Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-13-01586/USCOURTS-ca7-13-01586-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Feras Rahman
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 13-1586

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

FERAS RAHMAN,

Defendant-Appellant.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Eastern District of Wisconsin.

No. 11-CR-103 — Rudolph T. Randa, Judge.

____________________

ARGUED JANUARY 22, 2014 — DECIDED NOVEMBER 9, 2015

____________________

Before WOOD, Chief Judge, and MANION and WILLIAMS,

Circuit Judges.

WILLIAMS, Circuit Judge. In the early morning hours of 

January 19, 2010, the building that housed the Black & White 

Café, Grecian Delight, Cush Lounge, the Pizza Man restaurant and ten apartments burned to the ground. In hopes of 

discovering how the fire started, fire investigators asked Feras Rahman to sign a consent form that allowed investigators to look for the “origin and cause” of the fire. While inCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
2 No. 13-1586

vestigating the fire, investigators walked together across the 

basement performing a line search looking for a laptop and 

safe that Rahman told investigators were there, but after 

much searching, investigators found neither. Based on the 

absence of the laptop, the presence of gasoline, and other evidence, investigators settled on arson as the cause of the fire 

and Rahman as the suspect. Rahman was charged with, 

among other things, arson and lying to investigators about 

the location of the laptop. He was eventually acquitted of the 

arson counts, but convicted of one count of providing false 

statements to the government. 

On appeal, Rahman argues that evidence from the basement line search should have been suppressed as it exceeded 

the scope of his consent. We agree. The investigators had already ruled out the basement as the origin of the fire when 

they conducted the line search. Their only purpose for conducting the search was to look for secondary and circumstantial evidence of arson, which exceeded the scope of 

Rahman’s consent as it permitted them to look only for the 

origin and cause of the fire. Rahman also argues that there 

was insufficient evidence for the jury to find him guilty of 

giving a false statement to investigators. We agree with him 

that the fact that one of his computers was found at his home 

and did not contain business records was not sufficient to 

find him guilty of the charged false statement, and we remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I. BACKGROUND

At approximately 3:30 a.m. on a frigid January 19, 2010,

a fire broke out in a Milwaukee building that housed four 

businesses on the first floor—the Black & White Café (“Café”), Grecian Delight (a restaurant), Cush Lounge, and Pizza 

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No. 13-1586 3

Man—and ten apartments on the second floor. Emergency 

personnel responded about ten minutes later, but the fivealarm blaze consumed the building, causing the second floor 

of the building to collapse onto the first floor. At the request 

of a Milwaukee detective, Special Agent of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (“ATF”) and certified fire inspector Rick Hankins arrived on the scene between 8 and 9 a.m. to document the scene and investigate 

the cause of the fire.

While the firefighters battled the fire, the building’s business owners gathered at a nearby McDonald’s, where they

were interviewed and asked to consent to a search of their 

premises. At 8 a.m., Detective Elizabeth Wallich from the 

Milwaukee Police Department interviewed Feras Rahman, 

the owner of the Black & White Café, and presented him 

with a written consent form. The consent form that Rahman 

signed gave the investigators consent to search the Café “to 

determine the origin and cause of the fire that occurred on 

1/19/10.” 

Around 10 a.m. Wisconsin Deputy Fire Marshal Antonio 

Martinez interviewed Rahman. During the course of the interview, Rahman stated that he kept his safe and business 

records in the basement of the Café. He also mentioned that 

he owned a laptop that contained some of his business records, but he was not sure if the laptop was in the basement 

or on the first floor by the cash register. Although Rahman 

was not certain where the laptop was in the restaurant, he 

believed that it was still there. 

On January 20, Hankins arrived early on the scene to 

begin investigating the cause of the fire, but the debris from 

the fire still made most of the building inaccessible. To deCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
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termine how the fire started, Hankins sought surveillance 

videos from the businesses damaged in the fire as well as 

surveillance video from Chubby’s Cheese Steaks, a business 

located across the street from the Café. Sometime after 5 

p.m., Hankins saw Chubby’s Cheese Steaks’s surveillance 

video, which showed a brief illumination within the Café 

about 10 minutes before emergency personnel arrived. This 

video indicated to investigators that the fire originated in or 

above the Café; in other words, not in the basement. After 

seeing the video, around 8 p.m., Hankins decided to go 

down to the basement to retrieve the control mother board 

panel for the alarm system (“alarm box”) of the Café, “because [he] was interested in knowing what kind of data the 

alarm box might be able to offer ... and he wanted to preserve the alarm box for any additional water damage.”

Hankins stated that alarm systems can give investigators the 

date and time the system detects the outbreak of a fire and 

that investigators wanted the alarm box to see what kind of 

information it contained that might shed light on the fire’s 

cause and origin. According to Hankins, the alarm box was 

not suspected of causing the fire because neither it, nor the 

area around it, was damaged by the fire. 

On January 21, fire investigators began excavating the 

Café, layer by layer, as carefully as possible with an excavator. At this point, investigators, including Hankins, had numerous theories as to what started the fire and believed that 

the fire started somewhere between the first and second 

floors of the Café. Hankins, for the first time, also fully examined the basement and observed that although the basement contained a significant amount of water, it was obvious to him that the fire did not start there. During his invesCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
No. 13-1586 5

tigation of the basement, Hankins seized closed bank bags, a 

tray from a cash register, and a surveillance DVR.

