lock or securing 

the aid of a locksmith, that course offered her no advantage. 

It would have carried some risk of injury to the car, and it 

would have extended the period in which her own access to 

the car was suspended. Thus, although we assume that 

Garces had a sufficient possessory interest in the key to 

entitle him to raise the Fourth Amendment issue, see Soldal,

506 U.S. at 61-62, the seizure (if any) was reasonable because 

authorized by a party with apparently superior title.

Although Sophia Garces's consent legitimated the use of 

the key to open the car, there is, of course, no reason to 

suppose that it legitimated the officers' carrying away of the 

key after the car search. (We assume arguendo that the 

carrying away at that time played a causal role in the key's 

availability for use at trial.) We conclude, however, that the 

carrying away was lawful because, once the key was used to 

open the car, its incriminating nature was "immediately apparent." Coolidge, 403 U.S. at 466.

If the plain view doctrine's immediate apparency requirement were taken literally, it would mean that unless searching officers had probable cause to grasp the incriminating 

character of an item not specifically covered by a search 

warrant at the precise moment they first spotted it, its seizure 

would become unlawful for the duration of the search, regardUSCA Case #97-3073 Document #324291 Filed: 01/20/1998 Page 8 of 15
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less of information lawfully acquired later in the search. 

Such an approach would condition the lawfulness of a seizure 

on the fortuity of whether the item was discovered early or 

late in the search: if officers entered premises under a 

warrant, and first saw a kitchen knife and then a corpse with 

its throat slit, they could not take the knife; but they could if 

the sequence were reversed. Thus, although the phrase 

"immediately apparent" sounds temporal, its true meaning 

must be that the incriminating nature of the item must have 

become apparent, in the course of the search, without the 

benefit of information from any unlawful search or seizure.3

Cases interpreting the immediate apparency requirement 

of the plain-view doctrine are few and mixed. Menon, discussed earlier, clearly takes the view that in assessing compliance with the "immediately apparent" criterion, postdiscovery steps needed to establish the papers' incriminating 

character "count" so long as they themselves are legitimate. 

24 F.3d at 560-63. The First Circuit has described the onset 

of probable cause in the plain-view context as a cumulative 

process, using the metaphor of a light bulb: "The sum total of 

the searchers' knowledge must be sufficient to turn on the 

bulb; if the light does not shine during the currency of the 

search, there is no 'immediate awareness' of the incriminating 

nature of the object." United States v. Rutkowski, 877 F.2d 

139, 142 (1st Cir. 1989) (emphasis added). And just last 

month the Fourth Circuit held that the plain-view doctrine 

validated a seizure of drug paraphernalia, despite the fact 

that the searching officer did not recognize the incriminating 

nature of the paraphernalia until he had left the room and 

__________

3 Such unlawful search might, of course, include search of the 

object itself. See Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 375 (1993) 

("If ... the police lack probable cause to believe that an object in 

plain view is contraband without conducting some further search of 

the object ... the plain-view doctrine cannot justify its seizure."). 

But any subsequent legitimate steps in the search process are as 

effective as prior steps in supplying the requisite knowledge.

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returned to view it a second time. United States v. Jackson,

1997 WL 780240 at *1, *4 (4th Cir., Dec. 19, 1997).

On the other hand, the Sixth Circuit has enunciated the 

doctrine that the officers must have probable cause to believe 

the item incriminating "at the time of discovery." See, e.g., 

United States v. Szymkowiak, 727 F.2d 95, 98 (6th Cir. 1984); 

United States v. Beal, 810 F.2d 574, 577 (6th Cir. 1987). The 

latter case, however, is quite reconcilable with our view. 

