Source: https://openjurist.org/429/us/413
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 22:10:58+00:00

Document:
Thomas W. DONOVAN et al.
1. Section 2518(1)(b)(iv) is not satisfied when the wiretap application identifies only the "principal target" (usually the individual whose phone is monitored) of the interception, but the Government is required to name all individuals who it has probable cause to believe are engaged in the criminal activity under investigation and whose conversations it expects will be intercepted over the target telephone. Neither the language and structure of Title III nor its legislative history supports the interpretation that Congress intended to remove from the identification requirement those suspects whose intercepted communications originated on a telephone other than that listed in the wiretap application. Pp. 423-428.
2. Under § 2518(8)(d), the Government has a statutory responsibility to inform the issuing judge of the identities of persons whose conversations were overheard in the course of the interception, thus enabling him to decide whether they should be served with notice of the interception. Here the Government did not comply adequately with § 2518(8)(d), since the names of respondents Merlo and Lauer were not included on the purportedly complete list of identifiable persons submitted to the issuing judge. Pp. 428-432.
3. Although the Government was required under § 2518(1)(b)(iv) to identify respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco in the December 26 application, failure to do so under these circumstances did not warrant suppression under § 2518(10)(a)(i), since the identification in an intercept application of all those likely to be overheard in incriminating conversations does not play a "substantive role" with respect to judicial authorization of intercept orders and hence does not impose a limitation on the use of intercept procedures. Pp. 435-437.
(a) Here the statutorily imposed preconditions to judicial authorization (a determination that normal investigative techniques have failed or are unlikely to succeed, and probable cause to believe that (i) an individual is engaged in criminal activity, (ii) particular communications concerning the offense will be obtained through interception, and (iii) the target facilities are being used in connection with the specified criminal activity) were satisfied, and the issuing judge was simply unaware that additional persons might be overheard engaging in incriminating conversations, the intercept being lawful because the application provided sufficient information to enable the judge to determine that the statutory preconditions were satisfied. Pp. 435-436.
(b) There is nothing in the legislative history to suggest that Congress intended § 2518(1)(b)(iv)'s broad identification requirement to play "a central, or even functional, role in guarding against unwarranted use of wiretapping or electronic surveillance," United States v. Chavez, 416 U.S. 562, 578, 94 S.Ct. 1849, 1857, 40 L.Ed.2d 380. P. 437.
4. Nor was suppression justified under § 2518(10)(a)(i) with respect to respondents Merlo and Lauer simply because the Government inadvertently omitted their names from the comprehensive list of all identifiable persons whose conversations had been overheard. Pp. 438-439.
(a) There is nothing in the structure or legislative history of the Act to suggest that incriminating conversations are "unlawfully intercepted" whenever parties to those conversations do not receive discretionary inventory notice under § 2518(8)(d) as a result of the Government's failure to inform the court of their identities. P. 438.
(b) Here, at the time inventory notice was served on the other identifiable persons, the intercept had been completed and the conversations had been "seized" under a valid intercept order, and the fact that discretionary notice reached 39 rather than 41 identifiable persons does not in itself mean that the conversations were unlawfully intercepted. Pp. 438-439.
6 Cir., 513 F.2d 337, reversed and remanded.
Bernard A. Berkman, Cleveland, Ohio, and Carmen A. Policy, Youngstown, Ohio, for respondents.
During the course of the wiretap, the Government learned that respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco were discussing illegal gambling activities with the named subjects. On December 26, 1972, the Government applied for an extension of the initial intercept order.4 This time it sought authorization to intercept gambling-related conversations of Kotoch, Spaganlo, Florea, two other named individuals, and "others as yet unknown," but it did not identify respondents Donovan, Buzzacco and Robbins in this second application.5 The District Court again authorized interception of gambling-related conversations for a maximum of 15 days.
We granted certiorari to resolve these issues, which concern the construction of a major federal statute, 424 U.S. 907, 96 S.Ct. 1100, 47 L.Ed.2d 310, and now reverse.
