Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca9-12-50485/USCOURTS-ca9-12-50485-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Johnny Casel Nora
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

JOHNNY CASEL NORA, AKA John

Carter, AKA John Nora, AKA

Johnny Nora, AKA Johnny Carl

Nora,

Defendant-Appellant.

No. 12-50485

D.C. No.

2:09-cr-00092-

SVW-1

OPINION

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Central District of California

Stephen V. Wilson, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted

January 8, 2014—Pasadena, California

Filed August 28, 2014

Before: William A. Fletcher, Milan D. Smith, Jr.,

and Paul J. Watford, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Watford

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2 UNITED STATES V. NORA

SUMMARY*

Criminal Law

The panel reversed the district court’s denial of a motion

to suppress evidence seized from the defendant’s home, and

remanded for further proceedings, in a case in which the

defendant entered a conditional guilty plea to possession of

cocaine base with intent to distribute. 

The panel held that although the defendant’s arrest was

supported by probable cause, the arrest violated Payton v.

New York, 445 U.S. 573 (1980), and violated the Fourth

Amendment, where the officers physically took the defendant

into custody outside his home in the front yard only by

surrounding his house and ordering him to come out at

gunpoint, and no exigency existed. 

The panel held that evidence seized during a pat-down

search incident to an arrest made in violation of Payton must

be suppressed, whether the search occurs inside the home or,

as in the case of the cash and marijuana here, outside the

home. The panel held that the defendant’s post-arrest

statements are subject to suppression as well, as fruit of the

unlawful search of his person. The panel held that

suppression of this evidence renders the portions of the

warrant authorizing a search for narcotics-related evidence

and evidence of gang membership invalid. The panel held

that the remaining untainted evidence did not establish

probable cause to search the defendant’s home for the broad

* This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has

been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.

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UNITED STATES V. NORA 3

range of firearms described in the warrant, and that as a

consequence, the entire warrant was invalid and all evidence

seized pursuant to it must be suppressed.

COUNSEL

Michael J. Treman (argued), Santa Barbara, California, for

Defendant-Appellant.

André Birotte Jr., United States Attorney, Robert E. Dugdale,

Chief, Criminal Division, Cheryl L. O’Connor (argued) and

Max B. Shiner, Assistant United States Attorneys, Los

Angeles, California, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

OPINION

WATFORD, Circuit Judge:

The issue raised by this appeal is whether the police

violated Johnny Nora’s Fourth Amendment rights when they

searched his home. The search yielded narcotics and

firearms, which formed the basis for the federal charges

brought against him. After the district court denied Nora’s

motion to suppress the evidence seized from his home, Nora

entered a conditional guilty plea pending the outcome of this

appeal.

Nora contends that, although the officers obtained a

search warrant, all of the evidence discovered during the

search must be suppressed because the warrant was invalid. 

The warrant was invalid, Nora argues, because it was based

on information acquired as a result of his unlawful arrest. 

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And his arrest was unlawful, Nora urges, because the officers

either lacked probable cause to arrest him or, alternatively,

arrested him in violation of Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573

(1980).

I

The events relevant here occurred on a single night in

January 2008. Two uniformed police officers were patrolling

Nora’s neighborhood in South Central Los Angeles in an

unmarked car. As they drove down Nora’s street, the officers

saw three men they didn’t know standing on the sidewalk in

front of Nora’s two-bedroom house, about 75 yards away. 

The officers lost sight of the men for a few seconds. By the

time the officers pulled up in front of the house and got out of

the car, two of the three men (Nora and Andre Davis) were

standing on the porch, while the third (Patrick Hodges) stood

in the front yard, which was enclosed by a metal fence. See

Appendix (photograph of front yard and porch). The officers

stood on the sidewalk and attempted to engage in casual

conversation with the men.

