Opinion ID: 165743
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Probable Cause: The Initial Seizure of the Computer

Text: 26 Mr. Riccardi first contends that no probable cause existed to support a warrant to seize and search his computer. We find this argument unconvincing. 27 Detective Dickey's affidavit contains the following facts in support of probable cause: (1) that Mr. Riccardi called teenage boys for his gratification; (2) that his home contained a number of sexual photographs of teenage boys in the nude; (3) that a receipt from Kinko's showed that he had photographs digitalized for a computer format; (4) that the computer was capable of storing digitized images; and (5) that, based on Dickey's experience, possessors of child pornography often obtain and retain images of child pornography on their computers. 28 In our judgment, this is more than enough to support the magistrate's judgment that there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place. Gates, 462 U.S. at 238, 103 S.Ct. 2317. Mr. Riccardi's collection of some 300 photographs of young men, 50 to 80 of them naked in sexually suggestive poses, is sufficient to indicate the nature of his interests. The presence of a computer with an internet hook-up and a Kinko's receipt indicating that Mr. Riccardi had converted Polaroid photos into a digitized format, gives rise to a fair inference that the computer will contain images similar to the photographs. 29 Mr. Riccardi makes two principal points in response. First, he argues that the Kinko's receipt, being five years old, is too stale to support probable cause. See United States v. Snow, 919 F.2d 1458, 1459 (10th Cir.1990) (Probable cause to search cannot be based on stale information that no longer suggests that the items sought will be found in the place to be searched.). Second, he argues that because the Kinko's receipt was found in an envelope with non-pornographic pictures, it provides no support for the inference that he had converted pornographic pictures to a computer format. 30 Whether information is stale depends on the nature of the criminal activity, the length of the activity, and the nature of the property to be seized. Snow, 919 F.2d at 1460 (citations omitted). The Kinko's receipt may have been five years old, but it showed that Mr. Riccardi had the desire and ability to convert Polaroid photographs to a digital format, which, as Detective Dickey explained in his affidavit, is a common means by which child pornographers distribute and exchange their materials. When the receipt is considered in the context of other information in the affidavit — the apparent duration of Mr. Riccardi's harassment and solicitation of minors, the existence of sexually explicit pictures of minors found nearby, the screen names, and the observation that possessors often keep electronic copies of child pornography — it provides an ample nexus for the finding of probable cause. See, e.g., United States v. Sturmoski, 971 F.2d 452, 457 (10th Cir.1992) (holding that when the offense in question is ongoing and continuing in nature, the passage of time is not of critical importance); accord United States v. Schaefer, 87 F.3d 562, 568 (1st Cir.1996). This is especially the case given the nature of Mr. Riccardi's criminal activity, the possession of child pornography. As one court has explained: 31 The observation that images of child pornography are likely to be hoarded by persons interested in those materials in the privacy of their homes is supported by common sense and the cases. Since the materials are illegal to distribute and possess, initial collection is difficult. Having succeeded in obtaining images, collectors are unlikely to destroy them. Because of their illegality and the imprimatur of severe social stigma such images carry, collectors will want to secret them in secure places, like a private residence. This proposition is not novel in either state or federal court: pedophiles, preferential child molesters, and child pornography collectors maintain their materials for significant periods of time. 32 United States v. Lamb, 945 F.Supp. 441, 460 (N.D.N.Y.1996) (citing, among others, United States v. Harvey, 2 F.3d 1318, 1322-23 (3d Cir.1993); United States v. Koelling, 992 F.2d 817, 823 (8th Cir.1993); United States v. Rabe, 848 F.2d 994, 997 (9th Cir.1988)). 33 As to Mr. Riccardi's observation that the photographs in the envelope with the receipt were non-pornographic, this misses the point. The logical inference was not simply that these particular pictures — four photos of a teenage boy naked from the waist up — were likely to be found on Mr. Riccardi's computer, but that the proximity of the receipt and the computer to hundreds of other Polaroid shots of teenage males, many of them pornographic, made it likely that some of these, too, had been converted to a computer format, from which they could be distributed over the internet. 34