Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-94-02260/USCOURTS-ca10-94-02260-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Geneva Gallegos
Appellee
Levone Ray Maden
Appellee
United States of America
Appellant
John Paul Wilbon
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

. FILED 

United States Court or App~~ 

Tenth Circuit 

SEP 071995 

JPATRICK FISHER 

Cler!( 

vs. No. 94-2260 

LEVONE RAY MADEN; JOHN PAUL 

WILBON; GENEVA GALLEGOS, also 

known as Leann Rael, 

Defendants-Appellees. 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW MEXICO 

(D.C. No. CR 94-211 MV) 

Richard A. Friedman, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, 

D.C., (John J. Kelly, United States Attorney, Tara C. Neda, 

Assistant United States Attorney, Albuquerque, New Mexico, with 

him on the brief), for Plaintiff-Appellant. 

Albert B. Lassen of Lassen & Jaffe, Albuquerque, New Mexico, filed 

a brief for Defendant-Appellee Levone Ray Maden. 

Teresa E. Storch, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Albuquerque, 

New Mexico for Defendant-Appellee Paul Wilbon. 

Adam G. Kurtz, Albuquerque, New Mexico, for Defendant-Appellee 

Geneva Gallegos. 

Before TACHA, SETH, and BALDOCK, Circuit Judges. 

BALDOCK, Circuit Judge. 

The government appeals the district court's suppression of 

evidence seized when Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI") 

agents entered the apartment of Defendants Levone Maden and Geneva 

Appellate Case: 94-2260 Document: 01019276716 Date Filed: 09/07/1995 Page: 1 
Gallegos to execute an arrest warrant for Defendant Maden. The 

district court granted Defendants' motion to suppress on the 

grounds that the government had failed to demonstrate exigent 

circumstances to justify the FBI agents' decision not to comply 

with the knock and announce requirement of 18 U.S.C. § 3109 when 

they entered Defendants' apartment using a passkey. We exercise 

jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and determining in our 

review that exigent circumstances exist in the particular facts of 

this case, reverse. 

On March 28, 1994, FBI Special Agent Gregory M. Kuntz 

received a telephone call in his Albuquerque, New Mexico office 

from an anonymous informant calling from Texas. The informant 

told Agent Kuntz that "Rolex" Maden, a drug dealer wanted in 

Texas, had a quantity of cocaine at his apartment on Academy 

Boulevard in Albuquerque. The informant gave Agent Kuntz "Rolex" 

Maden's apartment number and telephone number. 

Agent Kuntz checked the name "Rolex" Maden and determined 

that it was an alias of Defendant Levone Maden. Further, Agent 

Kuntz learned that Defendant Maden, a convicted felon with an 

extensive criminal history, was subject to an outstanding arrest 

warrant in Texas. Agent Kuntz contacted FBI Special Agent 

Macaluso of the FBI Fugitive Task Force. Agent Macaluso informed 

Agent Kuntz that he was familiar with Defendant Maden and knew 

that a weapon had been taken from Defendant Maden's residence by 

an Albuquerque Police Officer in August 1993, but that he was not 

arrested at that time. Agent Macaluso also told Agent Kuntz that 

Texas authorities were unwilling to extradite Defendant Maden. 

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Agent Kuntz called Texas authorities to determine whether 

they would extradite Defendant Maden if the FBI Fugitive Task 

Force arrested him on the Texas warrant. While awaiting response 

from Texas, Agent Kuntz obtained a rap sheet on Defendant Maden 

from the Albuquerque Police Department, and determined the address 

of Defendant Maden's apartment using the telephone number supplied 

by the anonymous informant. 

At approximately 4:30 p.m. that afternoon, Agent Kuntz, Agent 

Macaluso, another FBI agent, and Detective Rock Hart of the 

Albuquerque Police Department met at Defendant Maden's apartment 

complex. The FBI agents confirmed that the apartment number the 

anonymous informant gave Agent Kuntz was leased to a "Joe Maden" 

and obtained a passkey from the apartment manager. 

Shortly after the FBI agents arrived at the apartment 

complex, two cars drove into the parking lot. Detective Hart 

identified one driver as Defendant Maden. He believed the other 

driver was Brian Berry, a wanted fugitive. Detective Hart was 

concerned that Defendant Maden recognized him as he drove by. 

Defendant Maden and the man suspected to be Brian Berry entered 

Maden's apartment. 

