Opinion ID: 752090
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Slade's Affidavit

Text: 24 Charles claims that Slade's affidavit supporting the search warrant for 862 Parham and the arrest warrant for Charles Owen contained deliberately false and misleading statements. Without these alleged misrepresentations, Charles argues that the affidavit would not have provided the probable cause required to support the search and arrest warrants. He thus argues that the district court should have suppressed the evidence obtained as a result of the search and arrest. Charles has the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that Slade's affidavit contained deliberate falsehoods or displayed a reckless disregard for the truth. United States v. Zimmer, 14 F.3d 286, 288 (6th Cir.1994). 25 In Franks v. Delaware, 438 U.S. 154, 98 S.Ct. 2674, 57 L.Ed.2d 667 (1978), the Supreme Court held that a search based on a warrant that contains deliberately or recklessly false allegations is invalid unless the remaining portions of the affidavit provide probable cause. Thus, a court considering whether to suppress evidence based on an allegation that the underlying affidavit contained false statements must apply a two-part test: (1) whether the defendant has proven by a preponderance of the evidence that the affidavit contains deliberately or recklessly false statements and (2) whether the affidavit, without the false statements, provides the requisite probable cause to sustain the warrant. Id.; United States v. Bonds, 12 F.3d 540, 568-69 (6th Cir.1993). 26 The district court ordered a hearing to consider Charles's allegations. In order to fulfill his obligation under the first prong of the Franks test, Charles outlined several of the affidavit's errors. First, Charles claimed that the affidavit implied that the government had at least three informants, when in fact Bell was the government's only informant. Charles also noted that the affidavit included an incorrect telephone number, alleged to be the number that Charles had threatened to use to trace one of Slade's calls. Moreover, Charles asserted that Slade offered inconsistent physical descriptions of Charles. Finally, Charles observed that the affidavit failed to mention Slade's several unsuccessful attempts to coordinate drug deals with Charles. 27 Although the district court noted that the affidavit suffered from poor draftsmanship, the court concluded that the alleged false statements resulted from careless errors rather than from a deliberate or reckless disregard for the truth. The court also concluded that the telephone number, provided by Slade in his affidavit, was indeed incorrect; however, no evidence was offered to support any conclusion other than that this mistake was an unintentional error. 28 In his opinion, the district court judge did not address Charles's claim that the affidavit contained conflicting physical descriptions of him. Charles observed that at different instances throughout the affidavit, he was described as being bald, having a flat-top hair cut, and having a short round hair cut. The government explains that these discrepancies resulted from Charles's change of hairstyles. During a colloquy with Charles's counsel, the judge rejected the argument that the affidavit should fail as a result of different hairstyle descriptions. 29 Finally, Charles contends that the affidavit's omissions of the failed drug transactions made the affidavit false. Although under some circumstances a material omission may invalidate an otherwise valid search warrant, we find that Slade's omission was not material in this case. See Bonds, 12 F.3d at 568. Pursuant to Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983), the affidavit provided sufficient evidence to constitute probable cause when considering the totality of the circumstances. Id. at 230, 103 S.Ct. at 2328. 30 After a careful consideration of the search warrant issues raised by Charles in his appeal, we conclude that the district court properly denied Charles's motions to suppress. There is no evidence that the district court's decision on these issues was erroneous. In fact, the record indicates that the district court judge erred on the side of caution by granting the defendant a Franks hearing. The record further indicates that the district court judge was thorough in his investigation and thoughtful in his opinion. The district court's conclusion that the errors in the affidavit resulted from poor draftsmanship rather than from a deliberate or reckless disregard for the truth was based on the evidence introduced during the hearing and cannot be characterized as erroneous. Because Charles failed to prove that the affidavit supporting the warrants contained deliberately or recklessly false statements, this court does not need to consider whether, absent the errors, the affidavit would still have provided the requisite probable cause to support the warrants. United States v. Zimmer, 14 F.3d 286, 288 (6th Cir.1994). 31 Accordingly we affirm the district court's denial of Charles's suppression motions.