The United States contends that § 2518(1)(b)(iv) requires that a wiretap application identify only the principal target of the interception, and that § 2518(8)(d) does not require the Government to provide the issuing judge with a list of all identifiable persons who were overheard in the course of an authorized interception. We think neither contention is sound.
Nor can we find support in the legislative history for the "principal target" interpretation. Title III originated as a combination of S. 675, the Federal Wire Interception Act, which was introduced by Senator McClellan several months prior to this Court's decision in Berger v. New York, 388 U.S. 41, 87 S.Ct. 1873, 18 L.Ed.2d 1040 (1967), and S. 2050, the Electronic Surveillance Control Act of 1967, introduced by Senator Hruska a few days after the Berger decision. S.Rep.No.1097, 90th Cong., 2d Sess., 66 (1968), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1968, p. 2112. Both bills required that wiretap applications include a full and complete statement of the facts and circumstances relied upon by the applicant and specification of the nature and location of the communication facilities involved. Although neither bill contained an express identification requirement such as that at issue here, both bills required the application to include a "full and complete statement of the facts concerning all previous applications . . . involving any person named in the application as committing, having committed, or being about to commit an offense." Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Criminal Laws and Procedures of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary on Controlling Crime Through More Effective Law Enforcement, 90th Cong., 1st Sess., 77, § 8(a)(3), and p. 1006, § 2518(4)(a) (1967) (emphasis added). Thus, even at this early stage, it was recognized that an application could identify several individuals, and there is no indication that the identification would be limited to principal targets.
In any event, for our present purposes it is unnecessary to speculate as to exactly how Congress interpreted Berger and Katz with respect to the identification issue. It is sufficient to note that in response to those decisions Congress included an identification requirement which on its face draws no distinction based on the telephone one uses, and the United States points to no evidence in the legislative history that supports such a distinction. Indeed, the legislative materials apparently contain no use of the term "principal target" or any discussion of a different treatment based on the telephone from which a suspect speaks.17 We therefore conclude that a wiretap application must name an individual if the Government has probable cause to believe that the individual is engaged in the criminal activity under investigation and expects to intercept the individual's conversations over the target telephone.
The other statutory provision at issue in this case is 18 U.S.C. § 2518(8) (d), which provides that the judge shall cause to be served on the persons named in the order or application an inventory, which must give notice of the entry of the order or application, state the disposition of the application, and indicate whether communications were intercepted.18 Although the statute mandates inventory notice only for persons named in the application or the order, the statute also provides that the judge may order similar notice to other parties to intercepted communications if he concludes that such action is in the interest of justice.19 Observing that this notice provision does not expressly require law enforcement authorities routinely to supply the judge with specific information upon which to exercise his discretion, the United States contends that it would be inappropriate to read such a requirement into the statute since the judge has the option of asking the law enforcement authorities for whatever information he requires.
Currently, the policy of the Justice Department is to provide the issuing judge with the name of every person who has been overheard as to whom there is any reasonable possibility of indictment. Brief for United States 39. Because it fails to assure that the necessary range of information will be before the issuing judge, this policy does not meet the test set out in Chun. Moreover, where as here, the Government chooses to supply the issuing judge with a list of all identifiable persons rather than a description of the classes into which those persons fall, the list must be complete. Applying these principles, we find that the Government did not comply adequately with § 2518(8)(d), since the names of respondents Merlo and Lauer were not included on the purportedly complete list of identifiable persons submitted to the issuing judge.
