Opinion ID: 2975547
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Status as a gang member

Text: As the majority opinion explains, this court’s precedent establishes that probable cause to search a defendant’s home exists where the defendant is “a drug dealer with continual and ongoing operations.” Newton, 389 F.3d at 636; see also Miggins, 302 at 393-94. However, “the allegation that the defendant is a drug dealer” by an “unproven confidential informant, . . . without more,” is 23 insufficient to establish probable cause to search a defendant’s residence.12 Frazier, 423 F.3d at 533; see also McPhearson, 469 F.3d at 524 (probable cause would exist based on “the independently corroborated fact that the defendants were known drug dealers at the time the police sought to search their homes”).13 Additionally, probable cause does not exist to search a defendant’s residence where the defendant possesses drugs but there is no allegation that he is a drug dealer. McPhearson, 469 F.3d at 521, 525 (warrant based on affidavit stating that the defendant had been arrested on a warrant for “simple assault,” and at the time had had in his pocket a clear plastic bag containing 6.4 grams of crack cocaine). This court has not yet addressed the issue of whether criminal status other than that of a drug dealer indicates a “continual and ongoing operation,” the evidence of which “is likely to be found where the [defendant] live[s].” Newton, 389 F.3d at 636; Miggins, 302 F.3d at 394 (quoting McClellan, 165 F.3d at 546). In this case, Bethal was identified as a gang member, which is not itself illegal. However, in addition, he was identified as involved in gang-related criminal activity: 12 The majority paraphrases this holding as referring to a “confidential informant,” Opinion at 11, but that is not what Frazier says; it refers, expressly, to an unproven confidential informant. Neither the named informant nor the narcotics officers in this case are unproven confidential informants. 13 With regard to the majority’s analysis of the relationship between this court’s prior holdings in Newton and Frazier, I note that “when a later decision of this court conflicts with one of our prior published decisions, we are still bound by the holding of the earlier case.” Darrah v. City of Oak Park, 255 F.3d 301, 310 (6th Cir. 2001) (citing Sowards v. Loudon County, 203 F.3d 426, 431 n.1 (6th Cir. 2000); Brentwood Acad. v. Tenn. Secondary Sch. Athletic Ass’n, 180 F.3d 758, 765 (6th Cir. 1999)). Thus, the majority’s explanation that Frazier “merely requires that the information in the warrant be provided by sources whose reliability is apparent in the affidavit itself,” Opinion at 11, is correct. Insofar as Frazier could be read to contradict the holding in Newton that “probable cause generally exists to search for the fruits and instrumentalities of criminal activity at the residence of a drug dealer with continual and ongoing operations,” 389 F.3d at 636, this court is bound to follow Newton. 24 specifically, two drive-by shootings. The police sought at his residence guns, ammunition, gang paraphernalia, and drugs. Thus, probable cause to search existed if Bethal’s status as a gang member indicated continual and ongoing criminal operations, and he was likely to keep the relevant evidence of gang activity where he lived. Clearly, drug dealers often engage in continuing operations. This court has had occasion to observe that “drug dealers usually continue their trade after moving to a new residence,” Frazier, 423 F.3d at 537, and has dealt with offenders who continued selling drugs after their residence was searched and they had to move their operations elsewhere, United States v. Bowen, 194 F. App’x 393, 400 (6th Cir. 2006); after being arrested, United States v. Mitchell, 63 F. App’x 224, 228 (6th Cir. 2003); after six different incarcerations, some for drug offenses, United States v. Chapman, 112 F. App’x 469, 471, 472 (6th Cir. 2004); and after their drug-dealing partners were convicted, United States v. Robertson, 67 F. App’x 257, 262 (6th Cir. 2003). Gang members likewise often engage in continuing criminal operations. Gang members may join as young as their early teens, or even younger. State v. Brown, 796 N.E.2d 506, 513 (Ohio 2003) (the defendant belonged to the “Baby Crips” as a child); State v. Drummond, No. 05-MA-197, 2006 Ohio App. LEXIS 6997, at -29 (Ohio Ct. App. Dec. 20, 2006) (in the eleven years since the defendant joined the Lincoln Knolls Crips at thirteen, he had “witnessed much shooting, death and other violence such as hand-to-hand fights,” and “been shot five times . . . at age sixteen, causing his leg to be amputated”). Gang members typically display significant loyalty to the gang, as a result of which many refuse to testify against one another, United States v. Roberson, 474 F.3d 432, 435 (7th Cir. 2007); take the blame for the criminal offenses of higher-status members, United States v. Padilla, 387 F.3d 1087, 1090 (9th Cir. 2004); or commit serious crimes, including killing police 25 officers or their own close friends, to indicate their loyalty, Grider v. Abramson, 180 F.3d 739, 744 (6th Cir. 1999); United States v. Bazemore, 41 F.3d 1431, 1433 (11th Cir. 1994). Gangs, including the Crips and the Bloods, tend to build an internal “culture,” which influences the decision-making of their members. Drummond, 2006 Ohio App. LEXIS 6997, at . They usually use “gang color,” which may include particular colors or symbols, to create a group identity, and also employ permanent markings such as tattoos to indicate the status of members according to a code that other members understand. Rios v. Rocha, 299 F.3d 796 , 800 n.5 (9th Cir. 2002) (Crips wear blue “rags” or bandanas and Bloods wear red); Adams by Adams v. Township of Redford, No. 95-1279, 1996 U.S. App. LEXIS 14473, at -3 (6th Cir. May 10, 1996) (“[A] gang’s ‘colors’ are an integral part of its identity.”); State v. Earl, 702 N.W.2d 711, 716 (Minn. 2005) (tear drop tattoo near the eye indicates that the possessor has killed one person). Gangs generally aggressively defend their