On January 22, Hankins decided to again investigate the 

basement and to look at entry points people could use to access the building. As part of his investigation, Hankins examined a door between the Café and the Grecian Delight 

restaurant next door. On the Grecian Delight side, there was 

a dead bolt lock with a turn knob, which allowed anyone to 

enter the Café from the Grecian Delight. When Hankins tried 

the door, the deadbolt was locked, so he broke through and 

found some large items in front of it. Hankins also had the 

basement drained so that a group of investigators could 

walk across the basement performing a line search to look 

for clues. Based on interviews with Rahman, Hankins was

looking for valuable items, including the laptop with the 

business records on it and a safe, which Rahman told investigators should be in the restaurant. According to Hankins, 

investigators often look for the remains of valuable items in 

the ashes of fires as their presence, or more importantly lack 

thereof, can be clues of criminality as thieves occasionally 

will commit arson to hide their burglary. After combing 

through the rubble, investigators found neither the safe nor 

the laptop.

On January 23, fire investigators were nearly finished excavating the Café, but still had not determined the exact 

cause and origin of the fire. They had a number of theories 

and needed a way to eliminate some of them. To help narrow the number of viable theories, investigators brought in 

Moon, an ignitable liquid detection canine, to confirm or 

eliminate the possibility that the fire was deliberately set. 

Moon alerted the investigators to the possible presence of an 

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ignitable liquid present in several places on the first floor. To 

confirm the presence of ignitable liquid, investigators took 

samples and sent them to a laboratory to be tested. It was 

while Hankins was collecting samples that he smelled gasoline. According to him, since there was no reason for gasoline to be present in the Café, he and his investigators for the 

first time leaned towards arson as the reason for the fire. After these samples were collected, investigators seized the 

back door of the Café as well as the door to Rahman’s office 

in the basement. On January 29, Hankins learned that the 

samples he sent to the laboratory were positive for gasoline. 

Based on the positive test of gasoline, investigators focused their investigation on Rahman. In a surveillance video 

recorded the night of the fire, Rahman was seen leaving the 

Café with a large, white rectangular box. After a search warrant was executed at Rahman’s home, agents found a white 

rectangular box containing a red laptop computer underneath Rahman’s bed. The laptop did not contain business 

records, but investigators did find a Google Earth search of 

the two block area surrounding Rahman’s restaurant. The 

government believed that Rahman was using the aerial shots 

of the neighborhood to search for an escape route. 

Rahman’s lawyer wrote the government suggesting that 

it should investigate Andres Karabelas, the owner of the 

Grecian Delight restaurant, as the culprit that set the fire. 

According to Rahman, Karabelas started having problems 

with his business and his personal life in 2008. Allegedly 

Karabelas had huge debts, mounting losses, and a $250,000 

insurance policy. Rahman also argued that Karabelas’s restaurant was struggling, that Karabelas could not make his 

payroll, and that he was late paying his suppliers. 

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As part of the investigatory process, investigators interviewed Karabelas regarding his actions on the night of the 

fire. Karabelas said that after closing up the restaurant, he 

went downstairs and locked the door that linked it to Cush, 

then, at 3:15 a.m., left through the front door with his two 

employees. He described the door between the Grecian Delight and the Café as having a deadbolt lock and said it was 

secured by a padlock to which he did not have the key.

Upon the conclusion of its investigation, the government 

charged Rahman with arson of a building resulting in injury

(Count One), mail fraud (Count Two), arson to commit mail 

fraud (Count Three), and making false statements (Counts 

Four and Five) in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 844(i), 844(h)(1), 

1001, 1341, and 2. Rahman filed a pretrial motion to suppress 

evidence obtained during searches of the fire scene, alleging 

that investigators exceeded the scope of his consent. The 

magistrate judge recommended denying the motion and the 

district court adopted the recommendation. 

At trial the government argued that while Rahman’s restaurant was profitable, business had declined since the 

summer and that Rahman wanted to pursue other business

opportunities, but that he could not because he was committed to running the Café. Under the government’s theory the 

only way out of running the Café was to light the fire and 

then collect $102,000 in insurance proceeds which he could 

then use to fund other business opportunities. The government also argued Rahman had the opportunity to commit 

arson in that he had a key to the restaurant and knew the 

alarm code. The defense’s theory was that Karabelas was responsible and could have entered the Café through the 

basement door, gone up the steps, spread the gasoline and 

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thrown the match, then ran out, returned to the Grecian Delight, closed the basement door and covered it with some 

materials, and left.

After a two-week trial, Rahman was convicted of one 

count of making a false statement concerning the laptop 

with business records on it (Count Four). According to the 

government, Rahman lied when he told them that his laptop 

was at the Café because he knew it was located at his home. 

Although Rahman was convicted of making a false statement, he was acquitted on the other counts. Rahman then 

filed a motion for judgment of acquittal or, in the alternative, 

for a new trial, but the motion was denied by the district 

court. 

At sentencing, the government asked the court to consider Rahman’s acquitted conduct of arson, and the district 

court stated that it was willing to do so if the government 

established the conduct by a preponderance of the evidence. 

