Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-3_16-cr-00251/USCOURTS-cand-3_16-cr-00251-6/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Lamar Johnson
Defendant
USA
Plaintiff

Document Text:

United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff,

 v.

LAMAR JOHNSON,

Defendant. /

No. CR 16-0251 WHA

ORDER DENYING MOTION

TO SUPPRESS FRUITS OF

WARRANT SEARCH

INTRODUCTION

In this criminal action, defendant is charged with various drug offenses. Defendant

moves to suppress the fruits of a warrant search. For the reasons stated below, the motion as to

the warrant search is DENIED.

STATEMENT

On March 16, a judge in San Mateo Superior Court issued a warrant to search defendant

Lamar Johnson, a vehicle allegedly belonging to Johnson, and a residence in East Palo Alto also

allegedly belonging to Johnson. The affidavit offered in support of the warrant alleged that

within thirty days prior to seeking the warrant, two police officers met with a confidential

informant, who stated that he could purchase cocaine base from a black man named “Lamar”

who sold the drugs from his vehicle. The confidential informant provided a phone number for

“Lamar,” but the officers’ records check named no registrant for that phone (Amram Decl., Exh.

B at *23).

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United States District Court

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The affidavit detailed two controlled purchases of cocaine base executed by the

confidential informant under the supervision of the Menlo Park Police Department. The

confidential informant placed calls to the cell phone number provided, and met the person who

answered at a predetermined location. The officers observed the confidential informant and a

second person arrive at the location, engage in casual conversation while the second person sat

in his van, and exchange items through the window. The confidential informant identified the

second person as “Lamar” and provided officers with cocaine base he purchased from “Lamar”

(id. at *24–25)

Detective Christopher Sample, the affiant, weighed the cocaine base and found it to be a

usable amount based on his training and experience, and performed a presumptive test to

confirm it was cocaine. Detective Sample and another officer surveilled the van used during the

first controlled purchase. When the driver stopped to converse with a pedestrian, impeding the

flow of traffic, the officers pulled him over, and requested his drivers license. The second

officer identified the driver as “Lamar” from the controlled buy. His drivers license identified

him as Lamar Megale Johnson (id. at *26–27)

A records check revealed that the traffic stop had occurred in front of Johnson’s own

home, which Johnson confirmed. The officers issued a warning and drove away, though

Detective Sample observed Johnson enter the home (id. at *27).

Ten days later, Detective Sample and two others oversaw a second controlled buy,

which proceeded in the same manner as the first, again exchanging cash for a usable quantity of

cocaine. The officers observed Johnson drive to the same address at which the traffic stop

occurred, where he walked in the front door and parked his van in the driveway (id. at *29).

The affidavit noted that the confidential informant was a paid informant, that he had

never given Detective Sample false information, that he correctly described the type of drug

involved, the location of the transaction, and the individuals involved, and that the money

involved corresponded with the quantity bought (id. at *30). (The affidavit never mentioned the

quantity, and expressly requested to keep that figure confidential to avoid disclosing the identity

of the confidential informant.)

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Detective Sample also averred that his training and experience informed him that sellers

of cocaine base often purchased it in bulk quantity and divided up, often in their own homes,

and that they kept other contraband on their person or in their homes. Based on that affidavit,

the judge in San Mateo Superior Court granted a search warrant authorizing a search of Lamar

Johnson, the van he used, and the residence he entered (id. at *31, *34).

The search, executed on March 21, 2016, recovered, a firearm, ammunition, scales,

plastic bags, pills in bottles, and cocaine base (id., Exh. D). Johnson now moves to suppress the

fruits of that search. In the same motion, Johnson also moved to suppress the fruits of an

earlier warrantless search. All agree that the two searches are unrelated and that the facts

concerning the warrant search are not in dispute. A separate order will address the warrantless

search. This order follows full briefing and oral argument.

ANALYSIS

Johnson moves to suppress the evidence obtained during warrant search of his home on

three bases. First, he argues that the affidavit did not support the inference that Johnson kept

cocain base or other contraband in his home, second, that the affidavit lacked sufficient facts

about the confidential informant’s credibility, and third, that the affidavit omitted information

about the quantity purchased during the controlled buys. Johnson’s arguments go solely to the

adequacy of the affidavit offered to obtain the warrant. He does not make a Franks challenge. 

This order rejects each argument.