There is no basis on the facts of this case to suggest that the authorization orders are facially insufficient, or that the interception was not conducted in conformity with the orders. Thus, only § 2518(10)(a)(i) is relevant: Were the communications "unlawfully intercepted" given the violations of §§ 2518(1)(b) (iv) and 2518(8)(d)?22 Resolution of that question must begin with United States v. Giordano, 416 U.S. 505, 94 S.Ct. 1820, 40 L.Ed.2d 341 (1974), and United States v. Chavez, 416 U.S. 562, 94 S.Ct. 1849, 40 L.Ed.2d 380 (1974). Those cases hold that "(not) every failure to comply fully with any requirement provided in Title III would render the interception of wire or oral communications 'unlawful.' " Id., at 416 U.S., at 574-575, 94 S.Ct., at 1856. To the contrary, suppression is required only for a "failure to satisfy any of those statutory requirements that directly and substantially implement the congressional intention to limit the use of intercept procedures to those situations clearly calling for the employment of this extraordinary investigative device." United States v. Giordano, supra, 416 U.S., at 527, 94 S.Ct., at 1832.
Giordano concerned the provision in Title III requiring that an application for an intercept order be approved by the Attorney General or an Assistant Attorney General specially designated by the Attorney General. Concluding that Congress intended to condition the use of wiretap procedures on the judgment of senior officials in the Department of Justice, the Court required suppression for failure to comply with the approval provision. Chavez concerned the statutory requirement that the application for an intercept order specify the identity of the official authorizing the application. The problem in Chavez was one of misidentification; although the application had in fact been authorized by the Attorney General, the application erroneously identified an Assistant Attorney General as the official authorizing the application. The Court concluded that mere misidentification of the official authorizing the application did not make the application unlawful within the meaning of § 2518(10)(a)(i) since that identification requirement did not play a "substantive role" in the regulatory system. 416 U.S., at 578, 94 S.Ct. at 1857.
"(T)he intent of the provision is that the principle of postuse notice will be retained. This provision alone should insure the community that the techniques are reasonably employed. Through its operation all authorized interceptions must eventually become known at least to the subject. He can then seek appropriate civil redress for example, under section 2520 . . . if he feels that his privacy has been unlawfully invaded." S.Rep.No.1097, 90th Cong., 2d Sess., 105 (1968), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News, p. 2194.
The floor discussion concerning the amendment adding the provision for discretionary notice merely indicates an intent to provide notice to such additional persons as may be constitutionally required.
The legislative history indicates that postintercept notice was designed instead to assure the community that the wiretap technique is reasonably employed. But even recognizing that Congress placed considerable emphasis on that aspect of the overall statutory scheme, we do not think that postintercept notice was intended to serve as an independent restraint on resort to the wiretap procedure.
Although the Government was required to identify respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco in the December 26 application for an extension of the initial intercept, failure to do so in the circumstances here presented did not warrant suppression under § 2518(10)(a)(i). Nor was suppression justified with respect to respondents Merlo and Lauer simply because the Government inadvertently omitted their names from the comprehensive list of all identifiable persons whose conversations had been overheard. We hold that this is the correct result under the provisions of Title III, but we reemphasize the suggestion we made in United States v. Chavez, that "strict adherence by the Government to the provisions of Title III would nonetheless be more in keeping with the responsibilities Congress has imposed upon it when authority to engage in wiretapping or electronic surveillance is sought." 416 U.S., at 580, 94 S.Ct. at 1858.
The order of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded to that court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
I concur in the Court's judgment and in all except Part II-A of the Court's opinion. I cannot agree, however, with the Court's construction of the identification provisions of § 2518(1)(b)(iv), since I believe the application for surveillance in this case complied with statutory requirements. However, the precise reach of the identification requirement is irrelevant because respondents are foreclosed from seeking suppression in any event.
Consistent with the Justice Department's recommendation, the Senate rejected the result which respondents now seek.
"(A) bill as controversial as this . . . requires close attention to the dotting of every 'i' and the crossing of every 't' . . . ." Id., at 14751.