According to the officers, whose testimony the district

court credited over Nora’s conflicting testimony, Nora

appeared nervous and stood stiffly with his right side

obscured from the officers’ view. Seconds into the

conversation, Nora abruptly spun toward the front door and

pushed past Davis to get into the house. As he did so, the

officers could see that Nora was holding a blue-steel semiautomatic handgun in his right hand. One of the officers

shouted “Stop! Police!” but Nora and Davis ignored the

command, rushed into the house, and shut the door behind

them.

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UNITED STATES V. NORA 5

After Nora and Davis fled into the house, one of the

officers detained Hodges, who was still standing in the front

yard, while the other officer ran around the side of the house

to watch the back door. Someone inside the house turned off

the only light that had been on, leaving the house completely

dark. The officers then called for backup. Within minutes,

some 20 to 30 officers arrived and surrounded the house with

weapons drawn. They were aided by a police helicopter

hovering above whose lights, Nora’s wife testified, lit up the

house “like the daytime.”

A standoff ensued for the next 20 to 30 minutes, which

ended when the officers used a public address system to order

the occupants of the house to come out. Nora and Davis

complied, followed a few minutes later by Nora’s wife and

children.

Officers immediately handcuffed Nora and searched him. 

They found a small amount of marijuana and more than

$1,000 in cash on his person. One of the officers read Nora

the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436

(1966), and then briefly questioned him. Nora made several

incriminating statements in response to those questions. 

Specifically, Nora admitted that he had personal use

quantities of methamphetamine and heroin in a dresser

drawer, that he lived at the house, and that he belonged to a

particular street gang. After determining Nora’s identity, the

officers ran a criminal background check, which revealed that

Nora had a prior conviction for carrying a loaded firearm and

two prior convictions for being a felon in possession of a

firearm.

The officers sought and obtained a warrant to search

Nora’s home for the following items: marijuana,

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methamphetamine, heroin, and related paraphernalia;

evidence relating to the sale of narcotics; firearms,

magazines, and ammunition; and evidence of gang

membership. The affidavit supporting the warrant relied on

the officers’ observations of Nora outside his home, as well

as the evidence obtained as a result of Nora’s arrest—namely,

the marijuana and cash found on his person, his post-arrest

statements, and the record of his prior convictions. Among

other things, the search of Nora’s home resulted in seizure of

the following:

• From an ironing-board closet hidden behind the

refrigerator: quantities of cocaine, cocaine base,

marijuana, over $9,000 in cash, and four semiautomatic handguns.

• From a bedroom dresser drawer: quantities of heroin

and methamphetamine.

• From the detached garage: quantities of cocaine base,

one handgun, one rifle, two shotguns, two electronic

scales, handgun magazines, and ammunition.

A federal grand jury charged Nora with possession with

intent to distribute controlled substances, possession of

firearms in furtherance of a drug trafficking offense,

possession of an unregistered firearm, and one count of being

a felon in possession of a firearm. Nora entered a conditional

guilty plea to possession of cocaine base with intent to

distribute, reserving his right to appeal the district court’s

denial of his suppression motion. The court ultimately

sentenced Nora to 122 months in prison.

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II

Nora first contends that the officers lacked probable cause

to arrest him. The government counters that the officers had

probable cause to arrest Nora for violating California Penal

Code § 25850(a) (formerly § 12031(a)). That statute, as

relevant here, makes it a misdemeanor to carry a loaded

firearm “while in any public place or on any public street.” 

§ 25850(a).1

The officers’ firsthand observations of Nora on the porch

undoubtedly gave them probable cause to believe he was

carrying a firearm. But for purposes of § 25850(a), Nora’s

front porch is not a “public place.” See People v. Strider,

100 Cal. Rptr. 3d 66, 74 (Ct. App. 2009). The question, then,

is whether the officers had probable cause to believe both that

Nora had been carrying the firearm while standing on the

sidewalk (which is a public place), and that the firearm was

loaded.

The officers’ observations gave rise to a “fair probability”

that Nora had been carrying the handgun while standing on

the sidewalk. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 238 (1983). 

