Opinion ID: 166596
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Computer Search Warrant

Text: 19 The Fourth Amendment requires that a search warrant describe the things to be seized with sufficient particularity to prevent a general exploratory rummaging in a person's belongings. United States v. Campos, 221 F.3d 1143, 1147 (10th Cir.2000). In considering whether the warrants at issue describe the items to be seized with sufficient particularity, we accept the district court's factual findings unless clearly erroneous. However, the district court's ultimate determination of sufficient particularity is reviewed de novo. United States v. Leary, 846 F.2d 592 (10th Cir.1988). 20 The manifest purpose of [the] particularity requirement was to prevent general searches. By limiting the authorization to search the specific areas . . . the requirement ensures that the search will be carefully tailored to its justifications, and will not take on the character of the wide-ranging exploratory searches the Framers intended to prohibit. United States v. Riccardi, 405 F.3d 852, 863 (10th Cir.2005) (citing Maryland v. Garrison, 480 U.S. 79, 84, 107 S.Ct. 1013, 94 L.Ed.2d 72 (1987); Voss v. Bergsgaard, 774 F.2d 402, 404 (10th Cir.1985); Campos, 221 F.3d at 1147). 21 Brooks argues that the third warrant, which authorized a laboratory search of his computer equipment, was not sufficiently particular for two reasons. First, he argues it failed to describe a specific search methodology for use on the computer. Second, he claims it allowed investigators to search for and view text files that may not have included pornographic images. 22 Search Methodology. At the outset, we disagree with Brooks that the government was required to describe its specific search methodology. This court has never required warrants to contain a particularized computer search strategy. We have simply held that officers must describe with particularity the objects of their search. Recognizing the difficulties inherent in computer searches, in some circumstances, we have suggested that law enforcement must engage in the intermediate step of sorting various types of documents and then only search the ones specified in a warrant. United States v. Carey, 172 F.3d 1268, 1275 (10th Cir.1999). As we explained in Carey, [w]here officers come across relevant documents so intermingled with irrelevant documents that they cannot feasibly be sorted at the site, the officers may seal or hold the documents pending approval by a magistrate . . . [t]he magistrate should then require officers to specify in a warrant which type of files are sought. Id. However, we have not required a specific prior authorization along the lines suggested in Carey in every computer search, see, e.g., Campos, 221 F.3d at 1147, nor has Brooks suggested how the search in this case would have been different with a scripted search protocol. 23 The question of whether the nature of computer forensic searches lends itself to predetermined search protocols is a difficult one. Given the numerous ways information is stored on a computer, openly and surreptiously, a search can be as much an art as a science. See Carey, 172 F.3d 1268 (10th Cir.1999). 1 But as we noted in Carey and Campos, courts will look to (1) the object of the search, (2) the types of files that may reasonably contain those objects, and (3) whether officers actually expand the scope of the search upon locating evidence of a different crime. Both Carey and Campos involved warrants less detailed than the one here. In Carey, while searching for drug crime evidence, officers came across evidence of child pornography, and without authorization they expanded their search of a computer for additional pornographic images. In Campos, the warrant broadly allowed for the seizure of a computer without any specific reason to believe it actually contained child pornography. The question in those cases was whether additional authorization for an expanded search was necessary. They do not, however, stand for the proposition that a warrant is per se overbroad if it does not describe a specific search methodology. 24 We thus find in the circumstances here that the warrant need not have included a search protocol to satisfy the particularity requirement of the Fourth Amendment. 25 Scope of Warrant. We now turn to Brooks's second overbreadth argument. The warrant authorized officers to search two computers and a number of disks for evidence of child pornography, including 26 photographs, pictures, computer generated pictures or images, depicting partially nude or nude images of prepubescent males and or females engaged in sex acts, . . . as well as correspondence, including printed or handwritten letters, electronic text files, emails and instant messages[.] 27 ROA, Vol. I at 62; Aplt. Br. Attach. B. While the warrant does not explicitly instruct officers to look solely for those text files containing child pornography, in context—and certainly in the view of the officers conducting the search—the restrictions placed upon searches for image files also apply to the other types of files. In other words, although the language of the warrant may, on first glance, authorize a broad, unchanneled search through Brooks's document files, as a whole, its language more naturally instructs officers to search those files only for evidence related to child pornography. In this light, the warrant should be—and was—read by officers to implicitly place the same restriction ( i.e., to locate child pornography) on the scope of the entire search. 28 Brooks, however, argues that our cases have required a more particularized inquiry than the warrant here describes. See Riccardi, 405 F.3d at 862 (citing Campos, 221 F.3d at 1147). We disagree that this requirement has not been met. In Riccardi, the warrant at issue in a child pornography investigation authorized the seizure of the defendant's computer and all electronic and magnetic media stored therein, together with all storage devises [sic], internal or external to the computer or computer system. Riccardi, 405 F.3d at 862. On review, we found that [b]y its terms, the warrant thus permitted the officers to search for anything—from child pornography to tax returns to private correspondence, making it precisely the kind of `wide-ranging exploratory search that the Framers intended to prohibit.' Id. at 863 (citing Maryland v. Garrison, 480 U.S. 79, 84, 107 S.Ct. 1013, 94 L.Ed.2d 72 (1987)). 29 Here, in contrast, we are faced with a warrant that authorized officers to search through computer files for particular items specifically related to child pornography. The warrant language is properly read to place the very same subject matter restriction on the authorization to search Brooks's text files as it clearly placed on searches of his image files. Moreover, Brooks has made no showing that officers improperly viewed text files, or expanded the scope of the search for materials other than child pornography. While the warrant could have been more artfully written, we are satisfied on these facts that it falls within the particularity requirement of the Fourth Amendment.