Court Opinion

ID: 9498949
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:33:18.585495+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:59:11.162674
License: Public Domain

GRUENDER, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I concur in full in the judgment and in the Court’s opinion except as to the finding of error in the admission into evidence of the face sheet of the search warrant under Federal Rule of Evidence 403. I would find that the district court did not err in admitting the face sheet of the search warrant.
I believe that, as a general proposition, admitting into evidence the search warrant face sheet can be proper to show the context for law enforcement presence and the lawfulness of the subsequent search. Cf. United States v. Wilson, 922 F.2d 1336, 1339 (7th Cir.1991) (holding that, without evidence of a warrant to explain the officers’ presence, the jury “would have been left scratching its collective head about what the police were doing at [the defendant’s girlfriend’s] apartment in the first place”). Ordinarily, the face sheet of a search warrant would, provide solely that there is probable cause to believe that certain evidence or contraband may be found at a specific location.
The face sheet of the search warrant in the instant case makes the unusual additional finding of probable cause to believe that Davis resided at the premises to be searched. While such an additional finding could be problematic in some cases, I am not convinced that the inclusion of this finding results in the probative value of the warrant face sheet being substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice or confusion, as required under Fed. R.Evid. 403 to establish inadmissibility. It certainly is true, as the Court notes, that Davis’s residency in or control over the house was a key issue at trial. However, the district court immediately gave the limiting instruction that the face sheet was to be “received for the limited purposes of demonstrating the reason and lawfulness of the search in question and for no other reason than that.” Because the district court gave an appropriate limiting instruction, I believe that the additional probable cause finding set forth in the face sheet of the search warrant should not have a significant effect on the Rule 403 balancing test. See United States v. Karam, 37 F.3d 1280, 1286 (8th Cir.1994) (holding that this Court is required to assume that the jury followed the limiting instructions given by the district court).
The Court notes that in applying the Rule 403 balancing test, we should consider the “relative probative value and prejudicial effect of any evidentiary alternatives,” ante at 7 (quoting Becht, 267 F.3d at 773), and cites Davis’s willingness “to admit that the officers had a legal basis to search” as an evidentiary alternative *849weighing against admissibility of the search warrant face sheet. I agree that a stipulation that law enforcement was present pursuant to a search warrant duly authorized by a judge would lessen the probative value of admitting the search warrant itself and, perhaps, tip the balance of the Rule 403 analysis in favor of inadmissibility. However, I am not convinced that Davis expressed a willingness to stipulate in this case. When the Government at trial offered the warrant face sheet for admission into evidence, Davis did not point to any previous purported offer to stipulate nor did he offer to stipulate at that time in support of his objection. Pri- or to opening statements, Davis’s counsel merely stated that “[t]he search warrant we are going to admit to,” in the context of arguing against the admission of evidence related to uncharged marijuana dealing. However, this pretrial remark, even in context, is ambiguous at best, and nothing in the record suggests that Davis meant for it to be construed so broadly as to be a stipulation that the police were present pursuant to a search warrant duly authorized by a judge.
The Court also relies on the fact that the Government referred to the face sheet of the search warrant during closing argument. WTiile I share the Court’s concern regarding how the Government referred to the search warrant face sheet during its closing argument, especially in light of the limiting instruction, it seems to me that these remarks might have been the basis for an objection based on improper argument. However, I do not find the Government’s unchallenged statements in its closing argument particularly relevant to a Rule 403 admissibility decision made during the Government’s case-in-chief.