After conducting two sentencing hearings, listening to arguments, and considering the government’s proposed findings of fact, the court concluded that Rahman was responsible for the arson and sentenced him to 30 months’ imprisonment, but allowed him to remain free pending the result 

of this appeal. Rahman now appeals the district court’s order 

denying his motion to suppress the evidence obtained during a search of the fire scene, the denial of his motion for 

judgment of acquittal, and his sentence.

II. ANALYSIS

A. Motion to Suppress Should Have Been Granted

When reviewing a denial of a motion to suppress, we review the district court’s factual findings for clear error and 

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No. 13-1586 9

its legal conclusions de novo. United States v. Fields, 371 F.3d 

910, 914 (7th Cir. 2004).

1. Investigators Committed a Trespass

Rahman argues that the district court should have granted his motion to suppress evidence collected during numerous searches of the Café’s basement as they violated the

Fourth Amendment. Under the Fourth Amendment, “[t]he 

right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated.” U.S. Const. amend. IV; Florida v. 

Jardines, 133 S. Ct. 1409, 1414 (2013). The text of the Fourth 

Amendment is closely connected to property, and for most 

of our country’s history, Fourth Amendment jurisprudence 

was tied to common-law trespass. See United States v. Jones, 

132 S. Ct. 945, 949 (2012). However, during the latter half of 

the twentieth century, this court, following the Supreme 

Court’s example, expanded Fourth Amendment protections 

and deviated from an approach that was exclusively property-based. Id. at 949-50. In Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 

(1967), the Court was asked to decide whether a Fourth 

Amendment violation occurred when an eavesdropping device was attached to a public telephone booth. In reaching its 

conclusion that a violation occurred, the Court said that “the 

Fourth Amendment protects people, not places.” Id. at 351.

After Katz, courts around the country focused on whether a 

person’s “reasonable expectation of privacy” was violated to 

determine when a Fourth Amendment violation occurred. 

See Jones, 132 S. Ct. at 950. Although the Katz reasonable expectation test was the predominant test that courts used, the 

common-law trespass theory was still available to defendants. Id. at 952 (stating that the Katz test was added as an alCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
10 No. 13-1586

ternative test to the common-law trespass test and was not 

designed to replace it). It is under this trespass theory on 

appeal that Rahman argues the government violated his 

Fourth Amendment rights, and we agree.

Rahman did not argue that his rights were violated under a common-law trespass theory before the district court,

and under normal circumstances we might consider his argument forfeited since the argument was available to him at 

the time of the search. However, because the government 

did not argue that Rahman forfeited this particular argument and addressed it in its appellate brief, we may reach 

the merits of Rahman’s argument under the “waived waiver” doctrine. See United States v. Prado, 743 F.3d 248, 251 (7th 

Cir. 2014) (stating that the defendant’s forfeiture of his appellate argument was absolved by the government’s failure to 

recognize the forfeiture and its response on the merits to defendant’s argument). After careful review, we conclude that 

the fire investigators’ search of the Café’s basement violated 

Rahman’s Fourth Amendment rights, and that certain pieces 

of evidence collected in the basement as a result of the search 

should have been suppressed.

Under the common-law trespass theory, a violation occurs when government officials, without a warrant: (1) physically intrude (2) on a constitutionally protected area (3) for 

the purposes of obtaining information, and (4) an exception 

to the warrant requirement does not apply. See Jones, 132 S. 

Ct. at 949-52. There is no doubt that investigators physically 

intruded upon Rahman’s restaurant and that the restaurant 

is a constitutionally protected area. See Michigan v. Tyler, 436 

U.S. 499, 508 (1978) (applying Fourth Amendment protection 

to commercial property and stating that a warrant was reCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
No. 13-1586 11

quired to search the defendant’s furniture store); see also See 

v. City of Seattle, 387 U.S. 541, 543 (1967) (stating that “[t]he 

businessman, like the occupant of a residence, has a constitutional right to go about his business free from unreasonable 

official entries upon his private commercial property”). And 

neither party disputes that the investigators were on Rahman’s property to gather information. The only remaining 

question as to whether the investigators’ search violated the 

Fourth Amendment is whether an exception to the warrant 

requirement applies. 

2. Investigators Exceeded Scope of Rahman’s Consent

The government argues that the search did not violate 

Rahman’s Fourth Amendment rights because Rahman gave 

written consent to all searches of the Café’s basement when 

he signed a form giving his consent to search the Café “to 

determine the origin and cause of the fire that occurred on 

1/19/10.” Because a person may voluntarily waive his Fourth 

Amendment rights, no warrant is required where the defendant consents to a search. United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 

164, 171 (1974); United States v. James, 571 F.3d 707, 713 (7th 

Cir. 2009). Rahman, however, maintains that his written consent to search for the fire’s “origin and cause” was just that—

a search to determine the fire’s origin and cause—and that it 

did not include consent to search for secondary and circumstantial evidence that could point to criminality, such as collecting evidence from the bank bags, his business receipts,

and the like.

“The scope of a search is generally defined by its expressed object,” Florida v. Jimeno, 500 U.S. 248, 251 (1991), 

and the scope of the investigators’ search cannot exceed the 

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scope of a defendant’s consent, see United States v. Long, 425 

F.3d 482, 486 (7th Cir. 1995). In determining the scope of a 

defendant’s consent, we apply an objectively reasonable 

standard. Jimeno, 500 U.S. at 251. Whether a search remained 

within the boundaries of consent is a factual question that is 

determined by the totality of the circumstances. Long, 425 

F.3d at 486; United States v. Wesela, 223 F.3d 656, 661 (7th Cir. 