Under these circumstances, the exact words of the statute provide the surest guide to determining Congress' intent, and we would do well to confine ourselves to that area. The statutory provision before us requires the wiretap application to specify the "identity of the person, if known, committing the offense and whose communications are to be intercepted." 18 U.S.C. § 2518(1) (b)(iv). (Emphasis supplied.) As the Court correctly indicates, the identification requirement was carefully added in the wake of Berger v. New York, 388 U.S. 41, 87 S.Ct. 1873, 18 L.Ed.2d 1040 (1967). That case involved the constitutionality of a New York statute requiring the naming of "the person or persons whose communications . . . are to be overheard." That very different statute plainly put Congress on notice that an identification provision could call, as did New York's, for the naming of multiple parties. Indeed, while requiring only the identification of "the person" whose communications are to be intercepted, Congress anticipated the obvious fact that interceptions effected pursuant to a single application and order could potentially affect a large number of persons. Standing to object to intercepted communications is conferred upon "(a)ny aggrieved person . . . ." § 2518(10)(a). In addition, a civil damages remedy is conferred upon "(a)ny person" whose communications are unlawfully intercepted or used in violation of the statute. Thus in fashioning highly specific requirements with respect to wiretap applications, Congress failed to employ language found in other parts of the same statute and so carefully written into the state statute at issue in the Berger case.
The Court emphasizes, however, that the statute expressly recognizes that more than one person may be named in a wiretap application. Ante, at 425. That is indeed true. See §§ 2518(1)(e), (8)(d). But I would think this is all the more reason for focusing upon the precise language in the provision establishing explicit requirements for an application. Since Congress expressly contemplated that applications might contain more than one name, its failure in § 2518(1)(b)(iv) to require the naming of "any person" or "the persons" whose communications are to be intercepted must mean that an open-ended identification requirement was never intended. In other words, Congress reasonably foresaw that, for a variety of reasons, actual wiretap applications might contain the names of more than one person. But Congress did not translate its recognition of what an application might reasonably contain into a command as to what it must contain.
Assuming that plain words of a statute might have to bow, in some circumstances, to compelling legislative history to the contrary, nothing of that kind is found here. As the Court observes, the earlier bills introduced in the Senate contained no identification provision at all. After Berger and Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967), were decided, the requirement was added in what was plainly an abundance of caution. For this Court in Berger flatly discounted any value in New York's broad identification requirement.
Hence, the statute, as it presently stands, comports entirely with Fourth Amendment requirements, and thus achieves the express legislative purpose of " 'reflect(ing) the constitutional commands of particularization.' " Ante, at 427. Under those circumstances, it ill serves this Court to speculate that our coequal branch of Government, despite the clear teaching of the Constitution, incorrectly surmised "that the Constitution (may have) required the naming . . . of all suspects rather than just the primary user." Ibid. In any event, if our own decisions have created confusion in the Congress, which is not surprising, nothing is gained by perpetuating that confusion in the face of Congress' clear intent to comply with this Court's interpretation of the Fourth Amendment.
In short, the Court has redrafted a statute passed by Congress to make it identical to a statutory provision found valueless by this Court a few years ago in the Berger case. This undertaking, unfortunately, is not entirely without consequence, notwithstanding the Court's refusal to approve suppression of the evidence here. Among other things, federal officers are potentially subject to a civil damages action, with compensatory damages of not less than $1,000, plus punitive damages, plus reasonable attorneys' fees.2 Nor is this federal remedy exclusive. State-provided damages remedies are not pre-empted. S.Rep.No. 1097, 90 Cong., 2d Sess., 107 (1968); 2 U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1968, p. 2196. Damages awards aside, the Court's opinion albeit in dictum hints that suppression may indeed be in the offing if an intentional "violation" is shown. Finally, district judges will now be put to the task, at least in some cases, of determining whether probable cause exists with respect to each person listed in the application. § 2518(3)(d). Judges may well wonder why such burdens are imposed upon them for a gain which the Court found illusory in the Berger case.
I would therefore interpret this statute to mean just what it says and no more. Wisely or not, Congress decided, consistent with Fourth Amendment strictures, to require only the identification of "the person" whose conversations are to be intercepted. Since Congress demonstrably knew how to use other language when it so chose, I would take Congress at its word and not try to "improve" on its draftsmanship.
