Court Opinion

ID: 9463896
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:19:37.632875+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:21.019582
License: Public Domain

GEE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting: .
I respectfully dissent.
Rather than seize and search suitcases that unquestionably contained marijuana, a railroad investigator and a police detective in Tucson, Arizona, chose to relay their suspicions to DEA agents in Houston, Texas. One of these swore out an affidavit to secure a warrant to search the suitcases. Although the Tucson investigators had never opened the suitcases or viewed the marijuana, and so informed the Houston agent, the affidavit contained unfortunate phraseology, suggesting that the Tucson investigators saw, rather than smelled, the marijuana. Characterizing this error as a “negligent misrepresentation” the majority invalidates the affidavit, the search warrant, the admission of the marijuana into evidence, and the convictions of these two defendants. Because I am unwilling to join the majority’s relentless application of the exclusionary rule, I dissent.
Granting that the error was a “misrepresentation” and that it was “negligent” the majority’s decision to invalidate every affidavit containing what a court may later decide were material “negligent misrepresentations” is too strong for me. Contrary to the majority’s suggestion, I find no “hints” in our cases as to what degree of unintentional material misrepresentation is required to invalidate an affidavit.1 As for *1375the majority’s remark that invalidating affidavits for negligent material misrepresentations is a salutary rule, I cannot agree. Indeed, viewed against the background of the major claimed justification for the exclusionary rule, the statement is a contradiction in terms. For if, as is well settled, the purpose of the exclusionary rule is to deter overzealous police conduct, then to extend it to apply to conduct which is not even intentional — neither overzealous, zealous, nor reluctant but merely careless — is inappropriate. We should refuse to employ the exclusionary rule as a bludgeon to correct police grammar and usage, especially when the police in general good faith have sought the magistrate rather than relying on “exigent circumstances” to justify their search. Cf. United States v. Hill, 500 F.2d 315, at 322 (5th Cir. 1974).
Finally, I must take issue with the majority’s apparent imposition of a requirement that an affidavit state an investigator’s qualifications to identify marijuana by odor. All that the cases cited by the majority require is that a “substantial basis” exist for the magistrate’s independent conclusion that the law officer was qualified to detect the odor of marijuana. See United States v. Pond, 523 F.2d 210, 213 (2d Cir. 1975), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 1058, 96 S.Ct. 794,46 L.Ed.2d 649 (1976). Here the magistrate could conclude from the nature of the work of the railroad agent and the police detective and the fact that they operated in Tucson, Arizona — a known rendezvous point for drug smugglers — that the agent and the detective were qualified to detect the odor of marijuana. See United States v. Lewis, 392 F.2d 377 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 393 U.S. 891, 89 S.Ct. 212, 21 L.Ed.2d 170 (1968). Cf. Monnette v. United States, 299 F.2d 847, 850 (5th Cir. 1962) (agent’s smelling of odor of fermenting mash constituted probable cause without statement of qualification to recognize odor). We have implicitly recognized the qualifications of Border Patrol agents to detect the odor of marijuana in a multitude of cases to establish probable cause. See, e. g., United States v. Garza, 547 F.2d 1234 (5th Cir. 1977). We should allow the magistrate to do the same here.

. In United States v. Thomas, 489 F.2d 664 (5th Cir. 1973, cert. denied, 423 U.S. 844, 96 S.Ct. 79, 46 L.Ed.2d 64 (1975), we expressly reserved the question. 489 F.2d at 671 n. 5. In United States v. Park, 531 F.2d 754 (5th Cir. 1976), we concluded that the unintentional misrepresentation was immaterial and never reached the question of the effect of an unintentional material misrepresentation. Finally, the majority’s statement of United States v. Hunt, 496 F.2d 888 (5th Cir. 1974) is unconvincing. In Hunt the court excised an intentional material misstatement along with material based on a prior illegal search. Under Thomas the presence of an intentional, material misstatement should have invalidated the entire affidavit. I fail to see how the majority can cite Hunt as a case in which we overturned an affidavit because of an unintentional misstatement.