That’s where the officers first saw him, and they lost sight of

him for only a few seconds before they next saw him standing

on the porch with the gun in his hand. They did not see him

pick up anything or accept anything from Davis or Hodges

while on the porch. Given the short interval during which the

1

“A person is guilty of carrying a loaded firearm when the person

carries a loaded firearm on the person or in a vehicle while in any public

place or on any public street in an incorporated city or in any public place

or on any public street in a prohibited area of unincorporated territory.” 

Cal. Penal Code § 25850(a).

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officers lost sight of Nora, they had reasonable grounds to

believe that the firearm they saw him holding on the porch

had been in his hand just moments earlier on the sidewalk as

well. See Maryland v. Pringle, 540 U.S. 366, 371 (2003).

The facts known to the officers also established a fair

probability that the firearm was loaded. The particular

firearm involved here—a semi-automatic handgun—is

principally used for self-defense and protection of the home,

see District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 628 (2008),

purposes served most effectively if the weapon is loaded. 

The officers saw Nora carrying the handgun at night outside

a home in which he later sought refuge, suggesting he was in

fact carrying the handgun for those purposes. As the district

court noted, the fact that Nora carried the handgun in his hand

“at the ready” strengthened the inference it was loaded; it

wasn’t stored in a gun case or left unattended in a vehicle,

circumstances in which a firearm might more plausibly be

unloaded. And Nora’s unprovoked flight into the house upon

seeing the officers added further weight to the inference that

criminal wrongdoingmight be afoot. See Illinois v. Wardlow,

528 U.S. 119, 124–25 (2000); Sibron v. New York, 392 U.S.

40, 66–67 (1968). These facts, taken together, provided a

reasonable basis for believing Nora had violated § 25850(a).

Nora argues that it’s possible he picked up the handgun

between the time he was standing on the sidewalk and the

time he reached the porch, and that the gun could have been

unloaded. But the concept of probable cause requires us to

deal in probabilities, not certainties, and for that reason it

doesn’t demand “the same type of specific evidence of each

element of the offense as would be needed to support a

conviction.” Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 149 (1972). 

Taking into account the totality of the circumstances, the

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UNITED STATES V. NORA 9

officers needed to have only a “reasonable ground” for

believing Nora had violated § 25850(a). Pringle, 540 U.S. at

371. Here, they did.

III

Nora next contends that, even if the officers had probable

cause to arrest him, they arrested him in violation of Payton

v. New York, 445 U.S. 573 (1980). The Court held in Payton

that the Fourth Amendment forbids arresting a suspect inside

his home unless the police first obtain an arrest warrant or an

exception to the warrant requirement applies. Id. at 590. 

That rule is designed to protect “the privacy and the sanctity

of the home,” id. at 588, and stems from “the overriding

respect for the sanctity of the home that has been embedded

in our traditions since the origins of the Republic.” Id. at 601.

The government properly concedes that the police

arrested Nora “inside” his home for purposes of the Payton

rule. Although officers physically took Nora into custody

outside his home in the front yard, they accomplished that

feat only by surrounding his house and ordering him to come

out at gunpoint. We’ve held that forcing a suspect to exit his

home in those circumstances constitutes an in-home arrest

under Payton. See, e.g., Fisher v. City of San Jose, 558 F.3d

1069, 1074–75 (9th Cir. 2009) (en banc); United States v. AlAzzawy, 784 F.2d 890, 893 (9th Cir. 1985). Since the officers

didn’t obtain an arrest warrant, Nora’s arrest violated the

Fourth Amendment unless an exception to the warrant

requirement applies.

The government argues, and the district court found, that

the “exigent circumstances” exception to the warrant

requirement applies. That exception permits a warrantless in-

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home arrest in certain narrowly defined circumstances. See

United States v. Struckman, 603 F.3d 731, 743 (9th Cir.

2010). One such circumstance is where the government can

show that the delay necessary to secure a warrant would

create “a substantial risk of harm to the persons involved or

to the law enforcement process.” Al-Azzawy, 784 F.2d at 894

(internal quotation marks omitted).

