Opinion ID: 786677
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Majority's Analysis

Text: 253 The majority opinion makes two mistakes. First, it repeatedly characterizes the search by Agent Bowdich and his fellow officers as a parole search. See, e.g., maj. op. at 1050-51 and 1051. However, Agent Bowdich's suspicionless search for evidence of a pre-parole crime was not a parole search under California law. This first mistake is not essential to the majority's analysis, however, for the majority is willing to assume that the search and accompanying detention violated the Fourth Amendment. 254 Second, the majority relies on New York v. Harris, 495 U.S. 14, 110 S.Ct. 1640, 109 L.Ed.2d 13 (1990), to conclude, incorrectly, that the modern cases in which the Court has performed an attenuation analysis — Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor — do not apply. Unlike the first mistake, this mistake is crucial. 255 The majority discusses the search and detention in Crawford's home as if they can be neatly separated for analysis. See, e.g., maj. op. at 1054 (The analysis that applies to illegal detentions differs from that applied to illegal searches.); id. at 1057-58 (Because the search failed to produce any physical evidence, however, and because Defendant made no incriminating statement during the search, we fail to see how the search, as distinct from the presumed illegal detention, caused Defendant's statement in the FBI office.). While analyses of illegal searches and seizures can sometimes be kept separate, there is no doubt that an illegal search and an illegal detention both violate the Fourth Amendment. See, e.g., Chandler v. Miller, 520 U.S. 305, 308-09, 117 S.Ct. 1295, 137 L.Ed.2d 513 (1997) (illegal search); Dunaway, 442 U.S. at 287, 99 S.Ct. 2248, 99 S.Ct. 2248. (illegal seizure). It is a standard police practice to restrict the motion of suspects during a residential search. See, e.g., Michigan v. Summers, 452 U.S. 692, 705, 101 S.Ct. 2587, 69 L.Ed.2d 340 (1981) (Fourth Amendment allows temporary detention of homeowner while police search the house pursuant to a warrant, so long as detention is reasonable); Franklin v. Foxworth, 31 F.3d 873, 875 (9th Cir.1994) (describing custom and practice of Portland police to detain occupants of a residence during a search); Wellins, 654 F.2d at 552 (defendant detained while his house was searched). In this case, because the search and detention were carried out simultaneously and with the same goal, Crawford's detention was inseparable from, and ancillary to, the illegal search, and the legality of the search and detention must be analyzed together. 256 The attenuation analysis in Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor applies equally to illegal searches and illegal seizures. See Brown, 422 U.S. at 597, 95 S.Ct. 2254(In Wong Sun, the Court pronounced the principles to be applied where the issue is whether statements and other evidence obtained after an illegal arrest or search should be excluded.). Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor have strikingly similar facts. In all three cases, the defendants were detained without probable cause. In Brown and Taylor, the defendants were formally arrested; in Dunaway, the defendant was not formally arrested. After their illegal detentions, all three defendants confessed. In each case, the Court conducted an attenuation analysis to determine if the confession was the product of the illegal detention. 257 In Harris, by contrast, the defendant was arrested with probable cause. The police entered Harris's house without an arrest warrant and arrested him in the house. Because the entry into the house had been accomplished without an arrest warrant, the arrest was illegal under Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980). However, the Court held that since the illegal act — the arrest — had been performed with probable cause and because the illegal arrest had not produced the confession, the confession was not required to be suppressed under Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor. See Harris, 495 U.S. at 21, 110 S.Ct. 1640. 258 It is uncontested in this case that at the time of the search Agent Bowdich had probable cause to arrest Crawford for the bank robbery. But he never arrested him. That is, he had probable cause to do what he did not do. But he had no probable cause or reasonable suspicion to justify the search and accompanying detention. That is, he had no probable cause to do what he did do. The majority opinion nonetheless concludes that because Agent Bowdich had probable cause to arrest Crawford, the suspicionless illegal search and detention are comparable to the illegal arrest in Harris. I disagree with that conclusion. 259 First, in Harris, the police had probable cause to justify their illegal act — the arrest of Harris. They lacked an arrest warrant, which made Harris's arrest illegal under Payton; but they had probable cause to perform the arrest. In this case, by contrast, Agent Bowdich had no probable cause (or even reasonable suspicion) to justify his illegal acts — the search and accompanying detention. The Supreme Court in Harris stated clearly that the existence of probable cause for the illegal arrest differentiated that case from Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor, where there had been no probable cause for the illegal actions in those cases. It wrote: 260 In each of those cases, evidence obtained from a criminal defendant following arrest was suppressed because the police lacked probable cause. The three cases stand for the familiar proposition that the indirect fruits of an illegal search or arrest should be suppressed when they bear a sufficiently close relationship to the underlying illegality. 261 495 U.S. at 18-19, 110 S.Ct. 1640. 