Opinion ID: 2972035
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Omissions from the Affidavit

Text: In addition to challenging the information that was contained in the affidavit, Sawyers asserts that certain information was omitted, which would have defeated a finding of probable cause. In support, Sawyers relies on information that was collected by the officers but not included in the affidavit. In particular, Sawyers’ seizes on two omissions which, if included, would have allegedly defeated probable cause: (1) the fact that Horton made a number of stops on the way to the Willow Creek apartment, raising the possibility that the drugs found in Horton’s car were from a source other than Sawyers at the Willow Creek apartment; and (2) the fact that, after his arrest, Horton gave conflicting answers in response to the officers’ questions regarding the source of the cocaine. Immediately after his arrest, Horton stated that he had obtained the cocaine from the Willow Creek apartment and that Sawyers was present. In a subsequent interview with Agent Dan Kennedy, however, Horton stated that he had 15 obtained the cocaine two days prior and that he had visited the Willow Creek apartment on August 8, 2001, merely to make a phone call.8 This Court in United States v. Atkin, 107 F.3d 1213, 1217 (6th Cir. 1997) addressed the issue of material omissions: Although material omissions are not immune from inquiry under Franks, we have recognized that an affidavit which omits potentially exculpatory information is less likely to present a question of impermissible official conduct than one which affirmatively includes false information. United States v. Martin, 920 F.2d 393, 398 (6th Cir. 1990). This is so because an allegation of omission “potentially opens officers to endless conjecture about investigative leads, fragments of information, or other matter that might, if included, have redounded to defendant’s benefit.” Id. (quoting United States v. Colkley, 899 F.2d 297, 301 (4th Cir. 1990)). If the defendant does succeed in making a preliminary showing that the government affiant engaged in “deliberate falsehood” or “reckless disregard for the truth” in omitting information from the affidavit, the court must then consider the affidavit including the omitted portions and determine whether probable cause still exists. United States v. Bonds, 12 F.3d 540, 568 n.23 (6th Cir. 1993). Atkin, 107 F.3d at 1217. Moreover, it is unreasonable to expect a police officer to include every piece of exculpatory information gathered about the case in the affidavit because the standard for obtaining a search warrant is lower than the standard to convict. Mays, 134 F.3d at 814-816.9 8 Sawyers also claims that the following information was excluded from the affidavit: (1) Dr. Allen Philp’s testimony at the suppression hearing that Sawyers was in the hospital recovering from gun shot wounds from July 27 to August 1 or 2, during which Horton was under surveillance, and during which the drug buys with the CI had been arranged; (2) a statement to FBI Agent Dan Kennedy, in which Horton asserted that he had obtained the cocaine recovered from the black bag in his car two days prior to his arrest, contrary to his original statement; (3) information in Officer Leon Taylor’s investigative report that, after the August 6, 2001 drug sale between Horton and the CI, Horton was observed meeting two black males in a Nissan Altima; (4) information in Officer Gene Donegan’s investigative report regarding the August 6, 2001 drug buy and Horton’s activities prior to the sale; and (5) Officer Donegan’s apparent knowledge that Horton had a source of drugs other than Sawyers. 9 The Court in Mays concluded that it was improper to apply the rationale of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), to the warrant application process. Mays, 134 F.3d at 815. 16 Alternatively, the courts have universally recognized a good faith exception to the exclusionary rule. Under that exception, even if a warrant is later found to be defective, if the executing officers relied upon it in good faith, evidence obtained pursuant to the search is still admissible. United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897 (1984). In Leon, a CI of unproven reliability informed police that two individuals were selling cocaine from their residence. Id. at 901. The district court upheld the defendant’s motion to suppress, stating that even though the police officers had acted in good faith, the affidavit was insufficient to establish probable cause. Id. at 903-04. The circuit court similarly refused the Government's invitation to recognize a good faith exception to the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule. Id. at 905. The Supreme Court, however, reversed, holding that although the warrant was invalid, the evidence seized pursuant thereto was nevertheless admissible. Id. The rationale offered by the Court was that “[t]he Fourth Amendment contains no provision expressly precluding the use of evidence obtained in violation of its commands, and an examination of its origin and purposes makes clear that the use of fruits of a past unlawful search or seizure ‘[works] no new Fourth Amendment wrong.’ Id. at 906 (quoting United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 354 (1974)). Therefore, evidence obtained in good faith reliance upon a facially valid search warrant should not be excluded unless such exclusion furthers the purpose of the Brady involved the due process guarantees afforded a defendant during trial, which the Court in Mays asserted do not apply in the less formal process of an officer obtaining a search warrant. The Court stated that it is improper in this setting to “entitl[e] the subject of a search warrant to disclosure of any information potentially contradicting a finding of probable cause.” Id. This is so because the probable cause determination implicated in Franks is not an adjudication of guilt or innocence and thus does not implicate due process. Id. at 816. Finally, the Court in Mays noted that “Franks recognizes that information an affiant reports may not ultimately be accurate, and is willing to tolerate such a result at that early stage of the process, so long as the affiant believed the accuracy of the statement at the time it was made.” Id. (citing Franks, 438 U.S. at 165). 