Nora didn’t present the kind of immediate threat to the

safety of officers or others necessary to justify a disregard of

the warrant requirement. Our decision in Al-Azzawy provides

a useful contrast. In that case the defendant refused

commands to exit his home a short time after he threatened to

shoot his neighbor, to light his neighbor’s trailer on fire, and

to “blow up” the entire trailer park in which the two lived if

the neighbor bothered the defendant’s family again. Id.

at 891, 894. Officers were told that the defendant had also

threatened the neighbor with a pistol the day before and had

been seen in possession of hand grenades and automatic

weapons a few days earlier. Id. at 891. We held that exigent

circumstances justified the defendant’s warrantless in-home

arrest because the officers reasonably believed that he

“possessed illegal explosives and was in an agitated and

violent state.” Id. at 894. Even on those facts, we said the

exigency question was close. Id.

The facts of this case are decidedly less compelling from

an exigency standpoint than those in Al-Azzawy. True, the

officers saw Nora in possession of a handgun. But Nora

never aimed the weapon at the officers or anyone else, and

the officers had no evidence that he had used or threatened to

use it. Cf. Fisher, 558 F.3d at 1072–73 (suspect aimed rifle

at officers and threatened to shoot). The officers had no

reason to believe that illegal weapons such as explosives were

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UNITED STATES V. NORA 11

present inside Nora’s home, or that anyone else to whom

Nora may have posed a danger was inside. Nor had Nora

given any other indication that he was in “an agitated and

violent state.” Al-Azzawy, 784 F.2d at 894. Finally, the

officers had no reason to believe Nora might pose a danger to

the public by attempting to flee, since they had the house

completely surrounded and could monitor all exit points. See

United States v. Gooch, 6 F.3d 673, 679 (9th Cir. 1993)

(defendant resting in closed tent posed no present danger to

officers or other campers, despite having discharged firearm

in crowded campground hours earlier).

Our conclusion that no exigency existed is buttressed by

the fact that the offense involved here was a misdemeanor. 

At the time the officers ordered Nora to exit his home, they

had probable cause to believe he had committed only a

misdemeanor violation of California Penal Code § 25850(a).2

The Supreme Court has said we should be hesitant to find

exigent circumstances “when the underlying offense for

which there is probable cause to arrest is relatively minor.” 

Welsh v. Wisconsin, 466 U.S. 740, 750 (1984). Reflecting

that hesitancy, we’ve held that “an exigency related to a

misdemeanor will seldom, if ever, justify a warrantless entry

into the home.” Hopkins v. Bonvicino, 573 F.3d 752, 769

(9th Cir. 2009) (internal quotation marks omitted). In our

view, this isn’t one of the rare cases in which exigent

circumstances can be found notwithstanding the relatively

minor nature of the offense involved.

2 The officers were not yet aware of Nora’s criminal history, which

would have elevated the offense to a felony. See Cal. Penal Code

§ 25850(c)(1).

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IV

Having concluded that the officers had probable cause to

arrest Nora but made the arrest in violation of Payton, we

must next decide whether the evidence obtained as a result of

Nora’s unlawful arrest should be suppressed. See Wong Sun

v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 484–88 (1963). That evidence

falls into three categories: (1) the cash and marijuana found

on Nora during the pat-down search incident to his arrest;

(2) Nora’s post-arrest statements admitting gang membership

and the presence of personal use quantities of narcotics in the

house; and (3) information relating to Nora’s identity—in

particular, the record of his past convictions.

A

As to the cash and marijuana found on Nora’s person, our

analysis is guided first and foremost by New York v. Harris,

495 U.S. 14 (1990), which established the scope of the

exclusionary rule’s application following a Payton violation. 

