Court Opinion

ID: 9464269
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:29:12.629101+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:32.632898
License: Public Domain

CAMPBELL, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
The fourth amendment provides that no warrants shall issue except as they particularly describe the place to be searched and the things to be seized. The question here is whether a warrant authorizing seizure at a particular store of “certain 8-track electronic tapes and tape cartridges which are unauthorized ‘pirate’ reproductions’’ [emphasis supplied] is defective for want of a particular description of the things to be seized. As my brothers point out, the fourth amendment does not require a “mi-ñute and detailed description of the property to be seized, but the property must be so definitely described that the officer making the search will not seize the wrong property.” People v. Prall, 314 Ill. 518, 522-23, 145 N.E. 610, 612 (1924). I disagree with my brothers’ conclusion that under the circumstances of this case the requisite clarity was lacking.
First, I would not frame the issue as whether a “generic” description is proper. I think of a generic description in this context as delineating a class that potentially includes both seizable and non-seizable goods, for example “certain automobile tubes and tires”, People v. Prall, supra, or “fur coats, stoles, jackets and other finished fur products . . . .” United States v. Scharfman, 448 F.2d 1352 (2d Cir. 1971), cert. denied, 405 U.S. 919, 92 S.Ct. 944, 30 L.Ed.2d 789 (1972). The trouble with a generic description is that it does not direct the officer which articles to select for seizure from the described, generally inoffensive, class. While a generic description may sometimes be sufficient — if, for example, it is narrowed by other circumstances, see United States v. Scharfman, supra; Vitali v. United States, 383 F.2d 121 (1st Cir. 1967)—it raises the problem of conferring free-wheeling discretion upon the officer. But the description in issue is not generic in the sense just described. It is limited to an identifiable class of tapes, viz. unauthorized *191“pirate” reproductions, all of which constitute seizable evidence of a wilful criminal violation. Like the “whiskey” mentioned in Steele v. United States No. 1, 267 U.S. 498, 45 S.Ct. 414, 69 L.Ed. 757 (1925), none of the items in the described class is innocent.
I do not mean to suggest that an overly general description in a warrant would in every case be adequately narrowed by limiting seizure to items termed “illegal”. But if as here unauthorized “pirate” items can be distinguished, visually as well as aurally, with a reasonable degree of accuracy, and if identifying them demands judgments that are more factual than legal, the concern that agents will inadvertently or purposely violate personal rights in the course of a seizure under the warrant is greatly diminished. A warrant thus authorizing seizure of “unauthorized ‘pirate’ reproductions” is not so general as it might first appear; issued upon probable cause, it meets the constitutional requirement of particularity. No discretion to pick and choose among “innocent” and “guilty” items is conferred.
The question is simply whether the description, “unauthorized ‘pirate’ reproductions”, conveys enough information so that an executing officer can be expected to identify and seize only such illicit tapes, and do so without unreasonably disturbing other items. I believe the description here is clear enough for such purposes. According to the evidence, pirated tapes can readily be ascertained, both from their appearance (they are said to have shoddy, amateurish covers and lettering and to look quite different from non-pirated items) and by checking the manufacturer’s name against those of the legitimate companies, all or most of which are well-known. There must be catalogs and lists showing what tapes are put out by what legitimate firms. Identification would seem little more difficult than executing a routine warrant authorizing the seizure of counterfeit bills. Appellees do not, indeed, claim that any identification problems arose here or that the tapes seized were not pirated. Since it seems well within the ability of agents to make this distinction and therefore execute the warrant, I do not see how the warrant fails to measure up to the fourth amendment requirement that the property to be seized be particularly described. And while I agree with my colleagues that additional descriptive material in the warrant would have done no harm, I see no constitutional necessity of inclusion of “do it yourself” instructions 1 or a biographical sketch showing the expertise of the agent who initially bought pirated tapes at the shop (and who stated in the affidavit that he had noticed 500 or more such pirated tapes in the shop “based upon [his] previous experience in this area”). In short, I think my brothers overestimate the difficulty of executing this warrant correctly. The agents had plain directions as to what to seize; they seized anything else at their peril. Certainly if the agents had seized substantial quantities of non-pirated tapes they would have been acting in plain disregard of the direction in the warrant, and would presumably be subject to personal liability, see Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971).
I do not mean to overstate my position. I concede that this is a close case, since in determining whether tapes are “pirated”, the officers must make a status judgment that could be — but on the present evidence does not appear to be — tricky. I concede that there are some categories of illicit items so general that an agent could not in most circumstances be expected reliably to pick out the items belonging to the class, e. g. all “stolen” watches. But compare Vitali v. United States, supra. To leave to the agent whether a watch was stolen would in many cases offer too great a potential for *192mistaken seizure. The agent would have to refer to much unique, possibly disputed information; he rather than the magistrate would, as a practical matter, end up deciding what items to seize. The distinction is between an agent executing the instructions of the magistrate and an agent acting essentially on his own initiative. But while distinguishing a pirated tape doubtless requires some outside knowledge as well as reference to outside materials (i. e. lists of legitimate tapes and their manufacture), it is not really a discretionary decision, in the sense of a legal decision about which reasonable men could end up differing. It rests on objective criteria. There is little to distinguish the decisional process required of the agents here from that required of agents who are told to seize heroin or other narcotics. In the latter instance, suspicious substances are first noted by eye; they may then be “field tested”; and then following seizure the substances are tested in a laboratory. Here the pirated tapes are first ascertained by eye; they are then checked against catalogs or the like, perhaps after consultation with experts; and finally they are aurally compared, this last stage being comparable to the laboratory testing of a drug. Both processes require essentially factual determinations. The executing agent is not vested with broad judgmental discretion to make a legal evaluation, as would be the case were he empowered to seize all “obscene” materials. See Marcus v. Search Warrant, 367 U.S. 717, 81 S.Ct. 1708, 6 L.Ed.2d 1127 (1961); Stanford v. Texas, 379 U.S. 476, 85 S.Ct. 506, 13 L.Ed.2d 431 (1965).2
I thus deem this warrant sufficiently particular in its description of the items to be seized, since it could be correctly executed through use of the kind of generally available, objective information that a magistrate can assume any agent may either possess or at least easily acquire.3 My brothers overstate matters when they speak of the warrant as requiring all information to be obtained after seizure. While the agents are still in the shop, they could easily screen the tapes using the catalogs of legitimate manufacturers for verification after first noting their suspicious jackets and lettering.
I can understand the court’s concern lest agents be vested with broad discretionary authority to pick and choose among hard-to-distinguish items. But on this record at *193least, it seems to me that the items are not that hard-to-distinguish; it seems entirely practicable to make a prima facie selection of “pirated” tapes, leaving untouched any unpirated items. My brothers’ approach will, I fear, discourage law enforcement in an area where it may already be hard enough for legitimate producers to enlist the interest and support of enforcement personnel. If the requirements of warrants become so technical in this field that only the most sophisticated government attorneys can write them successfully, the net result will be less a blow for civil liberties than a license for continued piracy. It is, of course, important to protect against the “roving commission” of a general warrant. However, it is also important not to erect such high barriers to enforcement that the underlying substantive law, designed to protect legitimate businessmen and performers, loses its potency. The ultimate threat to civil liberties occurs when those whom the law should protect must look elsewhere for self-defense.
I see little merit to the alternative grounds urged by defendants for suppressing the fruits of the search in question. They contend that the tapes seized under the warrant were “mere evidence”, unseiza-ble because of their insufficient nexus under the standards of Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967), with the particular crimes charged. On the contrary, I would consider the tapes both individually and collectively very relevant to the intent requirement of 17 U.S.C. § 104 as well as for sentencing purposes. A defendant could plausibly justify a few isolated sales of infringing tapes on grounds of oversight, clerical error or the like. The fact that a substantial part of the shop’s inventory consisted of pirated tapes would be the best proof of wilfulness and sale for profit. Furthermore, the seized tapes would appear to be instrumentalities of the crime of wilful infringement for profit, not mere evidence of wrongdoing. Whether or not each becomes the subject of a separate prosecution does not enhance defendants’ objection to their seizure nor their right to offer them for sale.
And, I am unable to worry about putting these defendants out of business. This could only occur because their inventory consisted entirely or mostly of tapes being offered for sale in plain violation of law— tapes which were, therefore, seizable as in-strumentalities and evidence of crime. The fact that defendants’ entire operation depended on items of this nature makes their conduct worse, not better. They stand in little different position than a fence who complains he is put out of business because the police seize his inventory of stolen goods.

