Opinion ID: 577188
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Motion to suppress evidence properly denied

Text: 32 Reed next contends that the district court improperly denied his motion to suppress evidence seized from three locations in Oktibbeha County, Mississippi, in August 1981. The relevant warrants had issued authorizing the search of a farmhouse, a suitcase and a safety deposit box. 33 We consider first whether Reed has established standing to challenge the search warrants issued for the farmhouse and for the suitcase. Before challenging the validity of a search, a defendant must demonstrate a legitimate expectation of privacy in the premises searched. United States v. Gonzalez, 940 F.2d 1413, 1420 (11th Cir.1991). Reed claims standing to contest the search of the farmhouse because the affidavit in support of the search warrant stated that a man known as Jack Reed controlled and occupied the house. This affidavit, however, was based on the law enforcement officials' erroneous belief that one of the purchasers of the property who had used a fictitious name was in fact Reed. Reed thus lacks standing to contest this search. 34 Reed also claims standing to challenge the search of the suitcase. Reed left a locked suitcase with Dr. Greg Boring, a person with whom Reed had been only briefly acquainted. Reed promised to retrieve it within three months but failed to do so. Nearly one year later, two men unknown to Boring informed him that they were to collect the suitcase for Reed. Boring refused to release it without Reed's permission. Shortly thereafter, a woman known to Boring as Reed's companion instructed Boring to release the suitcase to the men when they returned. No one returned to retrieve the suitcase, and no one provided further instruction. Approximately two months later, Boring released the suitcase to law enforcement officials at their request. 35 Finding that the facts show[ed] an erosion of Reed's reasonable expectation of privacy, the lower court concluded that Reed had abandoned the suitcase by the time it was searched by law enforcement officers. We review the district court's finding of abandonment under the clearly erroneous standard. United States v. Winchester, 916 F.2d 601, 603 (11th Cir.1990). In determining abandonment,  'the critical inquiry is whether the person prejudiced by the search ... voluntarily discarded, left behind, or otherwise relinquished his interest in the property in question so that he could no longer retain a reasonable expectation of privacy with regard to it at the time of the search. '  Id. (emphasis in original) (quoting United States v. McKennon, 814 F.2d 1539, 1545 (11th Cir.1987) (citation omitted)). For over one year Reed and his purported representatives promised but failed to retrieve the suitcase. We therefore find that the district court did not clearly err in its determination that Reed abandoned the suitcase and thus lacked standing to challenge its search. See United States v. Hershenow, 680 F.2d 847, 854 (1st Cir.1982). 36 Reed is properly before this Court to contest the search of his safety deposit box. A Mississippi judicial officer issued the search warrant for the safety deposit box on the basis of written affidavits and sworn oral testimony of law enforcement officers. The search yielded $210,000 in gold and currency. Reed contends that although the search warrant was issued by a state judge in accordance with state law, the search was federal in nature and therefore subject to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Reed specifically argues that the failure of the issuing judge to record or transcribe oral testimony offered in support of the warrants required suppression of the fruits of the search. See Fed.R.Crim.P. 41. 9 37 A state search warrant must comply with federal standards if the search was federal in execution. United States v. Gilbert, 942 F.2d 1537, 1539 (11th Cir.1991); United States v. Martin, 600 F.2d 1175, 1180 (5th Cir.1979). A search is federal in execution if a federal official  'had a hand in it.... The decisive factor ... is the actuality of a share by a federal official in the total enterprise of securing and selecting evidence by other than sanctioned means.'  Martin, 600 F.2d at 1180 (quoting Navarro v. United States, 400 F.2d 315, 317 (5th Cir.1968) (citations omitted)). In the instant case, federal agents provided intelligence information to the state officers involved. The warrant was therefore federal in character and subject to Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. 38 This Circuit has held that failure to meet the requirements of Rule 41 mandates a finding that the affidavit supporting the search warrant was inadequate and the evidence seized under that warrant must be suppressed. United States v. Acosta, 501 F.2d 1330, 1334 (5th Cir.1974), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 891, 96 S.Ct. 188, 46 L.Ed.2d 122 (1975); see United States v. Copeland, 538 F.2d 639, 642 (5th Cir.1976). Since the Acosta decision, however, the Supreme Court in United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 926, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 3422, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984), has ruled that [i]n the absence of an allegation that the magistrate abandoned his detached and neutral role, suppression is appropriate only if the officers were dishonest or reckless in preparing the affidavit or could not have harbored an objectively reasonable belief in the existence of probable cause. 39 Because Reed has alleged neither a breach of the magistrate's duties nor misconduct on the part of the participating law enforcement officers, suppression is appropriate only if the officers acted in bad faith. We therefore review de novo whether the officers acted in objective good faith. United States v. Taxacher, 902 F.2d 867, 871 (11th Cir.1990), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 1307, 113 L.Ed.2d 242 (1991). This inquiry is confined to determining whether reasonably well trained officers would have recognized that the issuance of the warrant was illegal despite the magistrate's authorization. Id. 40 In the case at bar, only state officers conducted the search and offered sworn oral testimony before the state judicial officer. Both the process used to obtain the warrant and the standards used by the state court judge to evaluate the request for the warrant fully accorded with the applicable Mississippi laws. We find that it is objectively reasonable that Mississippi law enforcement personnel seeking a search warrant would follow Mississippi procedural rules rather than federal procedural rules. See id. at 872; United States v. Accardo, 749 F.2d 1477, 1480-81 (11th Cir.1985), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 949, 106 S.Ct. 314, 88 L.Ed.2d 295 (1985). The lower court therefore properly admitted evidence obtained from the search of the safety deposit box. 41