17 exclusionary rule, that is, to deter police misconduct. Id. at 918. However, in the situation where the mistake was made by the issuing magistrate, excluding the evidence obtained by the police does nothing to deter such misconduct. Id. In exploring the parameters of the good faith exception, the Court made clear that the sufficiency of an affidavit could and should still validly be questioned in certain situations: (1) where “the magistrate or judge in issuing a warrant was misled by information in an affidavit that the affiant knew was false or would have known was false except for his reckless disregard of the truth,” id. at 923 (citing Franks, 438 U.S. 154); (2) where “the issuing magistrate wholly abandoned his judicial role,” id.; (3) where the “affidavit [is] ‘so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render official belief in its existence entirely unreasonable,’” id. (quoting Brown v. Illinois, 422 U.S. 590, 610-611 (1975)); and (4) where the warrant is facially deficient, as in “failing to particularize the place to be searched or the things to be seized,” id. Therefore, “[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 their affidavit or could not have harbored an objectively reasonable belief in the existence of probable cause.” Id. at 926. In the instant case, Sawyers charges Officer Donegan with conduct that evidenced “reckless disregard for the truth.” See Franks, 438 U.S. at 155. The Government, however, contends that Sawyers was not even entitled to a Franks evidentiary hearing because he did not make the necessary preliminary showing. Franks, 438 U.S. at 156. In Franks, the Supreme court clarified, “[t]o mandate an evidentiary hearing, the challenger’s attack must be more than conclusory...[t]here must be allegations of deliberate falsehood or of reckless disregard for the truth, and those allegations must be accompanied 18 by an offer of proof.” Id. at 171. Sawyers has not, however, satisfied these threshold requirements. He merely catalogues information that had been complied by the police but was not included in the affidavit, and makes no offer of proof that these omissions were made with “reckless disregard for truth.” Furthermore, without such proof that Officer Donegan omitted this information with “reckless disregard for truth,” the Court is left with merely a list of ’investigative leads, fragments of information, or other matter that might, if included, have redounded to defendant's benefit.’ Atkin, 107 F.3d at 1217 (quoting Colkley, 899 F.2d at 301 (4th Cir. 1990)). Although this Court concludes that probable cause existed within the four corners of the affidavit and that there was a sufficient basis for the district court judge to deny a Franks hearing, the judge elected to hold a Franks hearing because he was unable to determine from the record and oral argument whether the omission of the stated information was intentional. At the hearing, Officer Donegan testified regarding the alleged omissions in the affidavit. First, Donegan stated that he was unaware of Horton’s inconsistent statement to Agent Dan Kennedy. With respect to other omissions regarding Horton’s activities, including on the day of the August 6, 2001 buy, Donegan stated that he elected to exclude the information because it was merely duplicative of other information already contained in the affidavit that established that Horton was, in fact, a drug dealer. No other proof was adduced to establish that Officer Donegan recklessly disregarded the truth. The district court, therefore, correctly found that “there is no evidence in the record to suggest that Donegan intended to mislead [the issuing magistrate].” As the Government points out, “except in the very rare case where the defendant makes a strong preliminary showing that the affiant with an intention to mislead excluded 19 critical information from the affidavit, and the omission is critical to the finding of probable cause, Franks is inapplicable to the omission of disputed facts.” Mays, 134 F.3d at 816 (emphasis omitted). This statement requires a defendant to make a strong preliminary showing both (1) that the affiant intended to exclude the information and (2) that the information be critical to a finding of probable cause. As previously demonstrated, Sawyers failed as to both showings. First, he failed to prove the requisite intent. Second, the omitted information was superfluous. In light of the extensive surveillance that had been conducted, and information obtained as a result, neither fact was dispositive to the determination of probable cause. Even if the Court were to conclude that the affidavit, including the omitted information, was legally deficient, the Leon good faith exception would apply. As noted above, Officer Donegan did not engage in a reckless disregard for the truth or attempt to mislead the issuing magistrate. Similarly, there is no indication that the magistrate acted improperly. Further, it has already been shown that the information that was included in the affidavit provided a sufficient basis for a determination of probable cause, and the warrant was not so facially deficient as failing to particularize the place or things to be seized. Therefore, even if probable cause were lacking in the affidavit, rendering the accompanying search warrant invalid, the evidence obtained pursuant to the search warrant was nevertheless admissible. Sawyers relies on this court’s decision in United States v. Weaver, 99 F.3d 1372 (6th Cir. 1996), in support of his argument that the good faith exception is inapplicable in this case. In Weaver, the affiant officer used a boilerplate affidavit, filled in minimal particularized information, and conducted virtually no independent corroboration. Id. at 20 1375-79 (“[the affiant officer] possessed only [the informant’s] tip linking [the defendant] to possible drug activities, yet undertook no substantive independent investigative actions to corroborate his informant’s claims, such as surveillance of [defendant’s] residence.” (emphasis added)). Therefore, because the affiant officer had possessed “little firsthand information and no personal observations,” the court declared that the good faith exception to the exclusionary rule should not apply. Id. at 1380. Weaver is easily distinguishable from this case. First, Officer Donegan and the other officers had been conducting surveillance on Horton for two weeks prior to his arrest. They observed Horton enter and exit the apartment at 509 Willow Creek Drive just prior to his arrest and the discovery of the cocaine in his vehicle. Furthermore, the affidavit was not merely boilerplate. Rather, it chronicled Horton’s history as a drug dealer, as well as his connection to Sawyers, and explained Sawyers’ connection to Cleveland, the renter of the Willow Creek apartment. Based upon the foregoing, therefore, the Court concludes that any alleged deficiencies in the contents of the affidavit did not rise to the level of “reckless disregard for the truth.” Furthermore, even if the omitted information had been included, probable cause nevertheless existed.