When deciding whether to issue a search warrant, “[t]he task of the issuing magistrate is

simply to make a practical, common-sense decision whether, given all the circumstances set

forth in the affidavit before him, including the ‘veracity’ and ‘basis of knowledge’ of persons

supplying hearsay information, there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime

will be found in a particular place.” Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 238 (1983). The duty of

the reviewing court is “simply to ensure that the magistrate had a ‘substantial basis for . . .

conclud[ing]’ that probable cause existed.” Id. 238–39 (quoting Jones v. United States, 362

U.S. 257, 271 (1960).

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United States District Court

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The issuing judge may draw reasonable inferences about where the evidence is likely to

be found. United States v. Fernandez, 388 F.3d 1199, 1253 (9th Cir. 2004). In United States v.

Terry, 911 F.2d 272, 275 (9th Cir. 1990), our court of appeals noted that “a magistrate may rely

on the conclusions of experienced law enforcement officers regarding where evidence of a

crime is likely to be found,” including knowledge that drug traffickers kept contraband in their

homes or adjoining structures, as support for probable cause to support a search of a resident. 

Indeed our court of appeals expressly held a magistrate could draw the reasonable inference that

“[i]n the case of drug dealers, evidence is likely to be found where the dealers live.” AnguloLopz, 791 F.2d 1394, 1399 (9th Cir. 1986).

“[A] magistrate need not determine that the evidence sought is in fact on the premises to

be searched . . . .” United States v. Peacock, 761 F.2d 1313, 1315 (9th Cir. 1985) (emphasis in

original). Rather, “only a reasonable nexus between the activities supporting probable cause

and the locations to be searched” need be offered. United States. v. Ocampo, 937 F.2d 485, 490

(9th Cir. 1991). 

Johnson argues there was no substantial basis for the magistrate judge to find probable

cause to search his home for contraband, inasmuch as all of the controlled purchases occurred

from his van. Not so. As stated, our court of appeals has held that a magistrate may draw the

inference that a drug trafficker keeps contraband in his home. Here, although Johnson tends to

sell from his van, rather than from his home, the fact that Johnson left his van and entered his

home soon after completing a sale (the controlled sale observed here) provides a reasonable

nexus between his home and his drug sales, particularly when informed by Detective Sample’s

statement that drug dealers often kept some inventory in their homes.

Johnson cites United States v. Carter, 64 Fed. Appx. 109, 112 (10th Cir. 2003). There, a

search warrant authorized the search of premises other than the defendant’s residence, albeit

related to the defendant, based on the affiant’s knowledge and expertise that drug traffickers

often kept their drugs in stash houses (as opposed to their primary homes). The Tenth Circuit

affirmed the district court’s finding that the warrant was supported by probable cause. Johnson

contends Carter is at odds with Detective Sample’s statement that dealers tend to keep

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inventory in their homes, but those conclusions are not mutually exclusive. Moreover, there is

no requirement that the affidavit show “that the evidence is more likely than not to be found

where the search takes place.” Peacock, 761 F.2d at 1315. Here, where our affiant observed

Johnson return to his home after the controlled buys without stopping at a different location first

constitutes a substantial basis for finding probable cause to search his home. Thus, Carter

supports the government’s case.

Johnson also contends the affidavit lacked any indication of the reliability of the

confidential informant. Although Detective Sample’s description of the confidential informant

was sparse (for example, the fact that the confidential informant had not provided false

information begged the question of how much inside information he had provided in the first

place), he laid out several facts that corroborated the informant’s story, based on external

factors. That is, the veracity of the informant’s information bore itself out during the controlled

buys and subsequent surveillance: The confidential informant did, in fact, purchase cocaine

base from a person named Lamar, and the quantities corresponded to the amount of money paid.

Finally, Johnson contends the omission of the actual quantity of cocaine base purchased

undermined a finding probable cause, inasmuch as the quantity sold was a single small rock. 

This, Johnson contends, calls into question the applicability of Detective Sample’s experience

and training concerning the common practices of drug traffickers, because it indicates he was

just a small-time dealer unlikely to maintain the bulk inventory or other paraphernalia affied to. 

But Johnson ignores the fact that Detective Sample never limited his assertion of the

likelihood that a drug dealer kept more drugs and other contraband in his home to large-scale

dealers. Moreover, the repeated transactions, which occurred within a period of thirty days, no

matter the quantity sold at either transaction, still provided a substantial basis for the inference

that Johnson was involved in drug dealing on an ongoing basis.

This order finds that the San Mateo Superior Court judge had a substantial basis for

concluding that the search warrant was supported by probable cause. 

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CONCLUSION

For the reasons stated above, Johnson’s motion to suppress the fruits of the warrant

search of his residence is DENIED. A separate order will address the motion to suppress the

unrelated search of his person and subsequent search of his vehicle at a traffic stop.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: December 20, 2016. 

WILLIAM ALSUP

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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