Source: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/cadc/99-3123/99-3123a-2011-03-24.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 04:49:51+00:00

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Justia › US Law › Case Law › Federal Courts › Courts of Appeals › D.C. Circuit › 2000 › USA v. Gbemisola, Abdul J.
Elizabeth Carroll, Assistant United States Attorney, ar- gued the cause for appellee. With her on the brief were Wilma A. Lewis, Unites States Attorney, and John R. Fisher, Thomas J. Tourish, Jr., William J. O'Malley, Jr., and Eumi Choi, Assistant United States Attorneys.
Garland, Circuit Judge: Abdul J. Gbemisola appeals his conviction for possession with intent to distribute over one kilogram of heroin. He argues that evidence obtained through the use of an electronic tracking device should have been suppressed because the device was installed outside the jurisdiction of the magistrate judge who issued the warrant for its installation. He also argues that the evidence at trial was insufficient to support his conviction and that he was improperly joined for trial with two co-defendants. We find no merit to these arguments and affirm the conviction.
__________ 1 Mail Boxes Etc. rents mailboxes with 24-hour access at numerous locations in the Washington, D.C. area and worldwide.
purity--approximately 90%. The heroin in each box had a street value of approximately $1 million.
Customs agents repackaged the pots in their original boxes and sent them on to Customs' Washington, D.C. area field office at Dulles Airport in Northern Virginia. There, agents reopened the boxes and installed electronic tracking devices pursuant to a warrant obtained from a federal magistrate judge in the District of Columbia. Each device emitted a radio signal with the capacity to indicate when the box was moving and to disclose when it was opened. Agents removed some of the pots from each box, and diluted the heroin in the remaining pots with flour. Telephone books were added to the boxes to compensate for the weight of the removed pots. The boxes were then resealed and delivered to the three Mail Boxes Etc. addresses on the shipping labels: 1429 G Street, N.W.; 4401 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.; and 5505 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.
Meanwhile, on March 4, 1998, around the time that the boxes were being shipped from Southeast Asia, a person using the name "Winston" made three telephone reservations for travel on March 9 from O'Hare International Airport in Chicago to Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI) in Maryland. The reservations were made in the names of "Abdul Gevemisola [sic]," "Wahab Akanni," and "Winston Gillsillian [sic]." On March 9, "Winston" made new reservations for the same three to travel on March 10. On that day, the tickets were purchased with cash because the credit card with which "Winston" initially attempted to make the purchase was reported as unverifiable. The plane arrived at BWI at 10:17 a.m., and a ticket for three travelers--later found in the pocket of Gbemisola's co-defendant Wahab Akan- ni--was purchased for the 12:00 p.m. "Super Shuttle" from BWI to downtown Washington, D.C. The Shuttle ride takes approximately one hour.
to be accompanied by two other men, one of whom had a shoulder bag, who remained waiting outside. Although Gill- fillian attempted to retrieve the Federal Express package, which had been delivered to a box in the name of "Aldrich Hinton," Customs had already removed it. Gillfillian left empty-handed.
Gbemisola then walked out the door, and law enforcement agents watched as he entered a taxi. They followed in their own car. Almost immediately, the electronic tracking device alerted the agents that the box had been opened. The agents stopped the taxi and arrested Gbemisola. They found the Federal Express box lying open on the floor of the taxi's back seat. Inside Gbemisola's shoulder bag was the pot of heroin and the telephone books, as well as an envelope addressed to "Anthony Brown" at 4401 Connecticut Avenue, N.W. The envelope contained an auto repair estimate in the name of co- defendant Akanni.
were then arrested. Agents found documents related to the two other Mail Boxes Etc. stores on Gillfillian's person.
A grand jury returned an indictment against the three men. In Count One, all three were charged with conspiracy to distribute narcotics, in violation of 21 U.S.C. s 846. In Count Two, Gbemisola alone was charged with possession with intent to distribute a kilogram or more of heroin, in violation of 21 U.S.C. s 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(A)(I). In Count Three, the other two men were charged with the same crime. The three were tried together. None of the defendants testified, and Gbemisola did not present any witnesses. Dur- ing the trial, the government moved to dismiss the conspiracy charge because of discrepancies in dates listed in the indict- ment, and the court granted the motion. The jury found Gbemisola guilty on his remaining count, but acquitted his co- defendants on theirs.
Gbemisola appeals his conviction, citing three motions that he contends the trial court erroneously denied. First, during the trial a government witness testified that although the warrant for the tracking devices had been issued by a magis- trate judge sitting in Washington, D.C., the devices were actually installed in Virginia. Contending that this rendered the warrant invalid, defendant moved to suppress the evi- dence obtained from the use of the tracking device in the box he retrieved. Second, after the court dismissed the conspira- cy count mid-trial, Gbemisola moved to sever his case from that of his co-defendants. Finally, Gbemisola moved for judgment of acquittal on the ground that the evidence was insufficient to sustain the conviction.
device was unlawfully obtained. We decide that question de novo. See In re Sealed Case No. 96-3167, 153 F.3d 759, 764 (D.C. Cir. 1998).
ment indicated its agreement as well, that agreement does not resolve the suppression issue.