In Harris, police had probable cause to arrest the defendant

but arrested him in his home without a warrant or exigent

circumstances. The defendant made incriminating statements

while still inside his home, and later signed a written

confession incriminating himself at the police station. The

Court noted that the statements made inside the home were

properly suppressed. Id. at 20. But the Court held that the

written statement made at the police station was not subject

to suppression, reasoning that “where the police have

probable cause to arrest a suspect, the exclusionary rule does

not bar the State’s use of a statement made by the defendant

outside of his home, even though the statement is taken after

an arrest made in the home in violation of Payton.” Id. at 21.

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The Court refused to suppress the statement made outside

the home because doing so would not have advanced the

deterrent purpose the exclusionary rule is designed to serve. 

That purpose is served, the Court held, only by suppressing

evidence that “is in some sense the product of illegal

governmental activity.” Id. at 19 (internal quotation marks

omitted). In the context of a Payton violation, the illegality

doesn’t consist of gaining custody of the defendant; the

existence of probable cause to arrest provides a lawful basis

for that intrusion upon the defendant’s liberty. Id. at 18. 

Instead, the illegality consists of the officers’ intrusion into

the privacy and sanctity of the home without prior judicial

authorization. Id. at 17. Only evidence that the police

discover as a result of having made the arrest “in the home

rather than someplace else” can be deemed the product of a

Payton violation. Id. at 19.

Both the Supreme Court and our court have held that we

must suppress evidence seized during a pat-down search of

the defendant’s person following a Payton violation. See

Kirk v. Louisiana, 536 U.S. 635, 637–38 (2002) (per curiam);

United States v. Blake, 632 F.2d 731, 733, 736 (9th Cir.

1980). Those cases involved Payton violations in which the

police physically intruded into the home and conducted the

pat-down search while still inside. The question before us is

whether the rule of Kirk and Blake should be applied to

Payton violations involving a suspect who, like Nora, is

forced to exit his home in response to police coercion, such

that the pat-down search takes place outside the physical

confines of the home. The Sixth Circuit appears to have

applied the rule in these circumstances, albeit without

analysis. See United States v. Saari, 272 F.3d 804, 807, 812

(6th Cir. 2001) (upholding suppression of handgun found in

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14 UNITED STATES V. NORA

defendant’s waistband after police ordered him to exit his

home).

Deciding whether to apply a rule to a new factual scenario

requires knowing something of the rule’s rationale. Although

the exact rationale underlying the rule established in Kirk and

Blake wasn’t articulated, each of the potential rationales

supports extending the exclusionary rule to the scenario at

issue here. On the one hand, the rule could be based simply

on the notion that a Payton violation renders an arrest

unlawful, and a search incident to an unlawful arrest is itself

always unlawful, wherever it happens to occur. If Kirk and

Blake rest on that rationale, then deciding the suppression

issue before us is easy: The cash and marijuana found during

the search incident to Nora’s unlawful arrest must be

suppressed, even though the search occurred outside his home

in the front yard.

On the other hand, Kirk and Blake could rest on the notion

that, when the police arrest a suspect by physically intruding

into his home without a warrant, any personal effects found

on his person must be suppressed in order to protect the

privacy and sanctity of the home. An individual might wear

or carry things on his person within the confines of his home

that he wouldn’t take with him when venturing out in public,

so items discovered during a pat-down search conducted

inside the home could well be “the fruit of having been

arrested in the home rather than someplace else.” Harris,

495 U.S. at 19. Viewed in that light, Payton’s protection of

the privacy and sanctity of the home would be incomplete if

it didn’t extend to the person of a suspect arrested inside his

home.

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That same rationale applies when the police violate

Payton by ordering a suspect to exit his home at gunpoint. 

The home receives special constitutional protection in part

because “at the very core of the Fourth Amendment stands

the right of a man to retreat into his own home and there be

free from unreasonable governmental intrusion.” Payton,

445 U.S. at 589–90 (internal quotation marks and alterations

omitted). When the police unreasonably intrude upon that

interest by ordering a suspect to exit his home at gunpoint, the

suspect’s opportunity to collect himself before venturing out

in public is certainly diminished, if not eliminated altogether. 