The Court today holds that an application for a warrant to authorize a wiretap under Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, 18 U.S.C. §§ 2510-2520, must name all individuals who the Government has probable cause to believe are committing the offense being investigated and will be overheard. See 18 U.S.C. § 2518(1)(b)(iv). It also holds that the Government must provide sufficient information to the issuing judge to allow him to exercise the discretion provided by 18 U.S.C. § 2518(8)(d). I fully agree with both of these holdings. The Court concludes, however, that if the Government violates these statutory commands, it is nevertheless free to use the intercepted communications as evidence in a criminal proceeding. I cannot agree.
I continue to adhere to the position, expressed for four Members of the Court by Mr. Justice Douglas in his dissent in United States v. Chavez, 416 U.S. 562, 584-585, 94 S.Ct. 1849, 1861, 40 L.Ed.2d 380 (1974), that Title III does not authorize "the courts to pick and choose among various statutory provisions, suppressing evidence only when they determine that a provision is 'substantive,' 'central,' or 'directly and substantially' related to the congressional scheme." The Court has rejected that argument, however, see United States v. Chavez, supra; United States v. Giordano, 416 U.S. 505, 94 S.Ct. 1820, 40 L.Ed.2d 341 (1974), and nothing is to be gained by renewing it here. But even under the standard set forth in Giordano and Chavez and reaffirmed by the Court today, ante, at 433-434, the evidence at issue here should be suppressed.
"the fact that identification of an individual in an application for an intercept order triggers other statutory provisions. First, § 2518(1)(e) requires an intercept application to disclose all previous applications 'involving any of the same persons . . . specified in the application.' . . . Second, § 2518(8)(d) mandates that an inventory notice be served upon 'the persons named in the order or the application.' " Ante, at 425 n. 14 (emphasis added).
Yet in determining whether the identification requirement "directly and substantially implement(s) the congressional intention to limit the use of intercept procedures," United States v. Giordano, supra, at 527, 94 S.Ct., at 1832, or plays a "substantive role" in the "regulatory system" established by Congress, United States v. Chavez, supra, 416 U.S., at 578, 94 S.Ct., at 1857, the Court ignores the requirement's function as a statutory "trigger." In its analysis, the Court focuses solely on whether a list of additional names would affect a judge who must decide whether to issue a warrant. The Court reasons that once the judge has concluded that the specific requirements of § 2518(3)1 have been met, the presence of additional names in the warrant application could not change his decision. Ante, at 435-436. Failure to provide those names is, therefore, insignificant.
It is true, as the Court notes, ante, at 436 n. 23,5 that there is no allegation in this case that had the District Court been informed that the Government expected to overhear respondents Donovan, Buzzacco, and Robbins discussing illegal gambling activities it would not have issued a warrant. But that fact is irrelevant to an analysis of the role of the naming requirement in the regulatory system established by Congress. In Giordano, the Court rejected the argument that the Attorney General's failure to authorize the application for a warrant could be disregarded because the Attorney General had later ratified the application, thus demonstrating that he would have approved it originally. 416 U.S., at 523-524, n. 12, 94 S.Ct. at 1830. The important consideration was whether the requirement of high-level authorization was designed to play an important role, not whether it would have mattered in the particular case. The same analysis should be used here.
The Court's discussion of the consequences of the Government's failure to comply with the notice provision of § 2518(8)(d) parallels its discussion of the naming requirement, and is similarly flawed. The Court does recognize that the notice provision was designed to assure the community that the wiretap technique is reasonably employed and that "Congress placed considerable emphasis on that aspect of the overall statutory scheme." Ante, at 439. But because notice occurs after the intercept is completed, and because notice is not itself "an independent restraint on resort to the wiretap procedure," the Court concludes that failure to notify does not render an interception "unlawful" under § 2518(10)(a)(i). Ante, at 439.
"Injunctive relief, with its attendant discovery proceedings, is not intended to be available . . . . It is expected that civil suits, if any, will instead grow out of the filing of inventories under section 2518(8)(d)." S.Rep.No.1097, 90th Cong., 2d Sess., 107 (1968), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News, p. 2196.