At that time, the FBI agents received radio notice that the 

Texas Authorities had sent a teletype to the FBI offices seeking 

Defendant Maden's arrest and extradition. The FBI agents began 

surveillance of Defendant Maden's apartment and the cars driven by 

Maden and the man identified as Brian Berry. Four more FBI agents 

arrived, two who were part of the FBI Fugitive Task Force, and two 

who were members of a SWAT team trained to work in dangerous 

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situations. Finally, Detective Brian Sallee of the Albuquerque 

Police Department arrived and with Detective Hart, briefed the FBI 

agents at the scene on their prior experience with Defendant 

Maden. 

Detective Sallee informed the FBI agents that he had numerous 

contacts with Defendant Maden and had information that he had run 

a crack cocaine distribution operation known as the "Rolex" 

organization out of rooms he rented at a city motel. Detective 

Sallee also told the agents that he believed, based on an 

informant's report, that Defendant Maden had put a murder contract 

out on him two months earlier. Detective Sallee informed the 

agents that Defendant Maden's reported murder contract caused the 

Albuquerque Police Department to provide police protection to his 

family. Detective Hart informed the agents that he had seized a 

loaded semi-automatic hand gun from a motel room in which 

Defendant Maden was residing in March 1993. Detective Hart said 

that Defendant Maden acknowledged that the gun was his, but 

Detective Hart did not arrest him for a felon in possession of a 

firearm offense because he believed Defendant Maden might be of 

use as an informant. 

By 5:30p.m., the surveillance had revealed that a woman was 

in the apartment, in addition to Defendant Maden and the man 

believed to be Brian Berry. Based on the facts known to them, 

including the information relayed by Detectives Sallee and Hart of 

the Albuquerque Police Department, the FBI Fugitive Task Force 

members decided to make a no-knock, passkey entry into the 

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apartment to arrest Defendant Maden in order to minimize the 

danger to the agents. 

Using a cellular phone, one of the FBI agents telephoned 

Defendant Maden's apartment to divert one of the occupants. 

Simultaneously, Agent Macaluso used the passkey to open the 

apartment door, and the agents, wearing insignia identifying 

themselves as law enforcement personnel, entered the apartment, 

shouting, "police, police, hands on top of your head." When the 

FBI agents entered, Defendant Maden and Defendant Paul Wilbon 

(mistakenly identified as Brian Berry) were sitting in the living 

room and Defendant Gallegos was in the bedroom. The agents saw a 

large amount of crack cocaine in two plastic bags on top of a 

hutch in the dining room in plain view. The agents arrested 

Defendants, secured the apartment, and obtained a search warrant. 

The resulting search of the apartment revealed additional cocaine 

and a gun. 

The government indicted Defendants for possession with intent 

to distribute more than fifty grams of crack cocaine, 21 U.S.C. 

§ 841(a). Defendants filed separate motions to suppress, 

contending, inter alia, that the agents' passkey entry of 

Defendants Maden's and Gallegos' apartment violated the knock and 

announce requirement of 18 u.s.c. § 3109. As a result of the 

violation, Defendants argued that all evidence, including the 

crack cocaine found in plain view in the apartment, must be 

suppressed under the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine. 

The district court granted Defendants' motions to suppress. 

The court determined that in order to enter Defendants' apartment 

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without first knocking and announcing their authority as required 

by 18 U.S.C. § 3109, the agents had "to demonstrate with concrete, 

palpable facts that the defendant presents a danger to law 

enforcement officers in the context of resisting arrest with 

violence."1 Applying that standard, the district court concluded 

that the agents "did not subjectively believe that Levene Maden 

presented a danger to them in the context of resisting arrest with 

violence." Further, the district court found that the agents' 

belief that arresting Defendant Maden was potentially dangerous 

was not objectively reasonable because "prior encounters between 

Maden and law enforcement officers demonstrated that Maden did not 

have a propensity to use violence against law enforcement officers 

[and] Maden's complete lack of criminal history involving 

violent offenses." Thus, the district court found that the 

government had failed to support its decision to enter the 

apartment in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 3109 with either a 

subjective belief or an objectively reasonable belief that 

Defendant Maden had a propensity to use violence based on 

concrete, palpable facts. Consequently, the district court 

granted Defendants' motions to suppress the evidence found in the 

apartment. This appeal followed. 

On appeal, the government contends the district court erred 

in granting Defendants' motion to suppress. Specifically, the 

1 The district court also held that Defendant Wilbon had 

standing to contest the agents' no-knock entry because he was a 

frequent overnight guest in the home of Defendants Maden and 

Gallegos, and therefore had a subjective expectation of privacy in 

their apartment that society would recognize as objectively 

reasonable. We do not consider the district court's standing 

determination, however, because the government does not appeal it. 