Officers discovered fountain pens that they suspected were in 

truth guns and seized them; only later, after disassembly and 

lab analysis, did they raise their knowledge from mere suspicion over the probable cause threshold. Id. at 576. Szymkowiak explains that the purpose of the temporal immediacy 

rule is to "obviate prolonged, warrantless rummaging." 727 

F.2d at 98. But as long as any "rummaging" must be lawful 

for its yield to qualify (as under our view), it is unclear how 

the Szymkowiak rule provides any additional deterrence to 

prevent officers from unlawful invasions of privacy or possessory interests. Just as searching officers "are not limited by 

the fortuity of which officer first happened upon the evidence," Menon, 24 F.3d at 561-62, we believe they should not 

be limited by the fortuity of which piece of evidence they 

happen upon first.

Our reasoning here may differ in detail from that of the 

trial court and from the theories pressed by the government, 

and we are mindful of the resulting risk of prejudice to the 

defendant, see United States v. Dawkins, 17 F.3d 399, 408 

(D.C. Cir. 1994) (citing Giordenello v. United States, 357 U.S. 

480, 488 (1958)). But, as we observed before, at the suppression hearing the defendant did not focus attention on the 

admissibility of the key. The lawfulness of the seizure of the 

key was indeed at issue, but mainly as part of the challenge to 

the car search. Thus the district court's aphoristic disposition of the issue ("The consent not the key was the key to the 

solution") was a completely understandable telescoping of 

issues presented by the defendant. If defendant had been 

troubled by the ambiguity as to whether the finding of 

consent encompassed use of the key, the burden was on him 

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to demand clarification. United States v. Mitchell, 951 F.2d 

1291, 1299 (D.C. Cir. 1991); United States v. Caballero, 936 

F.2d 1292, 1296 (D.C. Cir. 1991).

* * *

Garces raises two evidentiary points. He moved in limine

to exclude evidence of threats made by him with a gun that 

looked like the weapon found in the Cadillac. The court ruled 

that the victims of these threats could testify to seeing Garces 

six days before the seizure and could describe the weapon he 

had in hand, but that they could not speak of the threats. At 

trial things did not work out exactly as intended. The threat 

victims blurted out the threats, saying that Garces had said 

he was "going to shoot" them. (Tr. 3/10/97, pp. 78, 149.)

While Rule 404(b) of the Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure generally excludes evidence of "other crimes, wrongs, or 

acts ... to prove the character of a person in order to show 

action in conformity therewith," it permits such evidence for 

such purposes as proving "motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake or 

accident." Appellant does not appear to claim here, however, 

that the threat testimony was inadmissible under Rule 404(b), 

but only that in admitting it the trial court abused its 

discretion under Rule 403, because of its unduly prejudicial 

effects. The "emotionally compelling" nature of the "death 

threats" testimony was by itself enough to overwhelm deliberative consideration of the "abstract," colorless charge of constructive possession of a firearm.

The judge was clearly aware of the potentially prejudicial 

nature of the witnesses' references to the threats, and indeed 

ruled them out. They were not directly elicited by the 

prosecutor's questions, and there is no indication in the 

record that the prosecutor encouraged the lapse. Indeed, 

one of the blurtings occurred in response to a question by 

defense counsel on cross-examination. (Tr. 3/10/97, p. 113.) 

The judge took reasonable precautions to minimize the risk of 

any misuse, instructing the jury that the threat incident 

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testimony was admitted only "for the limited purpose of 

aiding you to decide whether the defendant possessed the gun 

recovered by the police...." (Tr. 3/13/97, p. 64.) He went 

on to caution them that they may not consider the testimony 

about the threats "as evidence that the defendant had a bad 

character or that the defendant has a criminal personality." 

Id. Accordingly, we find no abuse of discretion in letting the 

jury, properly instructed, proceed to judgment. Furthermore, any possible prejudice from the references to the 

threats was well within the threshold of harmless error, given 

the overwhelming strength of the case against Garces.

Garces also sought protection from being linked to the 

Thomas Johnson murder for which the arrest warrant was 

issued. The court ruled that the government could introduce 

evidence of the warrant, execution of which had led to seizure 

of the car and its contraband, as part of the explanatory 

background, but said that the government witnesses must not 

refer to the warrant's being for the crime of murder. At 

trial, though the murder charge was not specifically mentioned, some witnesses referred to "homicide" investigators. 

