Opinion ID: 1458127
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Whether the Affidavit Contains a Full and Complete Statement of the Facts

Text: In reviewing whether an affidavit contains a full and complete statement of facts in compliance with § 2518(1)(c), we assess whether the affidavit attests that adequate investigative tactics were exhausted before the wiretap order was sought or that such methods reasonably appeared unlikely to succeed or too dangerous. Gonzalez, Inc., 412 F.3d at 1111. As a general rule, proof that law enforcement officials either lied or made reckless misstatements in affidavits to secure a warrant or order does not in and of itself invalidate that warrant or order, or compel suppression of evidence obtained upon its execution. But false statements that are material in causing the warrant to issue will invalidate it. United States v. Ippolito, 774 F.2d 1482, 1485 (9th Cir.1985). Agent Schrock's 45-page affidavit adequately describes the DEA's use of various investigative techniques throughout its 19-month investigation of the Rivera organization, explains why those techniques did not achieve the purposes of the investigation, and explains why the DEA did not use other investigative techniques because they were deemed unlikely to achieve those purposes. The affidavit explains that the DEA and local authorities in Yakima used six confidential sources and four sources of information to obtain information about the Rivera organization. For example, one confidential source identified Rigoberto as the user of Target Telephone 2 and was instructed by Gilberto to earn money for him by selling cocaine; a second purchased a pound of marijuana from Tony Cuevas and identified him as a subordinate Yakima-based distributor for the Rivera organization; a third attempted to infiltrate the Rivera organization by renting an apartment from Sabino Rivera and purchasing three pounds of methamphetamine from Margarita Sanchez; and a fourth, CS5, had numerous narcotics-related conversations with Jerardo Rivera over Target Telephone 1 and made four controlled cocaine purchases from Jerardo between November 2004 and January 2005, which also involved Mendoza and Rigoberto. The affidavit also explains, however, that these confidential sources and sources of information were unlikely to help the DEA verify the identities of the other members of the Rivera organization and understand the organization's methods of money laundering. For example, one of the confidential sources, who had once been threatened with a gun by Gilberto, was considered to be in too much danger; several of the confidential sources and sources of information were unwilling or too scared to infiltrate the Rivera organization or even continue cooperating with law enforcement; and one confidential source and one source of information were convicted of crimes and deported. Defendants contend that the affidavit should have provided more detail, such as why a confidential source was considered to be in too much danger, why other confidential sources were unwilling or too scared to infiltrate the Rivera organization, and why the government chose to deport a confidential source and a source of information. However, we have not required such a level of detail in a wiretap application. In Blackmon, we found inadequate an affidavit's explanation that four previously-used informants were insufficient to meet the purpose of the investigation because informants typically only possess limited knowledge concerning the scope of the criminal enterprise and because subjects of an investigation know that it is [in] their best interest to reveal as little as possible to others concerning how their business is conducted. 273 F.3d at 1210. We concluded that this general explanation was insufficient to prove necessity because it would be true of most or all drug conspiracy investigations, and the limitations on the usefulness of informants, no matter how successful or potentially successful to the particular operation, would support the necessity of a wiretap. Id. We reached the opposite conclusion in United States v. Canales Gomez, where the affidavit explained that the continued use of confidential informants was unlikely to be successful because the informants were in custody, were no longer in contact with members of the target drug trafficking organization, had been denied access to suppliers and customers, and were unaware of relevant trafficking locations or the scope of the full conspiracy. 358 F.3d 1221, 1225 (9th Cir.2004). The affidavit thus concluded that any temporary release of the informants would have been fruitless because no long-term buyer-seller relationship could have been developed, because any attempt by the informants to re-contact the organization would have been suspicious and dangerous, and because the informants would have been unable to provide timely, comprehensive information regarding the current trafficking operations. Id. We found that explanation to be sufficient. Id. Like the affidavit in Canales Gomez, and unlike that in Blackmon, the affidavit here did more than recite the inherent limitations of using confidential informants; it explained in reasonable detail why each confidential source or source of information was unable or unlikely to succeed in achieving the goals of the Rivera investigation. That is sufficient. While we do agree with Defendants that the affidavit failed to explain why CS5  who had purchased increasing amounts of cocaine from Jerardo and others only a few months before the DEA applied for the wiretap  was believed incapable of infiltrating the Rivera organization to the extent necessary to identify Jerardo's source of supply and his associates (besides Mendoza and Rigoberto) in importing, processing and selling cocaine, we conclude that this failure, given the level of detail in the affidavit as a whole, does not render the affidavit inadequate for purposes of § 2518(1)(c). See United States v. Fernandez, 388 F.3d 1199, 1237 (9th Cir.2004) (concluding that wiretap affidavit satisfied the requirements of § 2518(1)(c) despite the fact that it included some statements merely describing the inherent limitations of traditional investigative techniques); United States v. Torres, 908 F.2d 1417, 1423 (9th Cir.1990) (The presence of conclusory language in the affidavit will not negate a finding of necessity if the affidavit, as a whole, alleges sufficient facts demonstrating necessity.); cf. Blackmon, 273 F.3d at 1208 (suppressing wiretap evidence in part because the [wiretap] application contains only generalized statements that would be true of any narcotics investigation) (emphasis added). The affidavit also includes sufficient case-specific detail in its discussion of physical surveillance. The affidavit states that the DEA conducted physical surveillance of target residences and businesses on numerous occasions in order to corroborate information provided by confidential sources and identify residences of suspects, interactions between suspects, and possible methods of laundering narcotics proceeds. The affidavit describes how, for example, physical surveillance allowed the DEA to