Opinion ID: 563814
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Probable Cause for Search Warrant

Text: 35 Dodd also contends that the Drug Enforcement Agency's search of Dodd's property pursuant to a warrant violated the Fourth Amendment, because the warrant rested on stale evidence. We need not address probable cause for the warrant, because we find that the Drug Enforcement Agency officers acted in good faith in relying on the issued warrant. United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984). United States v. Craig, 861 F.2d 818, 821 (5th Cir.1988). 36 Where an officer's reliance on a warrant is objectively reasonable, evidence obtained under the warrant is not excluded. Such reliance is objectively reasonable unless the affidavit supporting the warrant is so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render belief in its existence unreasonable. Craig, 861 F.2d at 821. 37 The record here shows a substantial basis for the conclusion that the officials acted in good faith in relying on the warrant. The warrant was issued on December 2, 1989, on the basis of an affidavit by DEA agent Lonnie Watson. Watson stated in the affidavit that he had been informed by Dodd's co-conspirator Payne that Dodd had supplied Payne with multi-pound quantities of amphetamine during 1986 and 1987. Watson also stated in his affidavit that Storey, another of Dodd's co-conspirators, had informed him that Storey and Dodd produced five pounds of amphetamine per week from March, 1987 until June of 1988, at Dodd's property. Storey also informed Watson that Dodd had constructed an underground cave on Dodd's property for producing amphetamine and that Dodd and Storey had discarded numerous pieces of broken laboratory glassware and chemical containers at a dumpsite on Dodd's property. Watson stated further in the affidavit that, as late as September 28, 1989, a narcotics officer informed Watson that he had searched a trailer registered to Dodd and had found drug manufacturing paraphernalia in the trailer. Watson, an agent for the DEA of fourteen years' experience, stated that residue of amphetamine and precursor chemicals do not deteriorate even if buried or submerged in water over a period of years. 38 In short, there was evidence in the affidavit that Dodd's property had been continuously used for the production of amphetamine from March, 1988 until September 1989, four months before the warrant was issued. The affidavit indicated a long-standing pattern of illegal activity that produced physical remnants such as chemicals, broken glass, and an underground lab; these remnants were likely to persist even after the events described by Watson's informants had ended. These circumstances indicate that Watson's belief in the validity of the warrant was objective and reasonable, despite the gap in time between the occurrence of the events in the affidavit and the issuance of the warrant. United States v. Webster, 734 F.2d 1048, 1056 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1073, 105 S.Ct. 565, 83 L.Ed.2d 506 (1984) (where information in affidavit alleges long-standing, ongoing criminal act, officer's reliance on warrant issued on basis of affidavit is good-faith reliance); Craig, 861 F.2d at 822 (where evidence sought under warrant is likely to persist, interval between facts described in affidavit and issuance of warrant is not fatal to finding of good faith reliance on warrant by officer). Resolving as we must all issues of credibility in favor of the government, Glasser v. United States, 315 U.S. 60, 62 S.Ct. 457, 86 L.Ed. 680 (1942), we find that there was a substantial basis in the record for the conclusion that the officers acted in good faith in relying on the warrant. We therefore affirm the trial court's rejection of Dodd's motion to suppress the fruits of the DEA officers' search.