262 Second, in Harris, there was no causal link between the illegal act (the arrest without a warrant) and Harris's confession. The fact that Harris was illegally arrested in his home made it no more likely that he would confess than if he had been legally arrested with a warrant. The Court in Harris specifically noted the importance of the causal connection between the illegal conduct and the confessions in Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor. The Court wrote: 263 We have emphasized ... that attenuation analysis is only appropriate where, as a threshold matter, courts determine that the challenged evidence is in some sense the product of illegal government activity.   . Harris' statement taken at the police station was not the product of being in unlawful custody. Neither was it the fruit of having been arrested in the home rather than someplace else.    We ... hold that the station house statement in this case was admissible because Harris was in legal custody, ... and because the statement, while the product of an arrest and being in legal custody, was not the fruit of the fact that the arrest was made in the house rather than someplace else. 264 Id. at 19-20, 110 S.Ct. 1640 (citations and quotation marks omitted). In this case, as in Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor, there is a clear causal link between the illegal actions and Crawford's confession. 265 The majority opinion, however, concludes that there was no causal link. In part, the majority reaches this conclusion by a divide-and-conquer strategy. It treats the illegal search and detention as if they were two separate events, such that a causal relationship must be established between the illegal search and the confession, and, separately, between the illegal detention and the confession. But these illegal actions were inextricably intertwined. The question therefore must be whether these illegal actions considered together, as they occurred in the real world, were causally connected to Crawford's confession. 266 In part, the majority reaches its conclusion by a because-we-say-so strategy. It simply denies that there was a causal link. But Agent Bowdich's forthright testimony contradicts that conclusion. Agent Bowdich — who was in the best position to know — clearly believed that there was a causal link. As he testified, the illegal search and detention were a tool to get Crawford to confess. Given Agent Bowdich's clear statement of purpose, as well as the factual narrative of how he accomplished that purpose, it is impossible to conclude that there was no causal link. The degree of the causal connection may be in question; but the fact of that connection cannot be denied. 267 Harris is premised on there being no causal link at all. Once there is a some kind of a causal connection, Harris no longer governs. In the words quoted by the Court in Harris, the attenuation analysis applies when the challenged evidence is  in some sense the product of the illegal government activity. Harris, 495 U.S. at 19, 110 S.Ct. 1640 (citation omitted) (emphasis added). Once there is a causal connection in some sense, the degree and consequence of that connection is evaluated under the attenuation test of Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor. 268 Third, and finally, the majority opinion relies on a sentence in Harris to conclude that an attenuation analysis is not required in this case. Maj. op. at 1056. I quote that sentence in context: 269 Because the officers had probable cause to arrest Harris for a crime, Harris was not unlawfully in custody when he was removed to the station house, given Miranda warnings, and allowed to talk. For Fourth Amendment purposes, the legal issue is the same as it would be had the police arrested Harris on his doorstep, illegally entered his home to search for evidence, and later interrogated Harris at the station house. Similarly, if the police had made a warrantless entry into Harris' home, not found him there, but arrested him on the street when he returned, a later statement made by him after proper warnings would no doubt be admissible. 270 495 U.S. at 18, 110 S.Ct. 1640(emphasis added to indicate sentence quoted by the majority). Here, the Court is comparing the actual illegal arrest of Harris inside his home to two hypothetical situations. With these hypotheticals, the Court is making the point that there was no causal link between the illegal acts and the subsequent confession. In Harris, the illegal arrest did not produce the confession. See id. at 19, 110 S.Ct. 1640(Harris' statement taken at the police station was not the product of being in unlawful custody.). In the two hypotheticals, the illegal search and illegal entry did not produce the confession. In other words, the Court was emphasizing the necessity of a causal connection between the illegal act and the confession, and thereby differentiating Harris from Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor, in which there was such a connection. Thus, far from supporting the majority's analysis, the sentence it quotes from Harris serves only to underline the difference between this case and Harris. 271 In sum, Agent Bowdich gained a psychological advantage over Crawford through the illegal early morning search of his residence and the illegal detention incident to that search. This advantage would not have been available had Agent Bowdich simply waited until Crawford walked out onto the sidewalk before arresting him. Because Agent Bowdich had no probable cause (or even reasonable suspicion) to justify his illegal acts, and because those illegal acts had the purpose and effect of getting Crawford to confess, this case does not come under the rationale of Harris, but rather under the rationale of Brown, Dunaway, and Taylor. Under those cases, the illegal actions of Agent Bowdich and his fellow officers were not sufficiently attenuated to allow Crawford's confession to be admitted into evidence.