Opinion ID: 201110
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Lack of Supervision in Bellville's Home Office

Text: 23 The appellants also object to Sergeant Lyver's decision to allow Minnis to search Bellville's home office while he spoke with Bellville outside. We begin our analysis by noting that [t]he Fourth Amendment does not explicitly require official presence during a warrant's execution, therefore it is not an automatic violation if no officer is present during a search. United States v. Bach, 310 F.3d 1063, 1066-67 (8th Cir.2002). In fact, in some cases, searches conducted by technical experts outside of the view of the authorized police officer can actually reduce the intrusion on the defendant's privacy. See, e.g., id.; Rodriques v. Furtado, 410 Mass. 878, 575 N.E.2d 1124 (1991) (concerning a search of the defendant's body). Therefore, we look at the specific circumstances of Minnis' search of Bellville's home office to see whether the degree of supervision exercised by Sergeant Lyver was unreasonable. See Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 559, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979). 24 Although the details of Minnis' search are sparse, Mrs. Bellville claims that she saw him going through paperwork, going through [her] husband's file cabinets, looking through books, doing something on his computer, accessing it, looking at serial numbers and turning it over and stuff like that. Given the reason for Minnis' presence (to identify stolen items that Sergeant Lyver could not), that account does not describe anything that he would not have done if Sergeant Lyver had been in the room with him. He would still have taken the computers apart to see whether they were stolen from 3-Com, and he would have looked at the papers to see whether they contained the 3-Com trade secrets that Sergeant Lyver suspected Bellville of stealing. Unlike the situation in Sbordone, in which the civilian engaged in a purely mechanical exercise, Minnis relied on his technical expertise and familiarity with 3-Com property during this search. Sergeant Lyver could not have supplanted his role if he had been in the room with Minnis. Moreover, Minnis did not search Bellville's home beyond the office, and there is no indication that he went beyond the bounds of the warrant. See Bach, 310 F.3d at 1067 (If a practice substantially increase[s] the time required to conduct the search, thereby aggravating the intrusiveness of the search, then it may be reasonable to avoid that practice.) (internal quotation marks omitted); United States v. Heldt, 668 F.2d 1238, 1259 (D.C.Cir.1981) ([A] flagrant disregard for the limitations in a warrant might transform an otherwise valid search into a general one, thereby requiring the entire fruits of the search to be suppressed.). 25 In short, Sergeant Lyver's decision to question Bellville outside the home during Minnis' search of the home office did not result in a greater intrusion upon the Bellvilles' Fourth Amendment right to privacy. The degree of supervision that he exercised over Minnis during the search was not unreasonable. There was no violation of the appellants' Fourth Amendment rights. 26 Affirmed.