See also id., at 105.
The Court's opinion implies that if the violations of Title III considered here had been intentional, the result would be different. Ante, at 436 n. 23, 439 n. 26. This must be so, for surely this Court would not tolerate the Government's intentional disregard of duties imposed on it by Congress. I also assume that if the Government fails to establish procedures which offer reasonable assurance that it will strictly adhere to the statutory requirements, see ante, at 439-440, resulting failures to comply will be recognized as intentional. There is, therefore, reason to hope that the Court's admonition that the Government should obey the law will have some effect in the future.
But that hope is a poor substitute for certainty that the Government will make every effort to fulfill its responsibilities under Title III. We can obtain that certainty only by according full recognition to the role of the naming and notice requirements in the statutory scheme created by Congress. I respectfully dissent from the Court's failure to do so.
"(d) there is probable cause for belief that the facilities from which, or the place where, the wire or oral communications are to be intercepted are being used, or are about to be used, in connection with the commission of such offense, or are leased to, listed in the name of, or commonly used by such person.
In addition to the December 26 application requesting an extension of the initial intercept order, the Government also filed on that date a separate application seeking authorization to monitor a third telephone discovered at the same North Olmstead address. Both applications were accompanied by another affidavit setting forth the results of the initial monitoring, the manner in which the third telephone was discovered, the facts indicating that the newly discovered telephone was being used to conduct a gambling business, and reasons why continued interception was necessary. A copy of the affidavit filed on November 28 was also attached to the December 26 applications. For the sake of clarity, the two applications filed on December 26 will be treated as a single application.
An inventory notice must be served within a designated period of time upon "the persons named in the order or the application." 18 U.S.C. § 2518(8) (d). The inventory must give notice of the entry of the intercept order or application, state the disposition of the application, and indicate whether communications were or were not intercepted. Ibid. Upon the filing of a motion, the judge has discretion to make available the intercepted communications, the applications, and the orders. Ibid.
Although respondents Merlo and Lauer were not served with inventory notice pursuant to § 2518(8)(d), the intercept orders, applications, and related papers were made available to all the defendants, including Merlo and Lauer, on November 26, 1973. Thus, the introduction into evidence at trial of the contents of the intercepted conversations and evidence derived therefrom would not be prohibited by 18 U.S.C. § 2518(9).
Every Court of Appeals that has considered the issue has concluded that an individual whose conversations probably will be intercepted by a wiretap must be identified in the wiretap application if the law enforcement authorities have probable cause to believe the individual is committing the offense for which the wiretap is sought. United States v. Chiarizio, 525 F.2d 289, 292 (C.A.2 1975); United States v. Bernstein, 509 F.2d 996 (C.A.4 1975), cert. pending, No. 74-1486; United States v. Doolittle, 507 F.2d 1368 (CA5), aff'd en banc, 518 F.2d 500 (1975), cert. pending, Nos. 75-500, 75-509, 75-513; United States v. Civella, 533 F.2d 1395 (C.A.8 1976), cert. pending, Nos. 75-1813, 76-169; United States v. Russo, 527 F.2d 1051, 1056 (C.A.10 1975), cert. denied, 426 U.S. 906, 96 S.Ct. 2226, 48 L.Ed.2d 831 (1976). See also United States v. Moore, 168 U.S.App.D.C. 227, 235-236, 513 F.2d 485, 493-494 (1975) (interpreting D.C.Code § 23-547(a)(2)(D), which is almost identical to the provision at issue here).
A number of these courts have concluded, and respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco argue, that our decision in United States v. Kahn, 415 U.S. 143, 94 S.Ct. 977, 39 L.Ed.2d 225 (1974), resolved this identification issue. See United States v. Chiarizio, supra; United States v. Moore, supra. Although there is language in Kahn suggesting that wiretap applications must identify all such individuals, the identification question presented here was not before us in Kahn. The question in that case was whether a wiretap application had to identify a known user of the target telephone whose complicity in the criminal activity under investigation was not known at the time of the application. Kahn is a relevant, though not controlling, precedent.
