Opinion ID: 835638
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: motion to suppress subpoenaed records

Text: Defendant's next assignment of error pertains to his motion to suppress certain evidence that investigators had subpoenaed from third parties. The subpoenaed items included bank records, medical records, cellular telephone and pager records, employment records, and the like. Defendant argues that, although the records all were created and maintained by third parties, he had a significant privacy interest in them, in that they pertained to his activities and transactions in areas that the legislature has recognized as private. Because of his privacy interest in the records, defendant argues, the state could not lawfully obtain them by means of a mere subpoena directed at the entities that created and maintained the records but, instead, must obtain a search warrant. Defendant concludes that, because police investigators did not obtain search warrants for the records and there were no exigent circumstance obviating the need for warrants, the records must be suppressed. Part of our difficulty with this assignment of error is the fact that defendant adverts generally to the denial of his motion to suppress, but does not specify which of the myriad items described in the motion were erroneously admitted during his trial. Our only hint in that respect comes from the state's brief: It describes five items that were admitted at trial that potentially are relevant to defendant's motion: (1) photographs from a bank surveillance camera showing defendant withdrawing money from an automatic teller machine (ATM) at 8:54 p.m. on February 24, 1998; (2) evidence that defendant drove a black Acura with TIGERL vanity plates; (3) records provided by defendant's employer of telephone calls made from defendant's work station in February 1998; (4) testimony by a personnel specialist from defendant's workplace that defendant's employment records listed defendant's home as being at a specified address in Washington County; and (5) records of telephone calls made in 1997 and 1998 on defendant's account with a cellular telephone provider. We dismiss the first four items without discussion: We reject any claim that defendant might have a cognizable privacy interest in the license plates on his car, photographs taken of him in a public place, the address that he provided to his employer for tax and payroll purposes, or the telephone usage records of his employer. In considering whether the prosecutor needed a warrant to obtain defendant's own cellular telephone records, we begin with this court's observation in State v. Tanner, 304 Or. 312, 319-20, 745 P.2d 757 (1987), that, under the Oregon Constitution, a person's right to be free from unreasonable searches extends to those places and things in which the person has a privacy interest, even when there is no physical or sensory invasion into the person's own possessions or space. Whether a person has a cognizable privacy interest in an item is an issue of law. Defendant clearly had a cognizable privacy interest in the content of his telephone calls. See ORS 133.724 (setting out requirement that police obtain judicially issued warrant to intercept a telephonic communication). However, we cannot identify a source of law that establishes that defendant also had some interest in keeping private any records kept by a third party, his cellular telephone provider, respecting his cellular telephone usage. The cellular telephone provider generated and maintained those records from the provider's own equipment and for the provider's own, separate, and legitimate business purposes (such as billing). Cf. State v. Meredith, 337 Or. 299, 96 P.3d 342 (2004) (defendant, whose location and on-the-job activities were monitored via transmitter attached to her employer's vehicle, had no protected privacy interest in being free from that type of observation by her employer). Neither are we aware of any principle that would prevent the cellular telephone provider from responding to a proper subpoena. Defendant's assignment of error is not well taken.