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government argues that the district court applied the wrong legal 

standard to determine whether the agents' decision to dispense 

with the knock and announce requirement of 18 U.S.C. § 3109 was 

justified. Applying the correct standard, the government asserts 

there were exigent circumstances sufficient to excuse the agents' 

noncompliance with § 3109 because the agents had an objectively 

reasonable belief that there was an emergency situation based upon 

the particular facts of the case. We address the government's 

arguments in turn. 

The government first contends that the district court erred 

in granting Defendants' motion to suppress because it applied the 

wrong legal standard when it determined that the government had 

failed to justify the FBI agents' decision to effect a no-knock 

passkey entry of the apartment. In its conclusions of law, the 

district court ruled that "[t]o invoke the 'physical peril to 

officer' exception [to § 3109] , the government must demonstrate 

with concrete, palpable facts that the defendant presents a danger 

to law enforcement officers in the context of resisting arrest 

with violence." D. Ct. Order at 12. The government contends that 

the district court's "resisting arrest with violence" standard is 

not supported by our precedent, and required too high a level of 

certainty that Defendant Maden would violently resist the agents' 

entry into the apartment to excuse the agents' noncompliance with 

§ 3109. 

On appeal from a motion to suppress, we accept the district 

court's factual findings unless clearly erroneous, review 

questions of law de novo, and view the evidence in the light most 

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favorable to the prevailing party. United States v. Williamson, 1 

F.3d 1134, 1135 (lOth Cir. 1993). The question whether exigent 

circumstances exist to excuse compliance with 18 U.S.C. § 3109 

presents a mixed question of fact and law which we review de novo. 

United States v. Stewart, 867 F.2d 581, 584 (lOth Cir. 1989). 

The statutory standard which governs the agents' conduct in 

the instant case is contained in 18 U.S.C. § 3109, which codifies 

the knock and announce procedure. Section 3109 provides: 

The officer may break open any outer or inner door 

or window or a house, or any part of a house, or 

anything therein, to execute a search warrant, if, after 

notice of his authority and purpose, he is refused 

admittance or when necessary to liberate himself or a 

person aiding him in the execution of the warrant. 

18 u.s.c. § 3109. "The statute requires law enforcement officials 

to announce their authority and purpose, and to be denied 

admittance, before they break down the door of a house." United 

States v. Remigio, 767 F.2d 730, 732 (lOth Cir.), cert. denied, 

474 U.S. 1009 (1985); see also Wilson v. Arkansas, 115 S. Ct. 

1914, 1916-18 (1995) (tracing historical pedigree of common law 

knock and announce principle); Miller v. United States, 357 U.S. 

301, 306 (1958); United States v. Knapp, 1 F.3d 1026, 1030 (lOth 

Cir. 1993). Section 3109 applies when officials attempt to enter 

a house to execute an arrest warrant, Miller, 357 U.S. at 309, and 

"to entries effected by use of a passkey." Sabbath v. United 

States, 391 U.S. 585, 590 (1968). 

"Compliance with § 3109 may be excused only when exigent 

circumstances exist." Knapp, 1 F.3d at 1030. "The term 'exigent 

circumstances,' in conjunction with the entry of a residence 

during the execution of a search warrant, refers to those 

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situations where 'the officers believe there is an emergency 

situation and ... their belief is objectively reasonable.'" 

Stewart, 867 F.2d at 584 (quoting United States v. Spinelli, 848 

F.2d 26, 29 (2d Cir. 1988)). "The reasonableness of the officer's 

conduct hinges on the facts within their knowledge indicating 

exigency." Id. The government, however, bears the burden of 

establishing that exigent circumstances excused its noncompliance 

with § 3109. See United States v. Parra, 2 F.3d 1058, 1064 (lOth 

Cir.), cert. denied, 114 S. Ct. 639 (1993). 

In the instant case, the district court did not require the 

government to demonstrate exigent circumstances to determine 

whether to excuse the agents' decision to dispense with the knock 

and announce requirement of § 3109. Rather, the district court 

required the government to "demonstrate with concrete, palpable 

facts that the defendant presents a danger to law enforcement 

officers in the context of resisting arrest with violence." D. 

Ct. Order at 12. However, the district court's "resisting arrest 

with violence" standard is not the law in our circuit. Rather, 

our precedent establishes that "(c]ompliance with§ 3109 may be 

excused only when exigent circumstances exist." Knapp, 1 F.3d at 

1030. Under this standard, the district court must determine not 

whether a particular defendant presents a danger in the context of 

"resisting arrest with violence," but whether the law enforcement 

officers in question held an objectively reasonable belief that an 

emergency situation existed to excuse compliance with § 3109. 

~, Stewart, 867 F.2d at 584; United States v. Dahlman, 13 F.3d 

1391, 1398 (lOth Cir. 1993), cert. denied, 114 S. Ct. 1575 (1994). 