2000).

Rahman’s consent to search the Café for the “origin and 

cause” of the fire did not encompass a search for secondary 

and circumstantial evidence of arson. Rahman argues that 

the term “origin and cause” is a legal term of art that carries 

a precise definition that is limited in nature, as opposed to 

the broader meaning that the government would like us to 

adopt, and that it was in that limited context that he gave 

consent. The government, on the other hand, contends that 

arson can be a cause of fire and that an objectively reasonable person, when asked if fire investigators could search for 

“origin and cause” of the fire, would assume that the officers 

would be looking for arson. There is some support for the 

government’s argument. See McDonald v. Vill. of Winnetka, 371 

F.3d 992, 997 (7th Cir. 2004) (“The cause of any fire may fall 

into one of three broad categories: accidental, incendiary [intentionally set fire] and undetermined.”). But if we look to 

guidance from the Supreme Court, the issue becomes a little 

clearer. 

In Michigan v. Clifford, the Supreme Court was asked to 

determine whether evidence should be suppressed after it 

was collected by fire investigators without a warrant. 464 

U.S. 287 (1984). The fire in that case began in the early morning hours and was extinguished a few hours later. Id. at 290.

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No. 13-1586 13

While the fire investigators waited for water to be pumped 

out of the house, they found a fuel can in the home’s driveway, seized it, and marked it as evidence. Id. After the water 

was pumped out of the basement, the investigators first

searched the basement and quickly confirmed that the fire 

originated in the basement beneath the basement stairway. 

Id. The investigators continued their search and found two 

fuel cans beneath the basement stairway and a crock pot 

with attached wires leading to an electrical timer that was 

plugged into an outlet a few feet away. Id. at 290-91. After 

determining that the fire had originated in the basement, the 

investigators did not obtain a criminal warrant, but instead 

proceeded to search the remainder of the house looking for 

clues that pointed to arson. Id. at 291.

The Court was confronted with deciding when, and under what circumstances, investigators needed to obtain a 

criminal warrant if they wanted to search for evidence of 

criminal activity. The Supreme Court’s task was made difficult by the fact that fire investigators are not on the scene to 

suppress the fire, but to determine how the fire was started, 

which in some cases means gather evidence that points to 

arson. The Court tried to address the matter of distinguishing between when fire investigators are on the scene to determine literally what spark caused the fire and where the 

fire first started, and whether criminal actions breathed life 

into a fire. In addressing the issue, the Court said, “[i]n many 

cases, there will be no bright line separating the firefighters’ 

investigation into the cause of a fire from a search for evidence of arson. The distinction will vary with the circumstances of the particular fire and generally will involve more 

than the lapse of time or the number of entries and reentries.” Id. at 298 n.9. Although the Court recognized the 

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ambiguity in determining the origin and cause of a fire, the 

Court made one thing clear: if the primary object of investigators is to determine the cause and origin of a recent fire, 

investigators simply need an administrative warrant to conduct a valid search. Id. at 294. But if investigators’ primary 

object for conducting a search is to gather evidence of criminal activity, then they need a criminal search warrant. Id. 

Using the principle as its guide, the Court affirmed the 

exclusion of the two fuel cans found in the basement, the 

crock pot, the timer, and the cord that were found after fire 

investigators determined where the fire started. Id. at 299.

Moreover, the Court found that once fire investigators had 

determined the cause of fire, the additional search of the upstairs portion of the home could only have been for the purpose of finding evidence of arson, and therefore excluded all 

evidence that was found after the investigators made their 

determination. Id. at 297, 299.

As we understand Clifford, it is clear that the term “origin 

and cause” excludes any search whose primary object is to 

find information of criminal activity. Id. at 294, 298. As part 

of this exclusion is any search conducted in an area that is 

known not to be the origin of the fire, unless the evidence 

seized in this area helps investigators determine how the fire 

started. As the Court made clear, in many situations the primary object of a search conducted after the origin of the fire 

is determined is to gather evidence of criminal activity. Id. at 

297. If no exception to the warrant requirement applies, the 

search must be conducted pursuant to a criminal warrant. Id. 

at 294. 

To be clear, “origin and cause” does not exclude evidence 

that points to criminality that is seized while investigators 

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are conducting valid searches to determine where the fire 

was started and what literally sparked the fire. We know this 

to be true because the Court said as much. Id. at 294 (stating 

that evidence of criminal activity discovered during the 

course of a valid administrative search directed at determining the cause of a fire may be seized under the “plain view” 

doctrine). Applying the plain view doctrine, the Court did 

not exclude the first fuel can investigators seized before they

determined where the fire started. Id. at 299. 

The analysis of Clifford helps us determine the parameters of the written consent Rahman gave to fire investigators

“to determine the origin and cause of the fire that occurred 

on 1/19/10.” Relying on Clifford, we find that based on the 

totality of the circumstances, an objective reasonable person 

would conclude that when investigators asked Rahman for 

consent to determine the origin and cause of the fire, they 

would understand the request to be for consent to determine 

where the fire occurred and what sparked the fire, not for a 

search whose primary object is to look for criminal activity. 