I would reverse the decision of the district court.

. A warrant to seize “heroin” is adequately descriptive even though heroin would be indistinguishable from other powers to an unpracticed eye, and can only be identified with certainty by a laboratory test made after the fact. I don’t know of any requirement ruling out after-the-fact verification so long as initial identification on some practical basis is possible. Nor do I know of any authority that the affidavit or the warrant must particularize the methods whereby the officer is to verify the true nature of the object.

. The Supreme Court said in Stanford that the particularity requirement of the fourth amendment had to be observed with the “most scrupulous exactitude when the ‘things’ are books and the basis for the seizure is the ideas they contain”, 379 U.S. 476, 485, 85 S.Ct. 506, 511, 13 L.Ed.2d 431. But while the present case involves stocks of musical tapes, the basis for seizure has nothing whatever to do with the ideas or contents of the tapes. The situation is no different from that in United States v. Scharfman, 448 F.2d 1355 (2d Cir. 1971) where Judge Kaufman, speaking for the panel in upholding a warrant authorizing seizure of “fur coats, stoles, [and] jackets. . . .”, pointed out that when first amendment rights are not involved, the specificity requirement is more flexible. The circumstances surrounding the Scharfman warrant offered no greater guarantee than did the circumstances here that only properly seizable items would be impounded by the officers. One coat in the stores to be searched in Scharfman had been positively identified by an employee of the shippers whose furs had been hijacked, corroborating a tip which located the shipments at the fur stores in question. Here, two apparently pirated tapes were purchased from D and L by Agent Saraceni and Wayne Thomas, a salesman for Warner/Electra/Atlantic, Inc. Those tapes were conclusively determined to be unauthorized duplications. Agent Saraceni was able because of his experience in the field to make a visual estimate that numerous other illegal records were also on the premises of D and L. And when the warrant was executed, the officers could by inspection and ultimately by aural comparison make certain that only pirated tapes were seized.

. My brothers’ concern over a lack of “clear standards” for ascertaining pirated tapes would be more persuasive if there were any indication that distinguishing pirated tapes from genuine ones poses a real problem. But there is no evidence that it does. Search warrants issue every day telling agents to search for narcotics, counterfeit money, betting paraphernalia, and the like, all items requiring some discernment and even after-the-fact testing, but having, at bottom an objective basis for recognition. I see no difference here. Compare United States v. Drebin, 557 F.2d 1316 (9th Cir. 1977) (no evidence that legal and illegal films could be distinguished by visual inspection).