Opinion ID: 2979090
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Kinsella’s Authority to Consent to Search

Text: Burcham next argues that, even if the officers’ version is credited, the search of the storage unit was still impermissible because Kinsella was not listed as an authorized user on the unit’s lease agreement and did not have authority from Burcham to enter the unit or allow others to enter. Whether Burcham is correct turns on the concept of apparent authority. Police may obtain consent to search a location from anyone having “common authority over or other sufficient relationship to the premises”; the defendant himself need not have given consent. United States v. McCauley, 548 F.3d 440, 446 (6th Cir. 2008) (citations omitted). Further, actual authority is not required. The consent of someone possessing apparent authority will render a search No. 09-5245 United States v. Burcham Page 7 permissible. Illinois v. Rodriguez, 497 U.S. 177, 188 (1990). Apparent authority exists “if the facts available to the officer at the moment warrant . . . a man of reasonable caution in the belief that the consenting party had authority over the premises.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted) (ellipsis in original). Under this formulation of apparent authority, we do not have any trouble finding that the officers reasonably believed Kinsella to have authority to consent to a search of the storage unit. According to the officers’ testimony, Kinsella, Burcham’s girlfriend, was cooperative and provided them the access code and the key to the unit. Given the nature of storage units, it is reasonable to assume that someone close to the defendant with both the access code and key to the unit has authority to enter the unit and to allow others to do so. Confirming this, the facility’s manager went from requesting a warrant to allowing unimpeded entry when he learned that Kinsella had the code and key, a reaction that implies the general understanding that possession of the code and key to a storage unit are strong indicators of access and authority. Finally, Kinsella willingly signed a consent-to-search form, and it would be odd for someone to grant consent to search a place over which she had no authority. We therefore agree with the district court that the officers reasonably believed that Kinsella had authority to consent to search the storage unit, and thus we affirm the denial of the motion to suppress.