Opinion ID: 206195
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Control as a Factor Relevant to Probable Cause

Text: The government acknowledges this body of law, but submits that it is subject to an exception: Probable cause need not be shown for each particular unit [of a multiple-occupancy building] when the application establishes that the suspect exercises control over the entire premises. Appellant's Br. at 13 (emphasis added). We do not think the law supports such an absolute pronouncement. The New York Court of Appeals, whose rulings presumably controlled issuance of the warrant here at issue, as well as several of our sister circuits, have referenced control of a multiple-occupancy building as a fact that can support a warrant to search the whole premises. See People v. Tambe, 71 N.Y.2d 492, 503, 527 N.Y.S.2d 372, 377, 522 N.E.2d 448 (1988) (holding that where probable cause exists to believe that several individuals are involved in criminal activity, and that evidence of crime is in possession of one of them, law permits magistrate to find probable cause to search the places in the control of each); see also United States v. Butler, 71 F.3d 243, 249 (7th Cir.1995); United States v. Alexander, 761 F.2d 1294, 1301 (9th Cir.1985); United States v. Gonzalez, 697 F.2d 155, 156 (6th Cir.1983). Nevertheless, we do not understand these cases to support an exception to the general requirement that the search of a multiple-occupancy building must be supported by probable cause to believe that evidence of criminality will be found throughout the building. While control may be a fact relevant to the identification of such probable cause, see generally United States v. Johnson, 26 F.3d 669, 694 (7th Cir.1994) (observing that search of multiple-occupancy building is not overbroad when (1) the officer knows there are multiple units and believes there is probable cause to search each unit, or (2) the targets of the investigation have access to the entire structure), like any relevant fact, control does not necessarily dictate the same probable cause determination in every case. That depends on the totality of the circumstances. See Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. at 231-32, 103 S.Ct. 2317 (rejecting rules that make any single fact determinative in probable cause analysis). Control, after all, can be manifested in various ways e.g., ownership, occupancy, access, authority to exclude othersand exercised to varying degrees. Thus, even though a person may own the multiple-occupancy building from which he deals drugs, probable cause to search the whole is more likely to be identified if the building is a two-family structure of which the suspect is the only occupant than if it is a twenty-family structure in which the suspect occupies only a single residential unit with other units leased by families unassociated with his criminality. We do not attempt to hypothesize all the contexts in which various types or degrees of control might be evidenced in a multiple-occupancy building. We note simply that they are sufficiently numerous to defeat the government's argument that a simple allegation of controlnecessarily and by itselfprovides a substantial basis for authorizing the challenged search of a multiple-occupancy building. Indeed, we observe that the single case cited by the government in support of its control argument, United States v. Gusan, 549 F.2d 15 (7th Cir.1977), does not recognize such a rule. At the time the search there at issue was authorized, police were unaware that the first and second floors of the subject premises contained separate apartments. In fact, police observations of defendant's movements, as reported in the warrant affidavit, supported probable cause to believe that the defendant exercised control over both floors as a single residence. See id. at 20 (Swygert, J., concurring). [7] Thus, to the extent Gusan illustrates an exception to the rule that the search of a multiple-occupancy building must be supported by probable cause to search each unit, it is based not on the defendant's control of multiple units, but on reasonable law enforcement perceptions that the premises was being used as a single unit. This is consistent with an exception that has been summarized as follows: [I]f the building in question from its outward appearance would be taken to be a single-occupancy structure and neither the affiant nor other investigating officers nor the executing officers knew or had reason to know of the structure's actual multiple-occupancy character until execution of the warrant was under way, then the warrant is not defective for failure to specify a subunit within the named building. 2 LaFave, supra, § 4.5(b), at 581-82 & n. 64 (collecting cases recognizing exception (footnote omitted)); see Maryland v. Garrison, 480 U.S. at 86-88, 107 S.Ct. 1013 (identifying good faith reliance on warrant to search third floor where police did not discover premises contained two apartments until they began execution); United States v. Kyles, 40 F.3d at 524 (rejecting argument that warrant for apartment should not have authorized search of defendant's bedroom because agents had no reason to believe bedroom was separate residence); see also National City Trading Corp. v. United States, 635 F.2d 1020, 1024 (2d Cir.1980) (rejecting overbreadth challenge to search of commercial suite shared by two entities where there was no demarcation ... between the rooms occupied by each). This exception is plainly not applicable here because when police applied for the challenged warrant, they specifically described 1015 Fairfield Avenue as a multi family dwelling, and in no way indicated that they understood Clark to be using the premises as a single residence.