Court Opinion

ID: 9470301
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 03:01:59.628813+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:49.779428
License: Public Domain

KELLY, District Judge,
dissenting:
The majority opinion, to which I most respectfully dissent, holds that the warrant-less entry and search of defendant Cuaron’s home by seven armed law enforcement officers were justified because the exigencies facing those officers were so extreme that they dared not seek a warrant lest vital evidence of large-scale drug trafficking vanish in the meantime. For reasons expressed and explained herein, I believe that the majority’s conclusions, as those of the trial court, are unfounded in fact and ignore relevant precedent and code. Moreover, I am convinced the majority, perhaps unknowingly, acquiesces in the law officers’ evasion of certain established procedures relating to search and seizure,'the thrust of which will surely signal some form of “excusable neglect” not remotely envisioned in the Fourth Amendment nor approved in Weeks v. United States, 232 U.S. 383, 393-94, 34 S.Ct. 341, 344-45, 58 L.Ed. 652 (1914). The admonition of this momentous decision has served us well. It is as pertinent and timely today as ever, if not more so. An application of its terms to this rather sensitive, provocative, and otherwise uncharted area of law makes the trial judge’s decision quite simple. It serves as the rock on which my views are founded here:
The efforts of the courts and their officials to bring the guilty to punishment, praiseworthy as they are, are not to be aided by the sacrifice of those great principles established by years of endeavor and suffering which have resulted in their embodiment in the fundamental law of the land.... To sanction such proceedings would be to affirm by judicial decision a manifest neglect, if not an open defiance, of the prohibitions of the Constitution, intended for the protection of the people against such unauthorized action.
Today’s decision will surely serve to further confuse this area of law. In my view, it will also serve to license future abuse and unnecessarily plague the courts. In light of these views, I would reverse defendant Cuaron’s conviction and remand the case *592for a new trial. Perhaps in the course of that proceeding the basis for my reservations could be more succinctly addressed and clarified.
In the interest of clarity, I will first address that with which I agree. In this regard, I find little fault with the majority’s factual summary which, for the most part, parallels the findings of the trial court;1 nor do I quibble with most of the majority’s exposition of the applicable law. I agree that the government has the burden of proving that exigent circumstances made the warrantless entry “imperative,” Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 455, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 2032, 29 L.Ed.2d 564 (1971), or “necessary,” United States v. Baca, 417 F.2d 103, 106 (10th Cir.1969), cert. denied, 404 U.S. 979, 92 S.Ct. 347, 30 L.Ed.2d 294 (1971);2 and further agree that determining whether that burden is met requires us to evaluate the record’s facts, as a whole, against the presumed benchmark responses of “prudent, cautious and trained officers,” United States v. Erb, 596 F.2d 412 (10th Cir.), cert, denied, 444 U.S. 848,100 S.Ct. 97, 62 L.Ed.2d 63 (1979). I agree that judging the necessity of foregoing a warrant demands some notion of the minimum time that would be exacted in procuring one, United States v. McEachin, 670 F.2d 1139, 1146 (D.C.Cir.1981); United States v. Rubin, 474 F.2d 262, 268 (3rd Cir.), cert. denied 414 U.S. 833, 94 S.Ct. 173, 38 L.Ed.2d 68 (1973), which in turn requires an understanding of how long it takes to obtain the telephonic search warrant authorized by Fed.R.Crim.P. 41(c)(2), since such a warrant can generally be obtained more quickly than can the traditional kind, United States v. Baker, 520 F.Supp. 1080, 1083 (S.D.Iowa 1981).
While not necessarily pertinent to my reason for reversal, the factual basis giving rise to the decision-making process to “first secure the premises” also bothers me. In this regard, when the purported exigency arises from a mere threat that evidence will be lost,3 I cannot agree that the relevant test is whether “officers have reason to believe that criminal evidence may be destroyed ... or removed ... before a warrant can be obtained,” because such a “test” implies that any mere possibility, articulable suspicion or hunch that the evidence might be lost before a warrant arrives suffices to excuse a warrantless search, and all but guarantees that vague, speculative testimony of the sort given by Officer Diezi— and quoted at length by the majority — will be given much greater weight than it deserves. Of course, it is reasonable to guess that drug dealers — “family men” or not— get nervous when their couriers are delayed. They may indeed fear that the courier has been arrested; but they may also fear that he has been robbed by his customers, or that he has absconded with their drugs or money. Who knows which reaction is possible, or what the drug dealer’s response will likely be? In the absence of any limiting objective evidence, a policeman’s speculation as to what might occur is limited only by his imagination and his preconceptions — or, as officer Diezi might put it, his “experience.”4 An exception to the
*593Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement that may be established by a policeman’s speculative fears can scarcely be described as “specifically established and well-delineated,” Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 357, 88 S.Ct. 507, 514,19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967): it is better described as swallowing the rule.
I believe, rather, that evaluating a purported exigency requires an objective comparison between the likelihood, over time, that evidence will be lost and the likelihood that a warrant could not be timely obtained, if sought. I do not suggest that this comparison can be made with mathematical precision, and, of course, the level of tolerable risk of lost evidence will vary with a number of factors, as outlined, for example, in Dorman v. United States, 435 F.2d 385, 392-93 (D.C.Cir.1970), and in United States v. Rubin, supra. But where the crime involved is not violent, where the suspected criminals are not believed dangerous,5 and where the doctrine of hot pursuit is not at issue, it is my view that something near a realistic expectation that evidence will be lost if a warrant is sought should be required. See generally, Comment, Residential Searches to Prevent Destruction of Evidence: A Need for Strict Standards, 70 J.Crim.L. & Crim. 255 (1979).
As relates to the entire process, I dearly believe that, at all times material to the course of the law enforcement officers’ activities — however diligent they may be— however rank the offense — these officers must also be equally mindful of the rights of the citizen. Simply stated, they must “think warrant!” Justice Jackson taught us best in Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 68 S.Ct. 367, 92 L.Ed. 436 (1948), wherein, in part, he proclaimed as follows:
The point of the Fourth Amendment, which often is not grasped by zealous officers, is not that it denies law enforcement the support of the usual inferences which reasonable men draw from evidence. Its protection consists in requiring that those inferences be drawn by a neutral and detached magistrate instead of being judged by the officer engaged in the often competitive enterprise of ferreting out crime. Any assumption that evidence sufficient to support a magistrate’s disinterested determination to issue a search warrant will justify the officers in making a search without a warrant would reduce the Amendment to a nullity and leave the people’s homes secure only in the discretion of police officers. Crime, even in the privacy of one’s own quarters, is, of course, of grave concern to society, and the law allows such crime to be reached on proper showing. The right of officers to thrust themselves into a home is also a grave concern, not only to the individual but to a society which chooses to dwell in reasonable security and freedom from surveillance. When the right of privacy must reasonably yield to the right of search is, as a rule, to be decided by a judicial officer, not by a policeman or Government enforcement agent.
Here, even if this record’s indication of a risk of lost evidence went beyond the rankest form of speculation, it would be insufficient, because the trial court and all witnesses oddly measured the supposed risk by comparison with the several hours normally required to obtain a warrant from a state judge, and gave no consideration at all to the time required to obtain a telephone warrant. The only explanation on the record as to why a telephone warrant was not sought was given by DEA Special Agent Drew Moren:
Q [By the Assistant United States Attorney] Agent Moren, you were attempting to explain why you didn’t get an — attempt to get a telephone warrant; why didn’t you?
*594A We have discussed this before with the magistrates here. It’s not really looked upon favorably. I know one time Magistrate Sickler was going to allow one, a telephone warrant because of the geographical location where we were going to be. But we have never ever done it, you know, since then or before then, and to my knowledge, there has never been one in the judicial district, sir.
Rec., Vol. Ill, at 182.6 I find the officers’ response an inexcusable and hopefully unfounded one. The trial court’s silence here is disturbing. Indeed, at least his curiosity should have invoked the kind of answers I would insist upon at the time of rehearing. Obviously, my prime objection to the majority opinion is that it is plain to me, that since the burden is on the government to establish exigent circumstances, the exigency in this or similar ones should only be established by comparison with the time required to obtain a telephone warrant. I am unwilling to accept the requisites of F.R.Crim.P. 41(c)(2) as some form of an option tendered solely for the investigating officers’ convenience. Conversely, I believe its exercise, at least a timely attempt under these circumstances, is mandatory. Since no evidence whatsoever was introduced as to how long that time might be, let alone for a timely attempt, it follows that the action taken in this case falls to the presumption that warrantless searches are unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
The mere absence of evidence from which the necessary comparison can be made does not faze the majority; it simply pronounces that no delay at all could be brooked, since “the officers could not count on even thirty minutes to obtain a telephone warrant” from the time of Jon Neet’s arrest. This declaration is insupportable for several reasons. First, the existence of an emergency that arose when Jon Neet was arrested is
belied by the fact that agents chose not to commence the search until thirty minutes later. Cf. G.M. Leasing Corp. v. United States, 429 U.S. 338, 358-59, 97 S.Ct. 619, 631-32, 50 L.Ed.2d 530 (1977); id. at 361, 97 S.Ct. at 633 (Burger, concurring). Next, there is no evidence on the record that a telephone warrant would require as much as thirty minutes to obtain; it must be remembered that the investigation leading up to the search of defendant’s house involved the simultaneous, coordinated actions of over twenty law enforcement officers, including more than a dozen DEA agents.
Consistent with my views, experience in similar proceedings suggests that at least one or two of these agents should have been (and probably were) assigned to the task of obtaining a telephone warrant. Typically, at such a time as when Neet’s car is traced to the defendant’s residence, and his entry confirmed, or certainly when Jon Neet called back to his brother, William, from the defendant’s home, a magistrate should have been first called and simply alerted to “stand by.” I am convinced from the record probable cause existed sufficient to support a warrant as early as when Jon Neet left the defendant’s home at 1:35 P.M., but most assuredly at the time of the Neets’ arrest at 2:00 P.M. Within minutes from either instance the noticed magistrate could have been recalled either from the motel or at a convenient site adjacent to the surrounded Cuaron premises, at which time a warrant would doubtless issue. Viewed in this light, the time frame is inconsequential.
Next, and as the teaching of Weeks, supra, remains the law of this Circuit, the telephonic search warrant procedures were precisely designed to accommodate law enforcement consistent with its rule. It does not envision good faith exceptions, but compliance as time permits. Accordingly, I cannot excuse the conduct of these other*595wise well-trained but overzealous federal agents for the failure to even attempt to timely obtain a telephonic warrant. I am disturbed, as I believe the trial judge should have been, by the fact that these officers were indeed aware of its availability but consciously ignored its usage. As “trained officers,” I am also convinced they knew better. With this finding, in turn, I find that the officers consciously ignored the Fourth Amendment.
Regrettably, the majority correctly notes that the trial court did not assess the possibility of obtaining a warrant by phone. For the reasons stated, I am also convinced my colleague has erroneously ignored its constitutional implications.
Lastly, it would be a different matter if the only consequence of the majority’s dissimulation were to make certain that this indisputably guilty defendant would be convicted of his crimes.7 It is nonsense, however, to suppose that federal law enforcement officers will be impressed by the Supreme Court’s and Congress’s command that the telephonic search warrant procedure of Fed.R.Crim.P. be used in situations like this, United States v. Baker, 520 F.Supp. 1080, 1084 (S.D.Iowa 1981), when the majority’s tacit message is that they need not bother. Conversely, if these well-trained officers would have simply followed the rules, and had the trial court enforced them, and this Court insisted upon compliance by both, the Fourth Amendment and the lessons in Weeks are preserved.