Although the government argues that a lay person could 

possibly think that the term “origin and cause” included arson, we do not think it wise to allow the government to benefit from a layperson’s misconception of a phrase with legal 

significance, especially when investigators can clear up any 

misconception by informing the consenter in writing that 

investigators are looking for evidence of criminal activity 

and that such evidence could be used against him. Allowing 

investigators to benefit from a layperson’s misconception 

would create perverse incentives for the government in 

drafting consent forms. Our conclusion fits within the 

broader meaning of the Fourth Amendment, which allows 

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people to be “secure in their persons, houses, papers, and 

effects,” and prevents that right from being undermined by

the public’s potential misconception of legal terms. Based on 

our interpretation of Clifford, we may now decide what, if 

any evidence, should have been suppressed.

Rahman argues that the alarm box that Hankins seized 

on January 20 should have been suppressed because it 

would have only yielded secondary evidence connected to 

arson. We do not agree. There is no indication in the record 

that Hankins sought the alarm box in order to determine 

whether criminal activity occurred. Based on the surveillance tape from Chubby’s Cheese Steaks, the investigators

suspected that the fire started at 3:31 a.m. and that the origin 

of the fire was in or above the Café. It appears as though 

Hankins wanted the alarm box because it might contain information that would tell investigators what time the fire 

started, which might help pin down the fire’s cause and 

origin. Rahman argues that Hankins ruled out the alarm box 

as the source of the fire because neither the alarm box, nor 

the area immediately surrounding it, was damaged by the

fire. While that is true, Hankins had not ruled out the basement as the origin of the fire until the 21st, the day after he 

seized the alarm box. Given the potential useful nature of the 

information obtained from the alarm box that would help 

firefighters determine the cause and origin of the fire, the 

fact that Hankins had not yet ruled the basement out as the 

origin of the fire, and that there is no indication that 

Hankins’s primary object for seizing the box was to obtain 

information related to criminal activity, we conclude that the 

alarm box was properly admitted. 

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The same cannot be said about most of the remaining evidence seized from the basement. According to Hankins’s

own testimony, he ruled out the basement as the origin of 

the fire on January 21. Following the logic of Clifford, the 

presumption is that once the basement was ruled out as the 

origin of the fire, the search that Hankins conducted in the 

basement after he reached his conclusion was done for the 

purpose of searching for criminal activity, even if the theory 

had not yet been confirmed. Clifford, 464 U.S. at 297 (stating 

that “[b]ecause the cause of the fire was [] known, the search 

of the upper portions of the [defendant’s] house ... could only have been a search to gather evidence of the crime of arson”). Therefore, unless it can be demonstrated that items 

seized after Hankins reached his conclusion regarding the 

basement were seized for the purpose of establishing how 

the fire started elsewhere in the building, any evidence collected from the basement after Hankins reached his conclusion about the origin of the fire, including the closed bank 

bags, receipts, and a tray from a cash register were illegally 

seized and should have been excluded. The surveillance 

DVR seized in the basement on January 21 is admissible because investigators indicated that they were searching for 

videos of the business to help determine how the fire started,

and the surveillance DVR could have helped investigators 

reach that goal. 

Moreover, any evidence collected from the basement on 

January 22, including the fire investigators’ observations regarding the absence of a computer and safe in the basement,

should be excluded. Rahman told investigators that a safe, 

laptop, bank bags and receipts were located in the basement 

office of the Café, but after conducting a search they found 

no traces of a laptop or safe. On direct examination, Hankins 

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testified that one of the reasons he looked for the presence of 

those items was to determine whether someone might have 

intentionally set the fire to cover up a burglary. Based on 

Hankins testimony, it is clear that the primary reason he 

searched the basement on January 22 was to find evidence of 

criminal activity.

However, observations made on January 22 about the 

basement door between the Café and the Grecian Delight are 

admissible. Hankins stated that the goal for breaking the 

lock on the door was to secure a surveillance video or system that the owner of the Cush Lounge indicated would be 

located in the basement of the Cush Lounge. According to 

Hankins, the reason why the investigators went through the 

basement of the Café to gain access to the Grecian Delight 

was because that was the only safe way to get the Cush 

Lounge’s surveillance video. Since the investigators had not 

yet determined the cause and origin of the fire, the surveillance video would have been helpful in assisting investigators in their search. Although Hankins also admitted that 

investigators were trying to determine whether someone 

had broken into the Café from the Grecian Delight to set the 

fire, it is clear from the record that the primary object for 

breaking down the door was not to collect criminal evidence. 

That was simply a by-product of knocking down the door to 

secure the Cush Lounge’s surveillance system, but rather to 

gain one more piece of information that could help infirm 

where and how the fire started. 

