IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 15-50474

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

 Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

JEREMY TYSON GOVAN, 

 Defendant - Appellant

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of Texas

USDC No. 7:14-CR-215-1

Before JOLLY, JONES, and BENAVIDES, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

Appellant Jeremy Tyson Govan was convicted of conspiracy to possess 

and distribute methamphetamine in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). Govan 

appeals his conviction arguing that the district court erred in denying: 1) his

motion to suppress illegally-obtained evidence; and 2) his motion for a 

judgment of acquittal based on the insufficiency of the evidence presented at 

his trial. For the reasons that follow, we AFFIRM.

 

* Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not 

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH 

CIR. R. 47.5.4.

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

March 11, 2016

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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I.

Govan was charged in a conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine in 

Midland, Texas in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). 

At trial, Govan moved to suppress text messages seized by Detective 

Ronnie Mobley from Govan’s cell phone several months earlier. When Govan 

was arrested, Detective Mobley did not have a warrant to search Govan’s 

phone. Therefore, Govan argued that the text messages were obtained in 

violation of Riley v. California, 134 S.Ct. 2473, 2495 (2014) (holding that the 

“answer to the question of what police must do before searching a cell phone 

seized incident to an arrest is accordingly simple. Get a warrant.”). 

Nevertheless, the district court denied Govan’s motion to suppress.

The district court noted that, although Riley was not decided until six 

months after Govan’s phone was searched, Riley applied retroactively to 

Govan’s case under Davis v. United States, 131 S. Ct. 2419, 2430 (2011)

(holding “newly announced rules of constitutional criminal procedure ‘must 

apply retroactively to all cases, state or federal, pending on direct review or not 

yet final, with no exception.’”) (citations omitted). Thus, the district court 

determined that because the search of Govan’s cell phone violated the Fourth 

Amendment, the evidence was obtained illegally. The district court further 

reasoned, however, that notwithstanding the illegality of the search, the 

exclusionary rule did not apply because the search was conducted “in 

objectively reasonable reliance on binding judicial precedent,” quoting Davis, 

131 S. Ct. at 2428, and citing U.S. v. Finley, 477 F.3d 250 (5th Cir. 2007) (which 

earlier had held that officers were allowed to perform warrantless searches of 

cell phones incident to arrest). Therefore, the district court held that the text 

messages were admissible, based on Detective Mobley’s good-faith reliance on 

Finley. Accordingly, the district court denied Govan’s motion to suppress. 

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In addition to his motion to suppress the text messages, at the close of 

the Government’s case-in-chief Govan moved for a judgment of acquittal under 

Fed. R. Crim. P. 29. Although the Government presented substantial witness

testimony and other evidence of Govan’s involvement in the conspiracy, Govan

had offered no evidence, witness or otherwise. In support of his motion,

Govan’s only argument consisted of this brief statement: “The evidence is both 

legally and factually insufficient to support submission of this case to the jury.” 

The district court denied the Rule 29 motion. 

The jury found Govan guilty of conspiracy to possess and distribute 

methamphetamine. Govan appeals his conviction, arguing that the district 

court erred in its denial of his motion to suppress and his motion for a judgment 

of acquittal. 

II.

“When reviewing a district court’s denial of a motion to suppress 

evidence as obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment, we review the 

factual determinations for clear error and the legal conclusions de novo.” 

United States v. Powell, 732 F.3d 361, 369 (5th Cir. 2013), cert. denied, 134 S. 

Ct. 1326 (2014) (citation omitted). We “may consider all of the evidence 

presented at trial, not just that presented before the ruling on the suppression 

motion, in the light most favorable to the prevailing party, which in this case 

is the government.” United States v. Raney, 633 F.3d 385, 389 (5th Cir. 2011) 

(internal quotation and citation omitted). 

We “review de novo a district court’s denial of a motion for judgment of 

acquittal.” United States v. Izydore, 167 F.3d 213, 219 (5th Cir. 1999). “In 

evaluating the sufficiency of the evidence,” we “must affirm the verdict ‘if a 

reasonable trier of fact could conclude from the evidence that the elements of 

the offense were established beyond a reasonable doubt, viewing the evidence 

in the light most favorable to the verdict and drawing all reasonable inferences 

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from the evidence to support the verdict.’” Id. (quoting United States v. Myers, 

104 F.3d 76, 78 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 520 U.S. 1218 (1997)).

III.

A.

The principal issue on appeal is whether the district court erred in 

admitting the text messages obtained from Govan’s cell phone.

First, Govan argues that the district court erred by applying the goodfaith exception of United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 922 (1984) (holding that

evidence obtained in objectively reasonable reliance on a subsequently 

invalidated search warrant is not barred by the exclusionary rule).1 Govan

argues that for the good-faith exception to apply under Leon, an officer must

have actual knowledge of the legal basis that serves as the predicate for the 

good-faith exception to the unlawful search. But, in his brief, Govan

acknowledges that “nowhere in . . . Davis does there appear an assertion, or 

even a suggestion, that the officer who conducted the search [in Davis] was

aware” of the legal precedent that authorized the warrantless search; 

nevertheless, Davis applied the good-faith exception to the illegally-obtained

evidence. It seems that Govan’s only argument is that we should ignore Davis

and determine the merits of his appeal strictly under Leon (as he interprets it). 

This argument is completely meritless—as we do not have authority to ignore 

or overrule Supreme Court precedent. Furthermore, nothing in Davis, nor in 

our precedent, requires such subjective knowledge of an arresting officer.2 

 

1 The district court’s simple citation to Leon in its order denying Govan’s motion to 

suppress was only a reiteration of its authority under Davis. Furthermore, in the proceedings 

before the district court, Govan made no reference to the arguments he makes before us. We 

will nevertheless try to understand and discuss these arguments here, assuming that he had 

no opportunity to make such a response to the district court’s ruling.

2 See, e.g., Davis, 131 S. Ct. at 2423-24 (“searches conducted in objectively reasonable 

reliance on binding appellate precedent are not subject to the exclusionary rule”) (emphasis 

added).

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Govan’s second argument expands his first argument to further require 

that, for the good-faith exception to apply, Detective Mobley also had to testify

at Govan’s trial that he “had knowledge of the legal principle[s]” in Finley. But, 

as addressed above, Davis does not place such a requirement on the good-faith 

exception, and accordingly we reject Govan’s argument. 

In sum, the district court did not err in its denial of Govan’s motion to 

suppress. 

B.

We briefly turn to Govan’s argument that the district court erred by 

denying his motion for a judgment of acquittal. Govan argues that the 

Government’s evidence was insufficient because it showed only that he sold (or 

gifted) drugs as an individual, not as part of a conspiracy. At trial, however,

the Government produced substantial witness testimony detailing Govan’s 

involvement in the conspiracy (including testimony that Govan conspired with 

others to distribute methamphetamine and that he had a portion of that 

methamphetamine “fronted” to him by a larger-scale dealer). Considering all 

the evidence that was presented to the jury, “a reasonable trier of fact could 

conclude from the evidence that the elements of the offense were established 

beyond a reasonable doubt.” In short, the district court did not err in denying

the motion for a judgment of acquittal.

IV.

For these reasons, we hold that the district court did not err in denying 

Govan’s motion to suppress, nor in denying his motion for a judgment of 

acquittal. The district court’s judgment is, therefore, in all respects

AFFIRMED.

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