. I do find the majority’s statement that upon the Neets’ arrest “the agents immediately began efforts to obtain a warrant from state court” to be somewhat misleading. What actually happened is that within minutes of the arrest, but after the decision to “secure” Cuaron’s residence had been made, the task of obtaining a warrant for a second, exhaustive search of the house was delegated to Boulder police officer Kurt Matthews. (Rec., Vol. Ill, at 62-64). Mr. Matthews began almost immediately to prepare the warrant affidavits, but he did not complete this task until after the house had been entered, so that the observations made by the securing officers might be included in the affidavits. Mr. Matthews made his initial, fruitless attempts to contact a judge at “around 3:00 or 3:30.” Id at 191.

. I do not, however, regard the quoted words as terms of art synonymous with “convenient.”

. The exigency might be heightened, of course, if that threat were coupled with a threat to the safety of the police or public, as in Erb or McEachin, but such is not the case here.

. Officer Diezi admitted that he was unable to recall an instance where drugs had disappeared after the arrest of a courier; he explained, with presumably unconscious irony, that this was “because we secure the residence after the sale has taken place ... if we feel that there is any *593possibility that drugs or the money will disappear.” Rec., Vol. Ill, at 92-93 (emphasis added).

. According to officer Diezi, when the officers initially entered defendant Cuaron’s house to secure it, they did so with their weapons holstered, Rec., Vol. Ill, at 115. This alone negates the inference that the officers feared violence from anyone in the house.

. The majority’s reason for quoting a portion of this testimony is none too clear: perhaps it wishes to establish that the decision to eschew a telephone warrant was made in “good faith.” It has probably not escaped the majority that at oral argument below the sole argument raised by the government to excuse the officers’ conduct was based on their purported “good faith,” see Rec., Vol. IV, at 4; but if, in fact, the majority is adopting the holding of United States v. Williams, 622 F.2d 830 (5th Cir.1980) (en banc), it should state so plainly.

. I believe that had the trial court correctly suppressed the evidence obtained through the search of defendant’s home, defendant would still have been convicted on all four counts,