geographic territory, and even accidentally displaying the colors of a rival gang on a gang’s “turf” can be an offense punishable by death. See State v. Winton, No. 98-AP-1036, 1999 Ohio App. LEXIS 3364, at -3 (Ohio Ct. App. July 22, 1999) (high school student shot while waiting to pick his brother up at a school bus stop because a high school-age “Blood” saw a black bandana he was trying to conceal). Finally, like drug dealing, gang affiliation frequently persists after incarceration.14 See, e.g., Walker v. Gomez, 370 F.3d 969, 14 In fact, gang activity in prison may be more serious than gang activity on the streets. As the Supreme Court has recently observed, Clandestine, organized, fueled by race-based hostility, and committed to fear and violence as a means of disciplining their own members and their rivals, gangs seek nothing less than to control prison life and to extend their power outside prison walls. Murder of an inmate, a guard, or one of their family members on the outside is a common form of gang discipline and control, as well as a condition for membership in some gangs. Testifying against, or otherwise informing on, 26 971-72 (9th Cir. 2004) (incarcerated members of the East Coast Crips engaged in a series of attacks on prison staff); United States v. Keys, 899 F.2d 983 (10th Cir. 1990) (prisoner told guard “that he was a Crips member with sixty soldiers in the prison system” who would kill the guard at the prisoner’s request). In view of the characteristics of gang activity repeatedly recognized by the courts, it is reasonable to conclude that, like a drug dealer, a gang member who is known to be currently engaged in criminal activity is involved in a “continual and ongoing operation.” In this case, the affidavit contained significant information that Bethal was involved in ongoing criminal activity. He was identified by the Louisville Police Department Gang Squad as a gang member, and witnesses stated that he was involved in two different drive-by shootings along with his fellow Crips: the July 31, 2000, shooting in which LaKnogany McCurley was killed, and another shooting the next month in which no one was killed but an innocent bystander was struck. In addition to these two shootings, the task force investigated three others between Crips and Bloods, and the named informant explained that the retaliatory shootings dated back to a murder in 1996. Defendant’s residence was searched less than two months after the second of the shootings in which he was implicated. Thus, at the relevant time, Bethal was a gang member known to be involved in ongoing criminal operations. See United States v. Walton, 908 F.2d 1289, 1302 (6th Cir. 1990) (two instances of drug dealing four months apart “are close enough in time to infer” that defendants are engaging in continuing operations “in the interim”). B. Likelihood of finding evidence at the defendant’s home gang activities can invite one’s own death sentence. Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209, 227 (2006) (citations omitted). 27
The second question is whether Bethal was likely to keep at his residence the evidence of gang activity sought by police. The warrant first mentions handguns and ammunition. This court has observed that “individuals who own guns keep them at their homes.” United States v. Smith, 182 F.3d 473, 480 (6th Cir. 1999) (citing United States v. Shomo, 786 F.2d 981, 984 (10th Cir. 1986); United States v. Steeves, 525 F.2d 33, 38 (8th Cir. 1975); United States v. Rahn, 511 F.2d 290, 293 (10th Cir. 1975)). The majority contends that the perpetrator of a shooting would be most likely to dispose of a gun, rather than store it in his home. However, the cases cited by the majority do not address the situation of one who is involved in a series of retaliatory shootings. Under the circumstances here, Bethal was, if anything, more likely than the average gun owner to keep a gun and ammunition at home. As noted above, he was identified as an assailant in two drive-by shootings, which were part of a larger pattern of retaliatory gang shootings spanning five years. The shooters were thus themselves in danger of being shot by rival gang members. The affidavit states that at least one gang member did in fact carry a weapon with him in response to this danger. When the named informant forewarned Delion Burks, one of the targets of the shooting in which McCurley was killed, Burks responded that he “didn’t care,” because he was armed. Affidavit at 3. The axiom that drug dealers are likely to keep evidence of drug dealing at home has been explained by this court as a “reasonable inference[] about where the evidence is likely to be kept,” which an “issuing magistrate is entitled to draw.” Miggins, 302 F.3d at 394 (quoting McClellan, 165 F.3d at 546). The inference that one who was both a perpetrator and a potential target of frequent shootings between rival gangs would be likely to keep a firearm and ammunition at his residence is, 28 if anything, stronger. Though a magistrate could reasonably infer that a drug dealer would keep drugs at home both because this would make them readily available for sale and more easily protected from theft, there certainly are drug dealers who operate only out of their cars, or out of their places of business. See, e.g., Woosley, 361 F.3d at 925 (defendant conducted marijuana sales out of his place of business, an oil change shop); United States v. Clemis, 11 F.3d 597, 599, 602 (6th Cir. 1993) (defendant did not conduct drug transactions at his home, instead selling out of his car using drugs stored for him by third parties). The desirability of having the relevant item close at hand is considerably stronger in the case of a gun, which not only may be needed on short notice to engage in criminal activity – here, driveby shootings, rather than drug sales – but which may serve to protect the owner from attack, an attack which Bethal had good reason to fear. I would therefore hold that the magistrate had a substantial basis for concluding that Bethal was likely to keep weapons and ammunition related to the shootings at his home.
