Court Opinion

ID: 9465884
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 00:58:45.275645+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:25.535369
License: Public Domain

SPENCER WILLIAMS, District Judge,
concurring:
I concur in the majority’s opinion. I wish to emphasize, however, that the trial court must be guided by the underlying remedial objectives of the exclusionary rule, when it considers the question of whether the evidence seized in Room 611 has been tainted by the agents’ illegal entry.
The affidavit presented by the government in support of its request for a search warrant did not contain any information obtained as a result of the agents’ presence in Room 611, and no search of the hotel room occurred until after the request for a warrant had been approved. Thus, the only connection between the agents’ warrantless entry and the subsequent discovery of the evidence appears to be the extent to which observations made following the unlawful entry served as additional motivation for obtaining the warrant. With this in mind, the majority opinion sets forth the primary question concerning taint in this case quite clearly: were the observations made by agent Bagby following his illegal entry a substantial factor in the ultimate decision to seek the warrant, or did those observations at most merely intensify the government’s investigation. Suppression would be appropriate in the former circumstance, but ordinarily would not in- the latter.
Unfortunately, however, no mechanical test exists to determine whether the amount by which the government’s motivation to investigate Room 611 may have been heightened justifies suppression. The trial court may be required on remand to perform some delicate line drawing here, for the difference between admissibility and inadmissibility is only a matter of the degree to which the primary illegality is linked to the evidence sought to be introduced, and the extent to which the government may be said to have exploited its unconstitutional behavior.
In evaluating the facts of this case, and in drawing the necessary distinctions, the trial court must be guided by the underlying deterrent function of the exclusionary rule. As this court recently has observed, “[e]xploitation of illegalities is the focus of the fruits doctrine for the reason that the exclusionary rule is aimed at deterring police conduct in violation of the fourth amendment ‘in the only effectively available way — by removing the incentive to disregard it’.” United States v. Humphries, 600 F.2d 1238, (9th Cir. 1979). Evidence which is discovered during “merely intensified” investigations is deemed admissible because the possible deterrent value of the exclusionary rule in such cases is outweighed by the costs to society and to the truth-finding process. Cf. Stone v. Powell, 428 U.S. 465, 489-91, 96 S.Ct. 3037, 49 L.Ed.2d 1067 (1976) (discussing the purpose of the exclusionary rule and its costs). Evidence which is more directly the product of illegal government activity is evidence the *1308suppression of which will more likely be a meaningful deterrent. Cf. United States v. Ceccolini, 435 U.S. 268, 275, 98 S.Ct. 1054, 1060, 55 L.Ed.2d 268 (1978) (“Recognizing not only the benefits but the costs, which are often substantial, of the exclusionary rule, we have said that ‘application of the rule has been restricted to those areas where its remedial objectives are thought must efficaciously served’ . . . .”).
In my view it is significant in the present case that there appears to be no evidence that the agents did not, in good faith, believe that Berg had voluntarily consented to their admittance to his hotel room. Furthermore, the agents sought Berg’s permission before searching the room for any contraband, and when Berg refused to give that permission they refrained from searching. The implication is that these agents were attempting to conform their investigation to the requirements of the Fourth Amendment. It is also important to me that the search did not actually take place until after issuance of a warrant, and that the warrant was based on an affidavit containing no illegally obtained information. These facts tend to indicate that the government’s actions minimized any possible exploitation of the primary illegality represented by the warrantless entry. It would be a very different situation if there were any indication that the agents made their initial entry in bad faith disregard for Fourth Amendment- rights, or if they had ignored Berg’s refusal to permit a search, or if the search warrant later obtained had been issued on the basis of information discovered by means of the illegal entry. But if the government’s investigation had already focused on Room 611 independent by Bagby’s phone call, then the extent to which the primary illegality has been exploited here is slight indeed, and any possible deterrent effect arising from application of the exclusionary rule would be largely meaningless.