Garces argues that even the reference to the arrest warrant 

was a violation of Rule 404(b), on the theory that the search 

warrant alone adequately explained the officers' appearance 

at Garces's house, while the homicide references improperly 

linked him to a murder investigation.

Although the search warrant would have explained the 

officers' presence in Garces's home on July 24, it would not 

have explained what happened on their finding him there

his arrest. Yet that was part of the story explaining the links 

among Garces, the key and the car. So we reject Garces's 

404(b) argument. That the investigators' homicide specialty 

came out produced some but by no means all of the taint that 

would flow from mention of arrest for murder; jurors would 

reasonably suppose that homicide investigators must sometimes arrest for lesser crimes. Thus we find no abuse of the 

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court's discretion under Rule 403 to balance probative value 

against prejudicial effect.

The judgment of conviction is

Affirmed.

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RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge, concurring: It should have been 

simple enough to explain why the officers' seizure of the car 

key complied with the Fourth Amendment. Sophia Garces' 

consent to the search of her car carried with it her consent to 

using the key to open the car door. See Florida v. Jimeno,

500 U.S. 248, 250 (1991). The officers had already lawfully 

discovered the key in the defendant's clothing during the 

search authorized by the warrant. When the officers opened 

the car with the key, they found a gun. Upon completing 

their search of the car, they relocked the door, had the car 

towed to an FBI lot, and seized the key.

It does not take any intricate analysis to conclude that in 

addition to towing the car away, the officers could take the 

key as well. They could lawfully seize both items for the 

same reason: the car and the key were plainly evidence of 

defendant's criminal activity. Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 

294, 307 (1967), is directly on point. As the Court put it in 

Soldal v. Cook County, 506 U.S. 56, 65-66 (1992), a plain view 

seizure is valid so long as the probable cause standard is 

metit was hereand so long as the seizure is "unaccompanied by unlawful trespass"which it was in view of Sophia 

Garces' consent to the search. Other decisions sustaining 

seizures of the sort we have in this case are cited in 3 WAYNE 

R. LAFAVE, SEARCH AND SEIZURE § 8.1(c), at 623-24 (3d ed. 

1996).

The majority gets itself into an unnecessary tangle by 

supposing that the validity of the seizure of the key rests on 

"the consent of someone with authority over the property. 

United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164, 170-71 (1974)." Maj. 

op. at 7. In the first place, Matlock dealt only with the 

validity of a search not a seizure. In the second place, the 

legality of the seizure of the key (or the car for that matter) 

rested on the principles explained in Soldal, not on Sophia 

Garces' consent. Her permission enabled the officers to look 

for evidence of criminal activity without getting a warrant, 

but once they discovered such evidence, they did not need her 

consent to seize it.

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One other point is worth mentioning. I entirely agree that 

the officers had not seized the key within the meaning of the 

Fourth Amendment during their search of the premises, even 

though they had removed it from its original location. It is 

true that the Supreme Court has defined a Fourth Amendment seizure as a "meaningful interference" with an individual's possessory interests. E.g., United States v. Jacobsen, 466 

U.S. 109, 113 (1984). But I do not believe the Court meant 

this test to apply while a lawful search is ongoing. Whenever 

federal officers conduct a search of premises pursuant to a 

warrant, there is "a meaningful interference with" everyone's 

"possessory interests" in everything in the line of the search. 

Those present must stand aside. Until the search has ended, 

they cannot grab things, proclaim "these are mine," and walk 

away with the objects. If they tried anything of the sort, 

they could be prosecuted. See 18 U.S.C. § 2231. The 

"meaningful interference" test should be applied only after 

the search has ended and the officers have taken property 

away or have "secured" the premises from entry. This of 

course means that the key was not seized until after the 

officers used it to open the car door, at which point its 

evidentiary value was plain.

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