__________ amended to permit a magistrate to issue a search warrant not only for property within the judicial district, but also for property "either within or outside the district if the property ... is within the district when the warrant is sought but might move outside the district before the warrant is executed." Fed. R. Crim. P. 41(a); see also id. Advisory Committee's note on 1990 amendment (suggesting that amendment provides authority for issuance of warrant to follow beeper across state lines).
whether Customs needed an authorizing warrant in the first place--or instead whether the warrant that issued, although perhaps invalid, was superfluous.
__________ 3 Moreover, under the theory suggested by defense counsel in closing argument--that Gbemisola was merely picking up the box for a friend--Gbemisola would not have had the necessary expecta- tion of privacy in the first place. See Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 143 (1978); United States v. Magnum, 100 F.3d 164, 170 (D.C. Cir. 1996).
violate the Fourth Amendment when it reveal[s] no informa- tion that could not have been obtained through visual surveil- lance." Id. at 707.
The same analysis applies here. As Gbemisola left the Mail Boxes Etc. building, entered a taxi, and drove away, he was followed by a team of surveillance agents. Although the tracking device reported the location of the box, so too did the agents' visual surveillance. With respect to location, the device added nothing to what the agents could see with their eyes. That surveillance did not violate the Fourth Amend- ment, as Gbemisola "ha[d] no reasonable expectation of priva- cy" with respect to his travels on the public street. Knotts, 460 U.S. at 281. "[S]ince the movements of the automobile and ... of the [object] containing the beeper ... could have been observed by the naked eye, no Fourth Amendment violation was committed.... " Karo, 468 U.S. at 713-714.
But, Gbemisola argues, the device also reported when the box was opened--an event that the officers did not see. The decisive issue, however, is not what the officers saw but what they could have seen. See id.; Knotts, 460 U.S. at 282, 285. At any time, the surveillance vehicle could have pulled along- side of the taxi and the officers could have watched Gbemisola through its window. Indeed, the taxi driver himself could have seen the event simply by looking in his rear-view mirror or turning around. As one cannot have a reasonable expecta- tion of privacy concerning an act performed within the visual range of a complete stranger, the Fourth Amendment's war- rant requirement was not implicated. See Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351 (1967) ( "What a person knowingly exposes to the public ... is not a subject of Fourth Amend- ment protection.").
In sum, because no warrant was required for either the installation or use of the mobile tracking device, the fruits of that use were admissible at trial regardless of the validity of the warrant obtained by the government. See, e.g., United States v. Martinez, 78 F.3d 399, 401 (8th Cir. 1998) (upholding search of car under automobile exception regardless of validi- ty of warrant).
Defendant's remaining two arguments, relating to the suffi- ciency of the evidence to sustain the verdict and to the propriety of a joint trial, merit only brief discussion.
We must affirm a jury's verdict if " 'any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.' " United States v. Lucas, 67 F.3d 956, 959 (D.C. Cir. 1995) (quoting Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979)). In making that determination, "the prosecution's evidence is to be viewed in the light most favorable to the government, drawing no distinction between direct and circumstantial evidence, and giving full play to the right of the jury to determine credibility, weigh the evidence and draw justifiable inferences of fact." United States v. Foster, 783 F.2d 1087, 1088 (D.C. Cir. 1986) (internal quota- tion omitted).
particularly risky if an "innocent" recipient had decided to use the cooking pots for their apparent purpose. See United States v. Quilca-Carpio, 118 F.3d 719, 722 (11th Cir. 1997) (holding that reasonable jury could infer from quantity of drugs in false bottom of suitcase "that a 'prudent smuggler' is not likely to entrust such valuable cargo to an innocent person without that person's knowledge"); United States v. Herrera, 931 F.2d 761, 763 (11th Cir. 1991) (holding that to sustain conviction it "is not necessary that the evidence exclude every" innocent explanation for lack of knowledge of drugs in false suitcase compartment); see also United States v. Brown, 33 F.3d 1014, 1015-16 (8th Cir. 1994) (sustaining conviction where defendant used false name to pick up United Parcel Service package containing hidden narcotics).
did not refer to "two discrete events which ... were separat- ed by time, location and their participants." Def. Br. at 14. Rather, everything from the identical nature of the three boxes and their contents, to the co-defendants' joint travel, to their possession of documents in each other's names, makes clear that defendants were involved in a common scheme.
As joinder was proper under Rule 8(b), the remaining question is whether the district court should nonetheless have severed the defendants to avoid prejudice, as permitted by Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 14. See Schaffer, 362 U.S. at 514-15; Clarke, 24 F.3d at 262.4 We review the court's refusal to do so only for abuse of discretion, see United States v. Manner, 887 F.2d 317, 324 (D.C. Cir. 1989), and we find no abuse here. All of the evidence admitted at the joint trial could properly have been admitted at a sepa- rate trial to show the nature of the drug distribution scheme in which Gbemisola was an active participant. Hence, no prejudice arose from the joinder, and the court did not err in trying the defendants together. See Schaffer, 362 U.S. at 514-15; United States v. White, 116 F.3d 903, 916-18 (D.C. Cir. 1997); United States v. Gibbs, 904 F.2d 52, 56 (D.C. Cir. 1990).
If it appears that a defendant or the government is preju- diced by a joinder of offenses or of defendants in an indict- ment or information or by such joinder for trial together, the court may order an election or separate trials of counts, grant a severance of defendants or provide whatever other relief justice requires. Fed. R. Crim. P. 14.

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