verify that Gilberto used a particular mobile telephone number that was subscribed to by Espinoza and to determine that Rigoberto was likely involved in at least one of Jerardo's cocaine sales to CS5. However, the affidavit explains that despite the usefulness of physical surveillance, it did not significantly broaden investigators' understanding of how the Rivera organization functioned, did not verify relationships between suspects, and did not provide sufficient evidence to warrant the arrest or prosecution of the organization's members. We disagree with Defendants that the affidavit is misleading in stating that physical surveillance did not verify relationships between suspects or provide sufficient evidence to prosecute the organization's members. While it is true that the affidavit describes the suspected roles of fifteen persons in the Rivera organization and certain relationships among them, it is apparent that in many cases the DEA required additional evidence to verify those relationships. Moreover, while physical surveillance in combination with the use of confidential sources may have provided the government with enough evidence to arrest and prosecute a few members of the Rivera organization for drug crimes, it is clear from the affidavit that the government required additional evidence to accomplish its purpose of uprooting the entire drug trafficking conspiracy. We also disagree with Defendants that the affidavit relies only on a description of the inherent limitations of physical surveillance in explaining why that investigative technique was unlikely to further help achieve the purposes of the investigation. The affidavit provides three case-specific reasons why in the Rivera investigation physical surveillance was particularly unlikely to be more successful: (1) many members of the Rivera organization had their telephone bills sent to an unused family residence or to a girlfriend's residence so as not to disclose their current residential address to law enforcement; (2) many members of the Rivera organization lived in close-knit communities whose residents included illegal aliens who often were suspicious of law enforcement and would tip off other residents who they believed were targets of surveillance; and (3) members of the Rivera organization were suspicious of law enforcement surveillance and employed countermeasures in attempts to defeat such surveillance. Moreover, the affidavit describes two specific instances in which Rigoberto and Mendoza employed such countermeasures. Thus, the affidavit does more than describe the inherent limitations of physical surveillance. It also specif[ies] why, in the particular case at hand, these inherent limitations will [cause ordinary investigative techniques to] be insufficient. Blackmon, 273 F.3d at 1210. We further disagree with Defendants that the affidavit's discussion of the use of grand jury subpoenas either lacks sufficient case-specific detail or contains a material omission. In explaining why the DEA did not subpoena conspirators to testify before a grand jury during the Rivera investigation, the affidavit does recite the inherent limitations of that investigative tool, including that the service of grand jury subpoenas on conspirators will alert those conspirators, and probably other conspirators as well, to the fact that an investigation is ongoing, which in turn may compromise the investigation. However, the affidavit also illustrates the anticipated effect of those inherent limitations on the Rivera investigation: a confidential source informed Agent Schrock that in 2003, shortly after Miguel Rivera, father of Gilberto and Rigoberto, had been served with a grand jury subpoena to testify about a different drug trafficking organization, Gilberto fled to Tijuana, Mexico, because he feared that law enforcement might arrest him for his role in narcotics trafficking. Thus, the affidavit does more than recite the inherent limitations of using grand jury subpoenas as an investigative tool; it also demonstrates that those limitations were likely to prevent the DEA from successfully using that investigative tool in the Rivera investigation. Moreover, while the affidavit omits the information that Gilberto's wife and children lived in Tijuana, we disagree with Defendants that this omission is material. Defendants contend that, if the issuing court had been provided that information, it could have concluded that Gilberto traveled to Tijuana not for fear of being arrested but instead to visit his family. However, as the district court explained in ruling on Defendants' suppression motions, the fact that Gilberto's family lived in Tijuana did not discount the fact that a confidential informant had specifically advised [Agent Schrock] that Gilberto's travel to Mexico was a direct result of the grand jury subpoena. Accordingly, the fact that Gilberto's family lived in Tijuana would likely not have affected the issuing court's determination that the wiretap was necessary, and the omission of this fact from the affidavit was therefore not material. Cf. Ippolito, 774 F.2d at 1485-86 ([I]t is necessary to evaluate the hypothetical effect of knowledge of the existence of a potentially useful informant on the original district court's determination that a wiretap was necessary. If it would have no effect, then the misstatement would not be material.). We further conclude that the affidavit provides sufficient case-specific detail in explaining why the DEA was unlikely to achieve the objectives of the Rivera investigation by using, or continuing to use, undercover agents, trash runs, interviews with members of the Rivera organization, and pen registers and trap-and-trace devices. We do agree with Defendants that the affidavit fails to explain in sufficient case-specific detail why subpoenaing financial records held by non-conspirators would not achieve the investigation's goal of understanding the organization's money laundering operation and why the execution of search warrants was unlikely to yield a major quantity of narcotics or narcotics proceeds, especially since two police searches of Gilberto's residence prior to the start of the investigation had yielded large amounts of narcotics and cash. Nonetheless, considering the affidavit's detailed discussion of most of the other investigative techniques that the DEA used or considered using, we find these failures not to be fatal to the affidavit as a whole. See Fernandez, 388 F.3d at 1237; Torres, 908 F.2d at 1423. Finally, we find it immaterial that the affidavit omitted a discussion of the use of global positioning tracking devices. The record reveals that the DEA placed one such device on Rigoberto's vehicle but only after the wiretap application and affidavit had already been submitted, and that Rigoberto soon learned about the presence of the device and stopped driving that vehicle. Thus, including those facts in the affidavit would likely not have affected the issuing court's necessity determination. See Ippolito, 774 F.2d at 1485-86. In sum, we conclude that the affidavit supporting the wiretap application contains a full and complete statement as required by 18 U.S.C. § 2518(1)(c).