On January 23, investigators seized the door to Rahman’s 

office located in the basement as well as the back door of the 

Café. According to Hankins’s testimony, while he was collecting samples to send to the laboratory to determine if igCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
No. 13-1586 19

nitable liquid was present, he smelled gasoline. It was at this 

moment that he and other investigators leaned towards arson as the cause of the fire. Hankins testified that he collected these doors after they reached that conclusion. Based on 

the record, we conclude that both doors should be excluded 

because at the moment investigators seized the doors, they

were collecting evidence based on a theory that the fire in 

the Café was intentionally set. Moreover, observations made 

on the 26th about the basement door between the Café and 

the Grecian Delight should also be suppressed. As we previously stated, Hankins ruled out the basement on the 21st

and there is no evidence in the record that indicates that the 

door was taken for the purpose of discovering the origin and 

cause of the fire. Therefore, it must have been seized for the 

purpose of determining whether arson occurred. 

3. Davis Good-Faith Exception Does Not Apply

The government argues that investigators did not exceed

the scope of Rahman’s authority, but that if they did, the Davis good faith exception applies to all searches of the basement. Specifically, the government argues that Hankins reasonably relied in good faith upon Rahman’s broadly written 

consent and subsequent failure to object to the investigators’ 

search and that under the Katz test, Rahman failed to 

demonstrate that he had a subjective expectation of privacy 

in his restaurant. Under Davis v. United States, “searches 

conducted in objectively reasonable reliance on binding appellate precedent are not subject to the exclusionary rule.” 

131 S. Ct. 2419, 2423–24 (2011).

We reject this conclusion because at the time of the 

search, binding precedent with regard to searches was Katz’s

reasonable expectation of privacy test, but also the commonCase: 13-1586 Document: 40 Filed: 11/09/2015 Pages: 29
20 No. 13-1586

law trespass theory. The Court in Jones stated that even 

though for most of our country’s history “the Fourth 

Amendment was understood to embody a particular concern for government trespass upon the areas (‘persons, 

houses, papers, and effects’) it enumerates,” the Court made 

clear that “Katz did not repudiate that understanding.” 132 

S. Ct. at 950. In articulating this principle, the Court reiterated a sentiment articulated by Justice Brennan, in United 

States v. Knotts, when he stated that neither Katz, nor its 

progeny, eroded the common-law trespass theory. 460 U.S. 

276, 286 (1983) (Brennan, J., concurring in judgment); see also 

Jones, 132 S. Ct. at 955 (stating that the Katz test augmented, 

but did not displace or diminish, the common-law trespass 

test that preceded it) (Sotomayor, J., concurring). Therefore, 

at the time of the search, there were two branches of Fourth 

Amendment jurisprudence that bound the government’s actions: the reasonable expectations theory first articulated in 

Katz and the older, historical common-law trespass theory 

based on the text of the Fourth Amendment. See Wilson v. 

Health & Hosp. Corp. of Marion Cnty., 620 F.2d 1201, 1213 (7th 

Cir. 1980) (stating that Katz was not intended to render considerations of common law property rights irrelevant, but 

rather it expanded the Fourth Amendment to privacy and 

legitimate expectations of privacy). As the common-law 

trespass theory has always bound government actions, the 

government cannot rely on the Davis good faith exception. 

Therefore, the evidence that we have previously deemed excluded is not saved by Davis since binding appellate precedent at the time of the search would have prohibited the fire 

investigators’ search. 

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No. 13-1586 21

B. Judgment of Acquittal

Rahman also appeals the denial of the motion he made 

for a judgment of acquittal pursuant to Federal Rule of 

Criminal Procedure 29. To convict Rahman of making a false 

statement in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001, the government 

needed to show that Rahman knowingly and willfully made 

a materially false statement in connection with a matter 

within the jurisdiction of a federal agency. See United States 

v. Lupton, 620 F.3d 790, 805 (7th Cir. 2010). We review the 

denial of Rahman’s motion for judgment of acquittal de novo. United States v. Warren, 593 F.3d 540, 546 (7th Cir. 2010). 

In doing so, we ask whether “there was sufficient evidence, 

when viewed in the light most favorable to the government, 

to allow a rational trier of fact to find all of the essential elements of an offense beyond a reasonable doubt.” United 

States v. Westerfield, 714 F.3d 480, 484 (7th Cir. 2013) (quotation omitted).

Although Rahman argues to the contrary, a jury could 

find that that his statement to Wisconsin Deputy Fire Marshal Martinez was made in connection with a matter within 

the jurisdiction of a federal agency. The Supreme Court has 

instructed that “jurisdiction” in the 18 U.S.C. § 1001 context 

should not be “given a narrow or technical meaning.” Bryson 

v. United States, 396 U.S. 64, 70-71 (1969). Rather, here “[t]he 

term ‘jurisdiction’ merely incorporates Congress’ intent that 

the statute apply whenever false statements would result in 

the perversion of the authorized functions of a federal department or agency.” United States v. Stanford, 589 F.2d 285, 

297 (7th Cir. 1978). “A department or agency has jurisdiction 

... when it has the power to exercise authority in a particular 

situation.” United States v. Rodgers, 466 U.S. 475, 479 (1984).

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22 No. 13-1586

“Jurisdiction” for § 1001 purposes is not dependent upon 

whether the agency has in fact exercised that authority. United States v. Brack, 747 F.2d 1142, 1151 (7th Cir. 1984).

