Opinion ID: 809233
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Fourth Amendment Framework

Text: The Fourth Amendment guarantees individuals the right to be free from “unreasonable searches and seizures” of “their persons, houses, papers and effects.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. Searches and seizures must be based on “probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation,” which typically requires police officers to obtain a search warrant prior to searching an individual’s home. See id.; Herring v. United States, 555 U.S. 135, 136 (2009). “[S]earches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable.” Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586 (1980). The Fourth Amendment’s constitutional protections are enforced primarily through the application of the exclusionary rule, which prohibits the introduction of evidence obtained in its 9 No. 11-3446 violation. See Murray v. United States, 487 U.S. 533, 536–37 (1988). Recently, however, the Supreme Court has clarified that suppression “is not an automatic consequence of a Fourth Amendment violation.” Herring, 555 U.S. at 137. Instead, the decision to exclude improperly obtained evidence “turns on the culpability of the police and the potential of exclusion to deter wrongful police conduct.” Id. Where a violation of an individual’s Fourth Amendment rights was caused by “clerical error” or “isolated negligence attenuated from the arrest,” suppression need not necessarily result. Id. III. Constitutionality of the Warrantless Search and Defendant’s Arrest One condition of Defendant’s supervision with the Ohio APA was that he submit to voluntary, warrantless searches of his residence and vehicle, should his parole officer have “reasonable grounds to believe that [he was] . . . not abiding by the law, or otherwise [] not complying with the terms and conditions [of parole].” See Ohio Rev. Code Ann. § 2967.131(C). According to the government, this condition means that Defendant’s suppression motion must fail. In order to sustain this argument, the government maintains that, regardless of the sentencing judge’s order to the contrary, the APA had a statutory duty to disregard the “inaccurate” order and to keep Defendant under its supervision. In keeping with this theory, the government thus devotes a significant amount of its efforts explaining why Defendant’s 1993 convictions could not have been resentenced to community control under Ohio law and why the order releasing Defendant from supervision was therefore legally incorrect. These arguments are completely unpersuasive. The APA should have raised these points either directly to the sentencing judge or on formal appeal from the court’s order. This Court is not 10 No. 11-3446 the appropriate forum to decide Defendant’s actual parole status, and we need not do so. Rather, the sole question for our review is to determine if the APA was obligated to comply with the order, regardless of whether it considered the directive legally correct. Contrary to the government’s suggestion, the APA had no authority to disregard a binding court order simply because it disagreed with the sentencing judge’s legal analysis. A law enforcement agency has no power to deliberately ignore a court order. United States v. Grooms, 6 F. App’x 377, 381 (7th Cir. 2001). The APA may not grant unto itself the “unique privilege to pick over court orders and [to] choose to enforce only those it deems worthy of enforcement.” Id. When a law enforcement agency acts as the APA did here, it not only “erodes public confidence in law enforcement,” it also “undermines the rule of law itself.” Id. The district court erred in finding that the APA took sufficient action to invalidate Judge Rothgery’s order when it “timely expressed to Judge Rothgery its disagreement and so advised the defendant.” Only formal legal action by the sentencing judge, or by an appellate court with appropriate jurisdiction, had the power to rescind the legally binding order and to reinstate Defendant’s parole. An ex parte, private email was not sufficient. Not only does such a private communication fail to provide the defendant with adequate notice, it also has no legal force or effect. We would not indulge a defendant who pursued such a tactic, and we see no reason to extend such special consideration to the APA. A court speaks only through its orders, and only a court order could have rectified the sentencing judge’s error, if indeed there ever was one. 11 No. 11-3446 Accordingly, the APA did not have the authority to issue a warrantless search and arrest of Defendant, because a binding court order declared Defendant—as a matter of law—released from supervision.