The United States does not suggest that regardless of the factual circumstances a wiretap application must identify only a single individual. To the contrary, it concedes that if two or more persons are using the target telephone "equally" to commit the offense, and thus are "equally" targets of the investigation, "all must be named." Brief for United States 18 n. 13.
Counsel for the United States explained this position succinctly at oral argument: "The critical distinction . . . is (one) between the users of the telephone that is being monitored on the one hand, and all other persons throughout the world who may converse from unmonitored phones on the other hand." Tr. of Oral Arg. 13.
At the time of the enactment of Title III, Congress did not have before it the view we expressed on this issue in United States v. Kahn, 415 U.S., at 155 n. 15, 94 S.Ct. at 984. The Fourth Amendment requires specification of "the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." In the wiretap context, those requirements are satisfied by identification of the telephone line to be tapped and the particular conversations to be seized. It is not a constitutional requirement that all those likely to be overheard engaging in incriminating conversations be named. Specification of this sort "identif(ies) the person whose constitutionally protected area is to be invaded rather than 'particularly describing' the communications, conversations, or discussions to be seized." Berger v. New York, 388 U.S., at 59, 87 S.Ct., at 1883.
That Congress may have so understood the constitutional requirement is also suggested by the portion of the Senate Report dealing with that provision of S. 917 that required the intercept order to "specify the identity, of the individual if known, whose communications are to be intercepted." The Senate Report merely cites West v. Cabell, 153 U.S. 78, 14 S.Ct. 752, 38 L.Ed. 643 (1894), which concerns the need for proper identification of the subject of an arrest warrant. S.Rep.No.1097, 90th Cong., 2d Sess., 102 (1968). To the extent that Congress may have considered West to apply to wiretap orders, we have no reason to believe that Congress considered its applicability to extend only to those suspects using the target telephone.
The inventory notice must be served within a reasonable time but not later than 90 days after the date the application for an intercept order was filed. On an ex parte showing of good cause, service of the inventory may be postponed.
In addition to these provisions for mandatory and discretionary inventory notice, the Government is required to supply the issuing judge with recordings of the intercepted conversations, which are to be sealed according to his directions. 18 U.S.C. § 2518(8)(a). These notice and return provisions satisfy constitutional requirements. See Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 355-356, 88 S.Ct. 507, 513, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 and n. 16 (1967); Berger v. New York, supra, 388 U.S., at 60, 87 S.Ct., at 1884.
"A, a businessman, talks with his customers, and the latter are served with papers showing that A is being bugged . . . . (T)he damage to confidence in A and to A's reputation in general may damage A unjustly. In this case it would seem that the customers should not be served with the inventory." 114 Cong.Rec. 14476 (1968).
"Perhaps the approach of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which suggested that rather than submitting specific names we should submit categories of persons who had been overheard, is a better policy, would be more helpful to the district court in exercising its discretion, and we would have no objection to following any reasonable policy that the district courts determine would be useful to them in this area." Tr. of Oral Arg. 6-7.
as opposed to constitutional, violations, see nn. 15 and 19, supra, turns on the provisions of Title III rather than the judicially fashioned exclusionary rule aimed at deterring violations of Fourth Amendment rights. United States v. Giordano, 416 U.S. 505, 524, 94 S.Ct. 1820, 1831, 40 L.Ed.2d 341 (1974).
The concurring opinion of THE CHIEF JUSTICE contends that respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco lack standing even to seek suppression. Post, at 440-441. This contention rests on the ground that Congress rejected an amendment proposed by Senators Long and Hart that would have added a fourth ground justifying suppression namely, that the person against whom the Government sought to introduce the evidence was not named in the court order. Since these three respondents would have been entitled to suppression under the rejected amendment, the concurring opinion concludes they cannot seek suppression here.