There is no question that Hankins was a member of the 

ATF and that the ATF is a federal agency. Rahman argues 

that there was no jurisdiction for § 1001 purposes because 

when he made the statement at issue to Martinez a few 

hours after the fire, the ATF was not in charge of the investigation as it was a multi-jurisdictional effort. Rahman contends that Hankins’s presence at the scene at the time Rahman made his statement to a local official was not enough to 

provide federal jurisdiction. We disagree. Here, while many 

agencies were involved, ATF was one of those agencies, and 

it had the power to exercise authority because the agency 

has a federal responsibility to investigate fires that affect interstate commerce, and the building that burned down 

housed businesses engaged in interstate commerce. See 18 

U.S.C. §§ 844(h)(1) & (i). Hankins and the other investigators 

shared information and discussed theories regarding the fire 

during the course of the investigation. In particular, Agent 

Martinez shared the information that Rahman provided in 

the interview with ATF investigator Hankins, and Hankins 

used that information in his investigation of the scene. See

Brack, 747 at 1151 (7th Cir. 1984) (finding jurisdiction and 

stating that the “false statement need not be submitted directly to the federal agency: it suffices to show that the deception of a private company affected a federal agency because of that agency’s responsibility to ensure that its funds 

are properly spent”). We are satisfied that there was sufficient evidence for the jury to find that Rahman made a 

statement in connection with a matter within the jurisdiction 

of a federal agency for purposes of 18 U.S.C. § 1001. 

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No. 13-1586 23

Whether the government proved that Rahman made a 

false statement is a more difficult question. At trial, Martinez 

testified that during his interview with Rahman, he asked 

Rahman where he kept his business records. Recounting 

Rahman’s reply, Martinez testified: “And he told me that all 

his business records were kept in his basement in his office. 

And he also has—his computer, like a laptop that he keeps 

down there, and he keeps a lot of business records on that 

laptop.” The prosecutor next asked, “And he said that the 

computer would be in the restaurant?” Martinez responded, 

“Yeah, he believes it was in the restaurant, but he wasn’t 

sure if it was in the basement or up by the cashier. Or the 

cash counter in the front.” The prosecutor asked Martinez to 

confirm that, according to Rahman, the laptop was in one of 

those two places, and Martinez agreed. When asked whether 

Rahman described the area in the basement where the laptop would have been if he had left it in the basement, Martinez said it “would have been in his office by–on his desk.”

The false statement that Rahman was charged with making was, according to the jury instructions, “that his computer, which he claimed contained the business records of the 

Black and White Café, was inside the Café at the time of the 

fire.” The government maintains the statement was false because investigators found a red Gateway laptop in Rahman’s 

home that did not contain business records. Rahman, however, maintains that the government failed to prove he made 

a false statement. For him, the fact that the red laptop did 

not contain business records supports his position that he 

was not referring to that laptop when he volunteered to 

Martinez that one location of his business records was on a 

computer.

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24 No. 13-1586

As Rahman emphasizes, Martinez’s question to Rahman 

was directed at business records, not to the presence of a laptop. When Rahman volunteered the information that he also 

kept business records on a laptop, Martinez did not ask him 

any questions about the laptop to which Rahman was referring. Rahman was not asked about the laptop’s brand, or its 

color, or anything at all about what it looked like. Martinez 

did not even ask Rahman how many laptops or computers 

he had. Investigators who later questioned Rahman after the 

search of the basement did not ask any clarifying questions

regarding the laptop either.

The government’s position at trial was that Rahman was 

referring to the red Gateway laptop when he spoke with 

Martinez. While the government stresses that a forensic 

analysis showed there were no business records on the red 

Gateway laptop, the allegedly false statement that Rahman 

was convicted of making does not reference this particular 

computer. The allegedly false statement at issue instead only 

refers to his “computer,” with no other description. And 

Rahman volunteered to Martinez that he kept records on “a 

laptop” but never said it was on a red laptop or on a Gateway one. Rahman therefore maintains that the government 

did not establish beyond a reasonable doubt that the statement at issue could not be true, i.e., that Rahman did not 

have a second computer. He argues that the government did 

not establish that another computer, the one with the business records, was not in the Café at the time of the fire.

The government cites our statement, true as a general 

matter, that the law does not require the government to disprove every conceivable hypothesis of innocence in order to 

sustain a conviction. United States v. Humphrey, 468 F.3d 

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No. 13-1586 25

1051, 1054 (7th Cir. 2006). But the nature of the charge here 

matters. “When reviewing sufficiency of the evidence 

through the lens of a perjury conviction,” a charge with similarities to the false statement charge here, a literally true answer does not sustain a conviction. United States v. Gorman, 

613 F.3d 711, 716 (7th Cir. 2010) (citing Bronston v. United 

States, 409 U.S. 352, 356-58) (1973)). That is true even if a defendant gives a misleading or nonresponsive answer. 

Bronston, 409 U.S. at 361-62. Illustrating this principle, the 

Supreme Court reversed the defendant’s perjury conviction 

in Bronston where the statement was both misleading and 

nonresponsive, but not literally untrue. Id. 

Although the perjury conviction at issue in Bronston was 

founded on witness testimony in responding to attorney 

questioning at a court hearing, the Supreme Court’s reasoning behind its decision to reverse the conviction there is instructive here as well. The Court said it “perceive[d] no reason why Congress would intend the drastic sanction of a 

perjury prosecution to cure a testimonial mishap that could 

readily have been reached with a single additional question 

by counsel alert—as every examiner ought to be—to the incongruity of petitioner’s unresponsive answer.” Id. at 358. 