The warrant also authorized the officers to search for any “evidence of gang affiliation.” Affidavit at 1. I concur with the majority’s conclusion that the search for this evidence was impermissible because the warrant did not “particularly describ[e] . . . the persons or things to be seized.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. This court in United States v. Ables, 167 F.3d 1021 (6th Cir. 1999), succinctly explained the parameters of the particularity requirement under Sixth Circuit precedent: General search warrants which fail to particularly describe the things to be searched for and seized “create a danger of unlimited discretion in the executing officer’s determination of what is subject to seizure and a danger that items will be seized when the warrant refers to other items.” “However, the degree of specificity required is flexible and will vary depending on the crime involved and the types of items 29 sought. ‘Thus a description is valid if it is as specific as the circumstances and the nature of the activity under investigation permit.’” Id. at 1033-34 (6th Cir. 1999) (citations omitted) (quoting United States v. Savoca, 761 F.2d 292, 298-99 (6th Cir. 1985); United States v. Henson, 848 F.2d 1374, 1383 (6th Cir. 1988) (quoting United States v. Blum, 753 F.2d 999, 1001 (11th Cir. 1985))). Moreover, as the Supreme Court observed in Zurcher v. Stanford Daily, 436 U.S. 547, 565 (1978), courts must apply the requirement of particularity “with particular exactitude when First Amendment interests would be endangered by the search.” Here, the search for gang paraphernalia implicates the right of association. Dawson v. Delaware, 503 U.S. 159, 163 (1992) (“[T]he First Amendment protects an individual’s right to join groups and associate with others holding similar beliefs.”). The Ables court explained that “broadly worded categories of items to be seized” are permissible under the Fourth Amendment if the category is “‘delineated in part by an illustrative list of seizable items.’” Id. at 1034 (quoting United States v. Riley, 906 F.2d 841, 844 (2d Cir. 1990)). The fact that “the officers executing the warrant must exercise some minimal judgment as to whether a particular document falls within the described category” is insufficient to create the forbidden “unlimited discretion in the executing officer” regarding what items to seize. Id. Thus, a search for gang paraphernalia would be permissible if the warrant first provided a list of examples, as did, for example, the warrant in United States v. Jackson, 67 F.3d 1359 (8th Cir. 1995), which listed: Any evidence of street gang membership o[r] affiliation with any street gang, including, but not limited to, any . . . objects or graffiti depicting gang members[’] names, initials, logos, monikers, slogans, or containing mention of street gang membership, affiliation, activity, or identity; . . . and newspaper clippings tending to relate details or reference to any crime . . . . Id. at 1366 n.1. In this case, the affidavit provided no modifiers for its authorization to search for 30 “evidence of gang affiliation,” nor did it provide a “broadly worded category of items to be seized.” Thus, with respect to the search for gang paraphernalia, I agree that the warrant did not satisfy the particularity requirement.
The warrant also authorized the officers to search for marijuana and any other drugs. As the majority opinion notes, the affidavit does not provide information that defendant used or sold drugs. The strongest connection it provides between defendant and the drugs sought is that defendant was associated, as a fellow gang member and fellow shooter, with Kenneth Parker, whom the named informant knew to keep drugs and whom she called to purchase marijuana. The affidavit thus does not contain sufficient information to support a reasonable belief, based on “more than mere suspicion,” that defendant possessed marijuana or other drugs. Johnson, 351 F.3d at 258 (quoting Bennett, 905 F.2d at 934).