Court Opinion

ID: 9480353
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:45:27.920895+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:47:37.865019
License: Public Domain

NATHANIEL R. JONES, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I believe that Title III should be narrowly construed, and that the district court correctly determined that under George suppression was required because the interception was not made in conformity with the authorization. Therefore, I respectfully dissent.
The majority takes an unprecedented leap by extending the plain view exception to include plain hearing under Title III. The majority can cite to no authority for such an extension. Moreover, the majority argues that the instant case fits within the Coolidge rationale because there was a properly issued authorization which clearly makes the initial intrusion lawful, and because the agents “inadvertently” overheard Baranek talking to his mother, and inadvertence is at the heart of the plain view exception. In United States v. Couser, 732 F.2d 1207, 1208-10 (4th Cir.1984), the Fourth Circuit held that suppression was not required for the interception by Government agents of comments made by the defendant to persons in the background while he was conversing on the telephone. The court impliedly recognized a diminished privacy interest because all of the background conversations intercepted were statements made by an individual with a telephone receiver at his ear. Id. at 1209. The court characterized these interceptions as arguably “technical” violations of the authorization order and refused to suppress. However, the Couser Court did not rely on the plain hearing analogy adopted by the majority today, stating:
[Wjhether the “plain view” doctrine itself is an exception to the statutory requirements relating to wiretaps, and if so, to what extent, poses a question which need not be reached in the instant case, in *1073view of our conclusion that if the wiretap order in this case does not cover any of the background conversations, it is not the type of statutory violation requiring suppression.
Id. at 1210.
While it is clear that the agents initially inadvertently overheard Baranek talking to his mother, the conversation lasted for over two hours and the agents managed to record approximately 50 minutes of conversation during spot checks. At some point this begins to seem less than inadvertent. Furthermore, I do not believe the initial intrusion was lawful under the authorization order as the majority states because the agents immediately knew they were not listening to a “wire communication” and thus were aware they were operating outside the scope of the authorization.
The majority concedes that Baranek had a “subjective expectation of privacy” in a face-to-face conversation with his mother which took place in her home. The majority also acknowledges that there may or may not have been probable cause to place a “bug” in her home, and that the inadvertent failure of the defendants to properly hang up the telephone in effect operated as a “bug”. Yet, today’s decision could mean that if Government agents get lucky breaks and manage, through faulty telephone wiring or overly sensitive electronic surveillance equipment, to hear private face-to-face conversations inside individual homes, courts would not be required to suppress such conversations even though no warrant to search the home or place a “bug” inside had been secured.