And so, the Supreme Court said, “[t]he burden is on the 

questioner to pin the witness down to the specific object of 

the questioner’s inquiry.” Id. at 360; see also, e.g., United States 

v. Parker, 364 F.3d 934, 945 (8th Cir. 2004) (ruling that the 

government bears the burden of negating literally truthful 

interpretations of statements when the statements are ambiguous and are subject to reasonable interpretations).

Here too, the identity of the laptop to which Rahman was 

referring could have been cleared up by a single additional

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26 No. 13-1586

question or two by Martinez, or by the other investigators 

who spoke with Rahman later. A criminal conviction is a 

drastic sanction when no questioner pinned Rahman down 

to which laptop he was referring. It was not at all unlikely 

that Rahman would have more than one computer between 

work and home, yet the government pinned its case on the 

laptop in Rahman’s statement being the red Gateway.

In fact, that Rahman had more than one computer is just 

what the jury heard. The jury heard about not just one, but 

two laptops that Rahman had, and it also heard he used both 

at the Café. And it was from one of the government’s own 

witnesses that the jury heard about the second computer. 

Rahman’s ex-girlfriend, testifying for the government, stated

that she remembered a slow, gray, old, clunky laptop that 

Rahman kept downstairs at the Café. Downstairs was the 

location of Rahman’s office. Keeping the records on a laptop 

downstairs would be consistent with Rahman’s statement to 

Martinez that he kept business records downstairs, where 

his office was. In contrast to the gray laptop, the jury heard 

that the red laptop was also used by many other people, including by customers, for reasons including to surf the internet and to check social media sites, and that it was also 

used upstairs. Rahman points out that one might wonder 

whether a business owner would keep business records on a 

computer used by many others including customers. 

The government argues that “while it is unfortunate that 

investigators never asked Rahman to describe his laptop, the 

evidence at trial resolved any ambiguity as to which laptop 

he was referring.” But the failure was more than “unfortunate.” And the evidence at trial did not resolve the ambiguous statement. Rahman may not have been referring to the 

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No. 13-1586 27

red laptop when he spoke with Martinez. There was no evidence that another laptop, such as the gray laptop, did not 

contain business records. So neither the fact that the red 

Gateway computer was found at Rahman’s home nor that it 

did not contain business records is sufficient to find Rahman 

guilty of making the charged false statement.

That said, even if there was a second laptop with business records, Rahman could still be guilty of making a false 

statement if the government proved beyond a reasonable 

doubt that no other computer was found in the fire. Ordinarily a reviewing court must consider all of the evidence admitted by the trial court when considering a sufficiency of 

the evidence challenge, regardless of whether that evidence 

was admitted erroneously. Lockhart v. Nelson, 488 U.S. 33, 39 

(1988); see also McDaniel v. Brown, 558 U.S. 120, 131 (2010); 

United States v. Fenzl, 670 F.3d 778, 783 (7th Cir. 2012) (citing

United States v. Tranowski, 702 F.2d 668 (7th Cir. 1983)). Here, 

evidence admitted at trial and heard by the jury included 

that the search of the basement turned up no evidence of a 

laptop. But we have ruled that the government may not introduce the basement search evidence, a factor that will undoubtedly be dispositive, or at the least weigh very heavily, 

when the government decides on remand whether to dismiss the false statement charge. 

C. Remaining Issues

Rahman raises a sentencing issue that we address for 

completeness in the event there is a retrial. Rahman contends 

that the sentencing judge relied on factually inaccurate information which influenced the judge’s choice of sentence. 

“When errors of this nature are alleged to have affected the 

defendant’s sentence, we review the lower court record to 

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28 No. 13-1586

determine whether the district court actually relied on the 

inaccurate information in sentencing the defendant.” United 

States v. Salinas, 365 F.3d 582, 586 (7th Cir. 2004). We review 

the district court’s application of the Sentencing Guidelines 

de novo and its findings of fact for clear error. United States v. 

Bennett, 708 F.3d 879, 888 (7th Cir. 2013).

After reviewing the record, it is clear the sentencing 

judgment made a factual error. At sentencing, the judge noted that when firefighters arrived, the back door was unlocked. The judge stated that the only way it could have 

been unlocked was with a key, and since only Rahman had a 

key, that meant only Rahman, or someone at his direction,

set the fire. The judge further explained that since Andres 

Karabelas, the owner of the Grecian Delight, did not have a 

key, he could not have set the fire. That reasoning was clearly wrong, however, as Karabelas did not need a key to open 

the door from his side of the door. The government also 

agrees that the district court was mistaken about how the 

lock operated. While the judge pointed to other reasons why 

it found Rahman responsible for arson, the judge’s finding 

that Karabelas did not have a key to the basement door that 

separated the Café from the Grecian Delight seemed to be an 

important reason why the judge found Karabelas could not 

have been responsible for the fire. Rahman argues that because of this error, he is entitled to re-sentencing. We agree

with Rahman on this point, but because we remand for further proceedings, the judge will only need to consider it if 

the government elects to retry Rahman and he is again convicted. 

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No. 13-1586 29

III. CONCLUSION

We REVERSE the district court’s denial of the motion to 

suppress and REMAND for further proceedings consistent 

with this opinion. 

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