This view fails to recognize that § 2518(10)(a) establishing the suppression remedy provides alternative grounds on which one can seek suppression of evidence derived from a wiretap. Thus, the mere fact that Congress chose not to add a fourth alternative could not mean that it intended to prevent persons who would have been covered by that alternative from seeking suppression on one of the other grounds. As the Justice Department commented, in the same statement cited in the concurring opinion: "The (Long and Hart) amendment is designed to limit the scope of electronic surveillance, but it accomplishes this purpose in an artificial manner. So long as a court order is validly obtained, evidence obtained under the order should be admissible against any person not merely against the person named in the order." 114 Cong.Rec. 14718 (1968) (emphasis added). Here, respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco challenge the validity of the court order, and nothing in either Congress' rejection of the proposed amendment or the Justice Department's comment thereon suggests that § 2518(10)(a)(i) is unavailable to persons who might have had a remedy under a provision not enacted by Congress.
There is no suggestion in this case that the Government agents knowingly failed to identify respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco for the purpose of keeping relevant information from the District Court that might have prompted the court to conclude that probable cause was lacking. If such a showing had been made, we would have a different case. Nor is there any suggestion that as a result of the failure to name these three respondents they were denied the mandatory inventory notice supplied to persons named in the application. 18 U.S.C. § 2518(8)(d). Respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco were among the 37 persons served with the initial inventory.
No one suggests that the failure to identify in a wiretap application individuals who are "unknown" within the meaning of the statute, see United States v. Kahn, 415 U.S. 143, 94 S.Ct. 977, 39 L.Ed.2d 225 (1974), requires suppression of intercepted conversations to which those individuals were parties. Though recognizing that the failure to identify such an "unknown" individual does not make unlawful an otherwise valid intercept order respondents Donovan, Robbins, and Buzzacco suggest that the opposite is true with respect to the failure to identify in a wiretap application individuals who are "known" within the meaning of the statute. Counsel for these respondents suggested at oral argument that this difference in result is justified by analogy to warrantless searches or arrests. Tr. of Oral Arg. 40. Although law enforcement officials can often take action without a warrant when they have been unable to foresee the circumstances that eventually confronted them, they still must obtain a search or arrest warrant when their prior knowledge is sufficient to establish probable cause, and it is suggested that the same principle applies here. The major flaw in that reasoning is that this case does not concern warrantless action. Here, the omission on the part of law enforcement authorities was not a failure to seek prior judicial authorization, but a failure to identify every individual who could be expected to be overhead engaging in incriminating conversations. That the complete absence of prior judicial authorization would make an intercept unlawful has no bearing on the lawfulness of an intercept order that fails to identify every target.
Even if we assume that Congress thought that a broad identification requirement was constitutionally mandated, it does not follow that Congress imposed statutory suppression under §§ 2515 and 2518(10)(a)(i) as a sanction for noncompliance. In limiting use of the intercept procedure to "the most precise and discriminate circumstances," S.Rep.No.1097, 90th Cong., 2d Sess., 102 (1968), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News, p. 2191, Congress required law enforcement authorities to convince a district court that probable cause existed to believe that a specific person was committing a specific offense using a specific telephone. This requirement was satisfied here when the application set forth sufficient information to indicate that the primary targets were conducting a gambling business over four particular telephones. Nothing in the legislative history indicates that Congress intended to declare an otherwise constitutional intercept order "unlawful" under § 2518(10)(a)(i) resulting in suppression under § 2515 for failure to name additional targets.
Moreover, respondents Merlo and Lauer were not prejudiced by their failure to receive postintercept notice under either of the District Court's inventory orders. As noted earlier, the Government made available to all defendants the intercept orders, applications, and related papers. See n. 7, supra. And in response to pretrial discovery motions, the Government produced transcripts of the intercepted conversations.
Thus, this case is unlike United States v. Chavez. There, the Court concluded that the misidentification of the authorizing official as an Assistant Attorney General when the Attorney General had actually authorized the warrant application could not have affected the judge's decision to issue the warrant. 416 U.S., at 572, 94 S.Ct. at 1854.

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