In this context, too, Payton’s protection of the privacy and

sanctity of the home would be incomplete if it didn’t extend

to the person of a suspect forced to abandon the refuge of his

home involuntarily.

For these reasons, evidence seized during a pat-down

search incident to an arrest made in violation of Payton must

be suppressed, whether the search occurs inside the home, as

in Kirk and Blake, or outside the home, as in this case. In

either scenario, evidence found on the suspect’s person

should be regarded as “the fruit of having been arrested in the

home rather than someplace else.” Harris, 495 U.S. at 19. 

Accordingly, the cash and marijuana seized during the search

incident to Nora’s arrest must be suppressed.

B

We conclude that Nora’s post-arrest statements are

subject to suppression as well. Under our decision in United

States v. Shetler, 665 F.3d 1150 (9th Cir. 2011), Nora’s

statements must be deemed the fruit of the unlawful search of

his person.

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In Shetler, the police conducted an extensive illegal

search of the defendant’s home while the defendant was

detained outside, watching as the search progressed. Id. at

1154. Officers found evidence of methamphetamine

production in the house and garage. When questioned by the

police 36 hours later, the defendant confessed to having

engaged in methamphetamine production. We held that the

defendant’s confession was the product of the illegal search

and had to be suppressed. We noted that in these

circumstances officers will likely use evidence gleaned from

the illegal search in questioning the suspect, and the suspect’s

answers “may be influenced by his knowledge that the

officials had already seized certain evidence.” Id. at 1158. 

Because the government bore the burden of proving that the

defendant’s confession was not “fruit of the poisonous tree,”

id. at 1157, the government was required to produce evidence

demonstrating that the defendant’s answers “were not

induced or influenced by the illegal search.” Id. at 1158. The

government failed to do so.

The same is true here. Nora’s incriminating statements

followed immediately on the heels of the unlawful search of

his person, which yielded marijuana and a large amount of

cash. Whether the police questioned Nora about that

evidence or not, his answers were likely influenced by his

knowledge that the police had already discovered it. As in

Shetler, the government produced no evidence to the

contrary. Nor has the government shown that intervening

circumstances rendered the connection between Nora’s

statements and the illegal search “so attenuated as to dissipate

the taint.” Id. at 1159 (internal quotation marks omitted). 

Nora’s post-arrest statements must therefore be suppressed.

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C

As to Nora’s identity—in particular, the record of his

prior convictions—we need not decide whether that evidence

is admissible. We will assume that it is, resolving any doubts

on that score in the government’s favor. As will become

clear, even on that assumption, we conclude that the

government cannot prevail.

V

In light of what we’ve said above, some of the evidence

included in the search warrant affidavit was admissible and

some of it wasn’t. The remaining question is whether that

fact renders the search warrant invalid in whole or in part.

A search warrant isn’t rendered invalid merely because

some of the evidence included in the affidavit is tainted. 

United States v. Reed, 15 F.3d 928, 933 (9th Cir. 1994). The

warrant remains valid if, after excising the tainted evidence,

the affidavit’s “remaining untainted evidence would provide

a neutral magistrate with probable cause to issue a warrant.” 

Id. (internal quotation marks omitted); see also United States

v. Grandstaff, 813 F.2d 1353, 1355 (9th Cir. 1987). Thus,

after excising the cash and marijuana found on Nora’s person

and his post-arrest statements, we must determine whether the

remaining untainted evidence was sufficient to support

issuance of the warrant.3 We make that determination

without the usual deference owed to the magistrate’s initial

3 The government doesn’t challenge the district court’s decision to

suppress evidence discovered during a protective sweep of Nora’s home,

which officers conducted before obtaining the warrant, so we will

disregard that evidence as well.

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finding of probable cause. United States v. Kelley, 482 F.3d

1047, 1051 (9th Cir. 2007).