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Because the district court applied its "resisting arrest with 

violence" standard rather than the exigent circumstances test, we 

hold the district court applied the wrong legal test to determine 

whether the factual circumstances justified the agents' no-knock 

passkey entry of Defendant Maden's apartment.2 

Next, the government contends that under the exigent 

circumstances standard the district court erred because the agents 

held an objectively reasonable belief there was an emergency 

situation excusing compliance with § 3109. We agree. 

The FBI agents decided to dispense with the knock and 

announce requirement of § 3109 and make a no-knock passkey entry 

of the apartment to arrest Defendant Maden because they believed 

there were exigent circumstances based on particular facts within 

their knowledge. The FBI agents knew that Defendant Maden, a 

wanted fugitive, was in the apartment with a man the FBI agents 

believed to be Brian Berry, another wanted fugitive. Detective 

Hart of the Albuquerque Police Department informed the FBI agents 

that he had removed a loaded semi-automatic handgun from Defendant 

Maden's motel room residence eight months earlier. Detective 

Sallee informed the FBI agents that Defendant Maden had placed a 

2 The district court cited our opinion in Stewart as authority 

for its conclusion of law that to justify noncompliance with 

§ 3109, the government must "demonstrate with concrete palpable 

facts that the defendant presents a danger to law enforcement 

officers in the context of resisting arrest with violence." We do 

not read Stewart to require such a specific showing of exigency to 

support a no-knock entry to execute a search or arrest warrant. 

Instead, Stewart instructs that a court reviewing a police 

decision to dispense with the knock and announce requirement of 18 

U.S.C. § 3109 must determine whether based on the "particular 

facts" within their knowledge, the officers had an objectively 

reasonable belief that there was an emergency situation. Stewart, 

867 F.2d at 584. 

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murder contract out on him, a threat that the Albuquerque Police 

Department viewed with sufficient seriousness to provide police 

protection to Detective Sallee's family. Finally, the FBI agents 

had information that Defendant Maden, a known drug offender, had a 

quantity of cocaine in the apartment. Based on the sum of the 

particular facts surrounding the execution of the arrest warrant, 

we conclude that the FBI agents' belief that there was an 

emergency situation was objectively reasonable. 

v. Kennedy, 32 F.3d 876, 882-83 (4th Cir. 1994) 

See United States 

(exigent 

circumstances excused DEA agents' decision to dispense with § 3109 

requirements where agents knew that defendants had criminal drug 

records and were suspected of selling drugs, defendant had 

threatened to "kill[] a cop," and agents knew that drug dealers 

commonly carried guns), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 939 (1995); 

Dahlman, 13 F.3d at 1398 (police had objectively reasonable belief 

that no-knock entry was justified where police heard from 

informant that defendant wanted a shoot out with police, defendant 

had reached for weapon in past while being arrested, and defendant 

was alerted to officers' approach to execute search warrant by 

barking watch dog); Spinelli, 848 F.2d at 29-30 (police had 

objectively reasonable belief that no-knock entry was justified 

where police knew defendant had violent reputation, was subject to 

warrant for parole violation, and was believed to be involved in 

manufacturing volatile and explosive methamphetamine); United 

States v. Ramirez, 770 F.2d 1458, 1461 (9th Cir. 1985) (police had 

objectively reasonable belief that no-knock entry was justified 

where police knew from teletype that suspects in a kidnapping and 

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f 

murder investigation were to be considered armed and dangerous) . 

In applying the correct legal test, we find that the FBI agents in 

the instant case had an objectively reasonable belief that there 

was an emergency situation. See Stewart, 867 F.2d at 584. 

Consequently, we hold that the government established exigent 

circumstances sufficient to justify the agents' decision to 

dispense with the knock and announce requirement of 18 U.S.C. 

§ 3109 and make a no-knock passkey entry of the apartment. We 

therefore REVERSE the district court's order granting Defendants' 

motions to suppress and REMAND for further proceedings consistent 

herewith.3 

3 Defendant Wilbon filed a Motion to Strike Appendix c of the 

Government's Brief-In-Chief. Appendix C of the government's brief 

contains a copy of the search warrant and search warrant 

application that supported the search of Defendant Maden's 

apartment subsequent to his arrest. In reply, the government 

filed a Motion of the United States to Supplement Record on Appeal 

with Search Warrant and Accompanying Affidavit and Return. 

Because the government failed to offer either the search warrant 

or the search warrant application into evidence before the 

district court, we GRANT Defendant Wilbon's motion to strike 

Appendix C of the government's brief-in-chief, and DENY the 

government's motion to supplement the record on appeal. 

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