Two principal pieces of evidence remain after excising

the tainted evidence from the affidavit: (1) the officers’

observation of Nora with a handgun under circumstances

establishing probable cause to believe he had violated

California Penal Code § 25850(a); and (2) the officers’

knowledge of Nora’s criminal history, in particular his prior

conviction for carrying a loaded firearm and his two prior

convictions for being a felon in possession of a firearm.

This remaining, untainted evidence did not provide

probable cause to search Nora’s home for marijuana, heroin,

and methamphetamine, or for evidence of gang membership,

all of which were listed in the warrant as items subject to

seizure. Those portions of the warrant are therefore invalid. 

That leaves the portion of the warrant authorizing the seizure

of “[f]irearms, assault rifles, handguns of any caliber and

shotguns of any caliber,” as well as ammunition for such

firearms. We must decide whether that portion of the warrant

is valid; if it is, the severance doctrine might apply. See

United States v. Gomez-Soto, 723 F.2d 649, 654 (9th Cir.

1984) (noting that, if applicable, the severance doctrine

“allows us to strike from a warrant those portions that are

invalid and preserve those portions that satisfy the fourth

amendment”).

To satisfy the Fourth Amendment, the warrant’s firearms

clause must be supported by probable cause and describe with

particularity the items to be seized. United States v. Sells,

463 F.3d 1148, 1156 (10th Cir. 2006); In re Grand Jury

Subpoenas Dated Dec. 10, 1987, 926 F.2d 847, 857 (9th Cir.

1991). Because we conclude that the firearms clause was not

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UNITED STATES V. NORA 19

supported by probable cause, we need not decide whether the

clause satisfies the particularity requirement.

The untainted evidence unquestionablyprovided probable

cause to search Nora’s home for the blue-steel semiautomatic handgun the officers saw him carrying. Nora ran

into the house with the gun in his hand but exited without it,

giving the officers reason to believe it was still inside. The

gun was of course evidence of the crime for which the

officers had probable cause to arrest him and would therefore

have been subject to seizure on that basis alone. But without

more, the officers’ firsthand observations of Nora with a gun

in his hand did not give them reasonable grounds to believe

that any additional firearms would be found in the house. See

Millender v. Cnty. of Los Angeles, 620 F.3d 1016, 1025 (9th

Cir. 2010) (en banc), rev’d on other grounds sub nom.

Messerschmidt v. Millender, 132 S. Ct. 1235 (2012).

The only other arguably untainted evidence the officers

had was knowledge of Nora’s criminal history. We have

stated that criminal history “can be helpful in establishing

probable cause, especially where the previous arrest or

conviction involves a crime of the same general nature as the

one the warrant is seeking to uncover.” Greenstreet v. Cnty.

of San Bernardino, 41 F.3d 1306, 1309 (9th Cir. 1994); see

also 2 Wayne R. LaFave, Search & Seizure: A Treatise on the

Fourth Amendment § 3.2(d), at 72 & n.147 (5th ed. 2012). 

For example, in Hart v. Parks, 450 F.3d 1059 (9th Cir. 2006),

we noted that the suspect’s prior theft convictions were

“particularly relevant” (when combined with other evidence)

to determining whether the police had probable cause to

arrest him for another theft. Id. at 1066.

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By the same logic, Nora’s prior firearms convictions

might have been relevant if the officers had observed Nora

holding an object that appeared to be a firearm, and the issue

was whether the officers had probable cause to believe the

object was in fact a firearm. But here, the officers didn’t need

the prior convictions to support the inference that Nora in fact

possessed a firearm; they already had probable cause to

believe that. Rather, at issue is whether a fair probability

existed that Nora owned other firearms, in addition to the

single firearm the officers had observed. Nora’s prior

firearms convictions don’t speak to that issue and thus are of

marginal relevance to the probable cause issue before us.

Our decision in United States v. Weber, 923 F.2d 1338

(9th Cir. 1991), illustrates the shortcoming here. In Weber,

the defendant ordered four photographs of children engaged

in sexually explicit acts from a fictitious distributor created as

part of a government-orchestrated sting operation. Id. at

1340. The agents planned to deliver the photographs to the

defendant’s home through a mail courier. They then sought

an anticipatory warrant to search the defendant’s home, not

just for the four photographs he had ordered, but for any other

photographs, books, magazines, and videotapes depicting

child pornography. Id. at 1340–41. To justify this much

broader search for child pornography, the warrant affidavit

contained an officer’s expert opinion regarding three classes

of suspects likely to keep such materials at home (“child

molesters,” “pedophiles,” and “child pornography

collectors”). Id. at 1341. We found the evidence insufficient

to establish probable cause to search for materials beyond the

four photographs involved in the sting. Although the expert’s

opinion described three classes of suspects likely to possess

the broad range of child pornography materials described in

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UNITED STATES V. NORA 21

the warrant, the government failed to demonstrate that the

defendant belonged to one of those classes. Id. at 1341, 1345.

Here, the government’s evidence is insufficient for the

opposite reason: The affidavit established that Nora belonged

to a class of suspects with prior firearms convictions, but

didn’t show why that class of suspects would tend to own

multiple firearms. Nor did the affidavit contain other facts

tying Nora himself to firearms beyond the one he had been

observed carrying. Were we to hold that this evidence

suffices for probable cause, officers would have free rein to

search a suspect’s home anytime the suspect had prior

firearms convictions and was spotted with a single gun,

whether near his home or not. While the police in those

circumstances might have probable cause to search for the

specific firearm they observed, they would need evidence

tending to show that the suspect in question—or the class of

people to which the suspect belonged—possessed additional

firearms to justify a more expansive search. As we stated in

Weber, “probable cause to believe that some incriminating

evidence will be present at a particular place does not

necessarily mean there is probable cause to believe that there

will be more of the same.” Id. at 1344.

We are thus left with no portion of the warrant that

satisfies the Fourth Amendment’s requirements. The officers

had probable cause to search for the blue-steel semiautomatic handgun they saw Nora carrying, but the only

clause of the warrant addressing firearms did not specifically

describe that weapon. It instead purported to authorize the

seizure of firearms of any stripe, expanding the scope of the

search to include firearms for which the officers did not have

probable cause. Since a warrant must “be no broader than the

probable cause on which it is based,” id. at 1342, the firearms

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clause must be stricken as well. With no valid portion of the

warrant that could even potentially be saved, the severance

doctrine cannot apply.

Because the entire warrant was invalid, the government’s

plain view argument also fails. In order for the plain view

doctrine to apply, “the officer must lawfully have been in the

place from which the object could be seen in plain view.” 

United States v. Galpin, 720 F.3d 436, 451 (2d Cir. 2013); see

Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 375 (1993). The

officers’ entry into Nora’s home was not authorized by a

valid warrant or an exception to the warrant requirement,

which means they were not lawfully present in the home in

the first place. The plain view doctrine is therefore

inapplicable. See United States v. Spilotro, 800 F.2d 959, 968

(9th Cir. 1986).

* * *

Although Nora’s arrest was supported by probable cause,

the manner in which officers made the arrest violated Payton. 

Evidence obtained as a result of Nora’s unlawful arrest must

be suppressed, which renders the portions of the warrant

authorizing a search for narcotics-related evidence and

evidence of gang membership invalid. The remaining

untainted evidence did not establish probable cause to search

Nora’s home for the broad range of firearms described in the

warrant. As a consequence, the entire warrant was invalid

and all evidence seized pursuant to it must be suppressed. 

We reverse the district court’s order denying Nora’s

suppression motion and remand for further proceedings.

REVERSED and REMANDED.

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APPENDIX

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Case 2:09-cr-00092-SVW Document 36-7 Filed 11/02/09 Page 2 of 3 Page ID #:189

United States v. Nora 

CA # 12-50485

28 Excerpts of Record 

Volume II

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