Court Opinion

ID: 9489198
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 13:08:52.427425+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:53:23.633537
License: Public Domain

TATEL, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and concurring in the judgment:
I join the judgment of the court, the portion of the court’s opinion rejecting Vanness’s sentencing challenge, and the portion of the court’s opinion concluding that the district court did not commit clear error in finding that the detective on whose affidavit the search warrant was based did not knowingly or recklessly include a false statement in his affidavit. Because we can easily uphold this finding, I see no need to address Vanness’s many challenges to the finding of probable cause supporting the search warrant. As Vanness concedes in his brief, under United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984), whether there was probable cause to issue a warrant is irrelevant if the officers conducting a search reasonably relied in good faith on a warrant issued by a detached and neutral magistrate, see id. at 913, unless the affidavit on which the warrant was based included a material statement “that the affiant knew was false or would have known was false except for his reckless disregard of the truth,” id. at 923 (citing Franks v. Delaware, 438 U.S. 154, 98 S.Ct. 2674, 57 L.Ed.2d 667 (1978)); accord United States v. Richardson, 861 F.2d 291, 294 (D.C.Cir.1988) (“[E]ven if the inaccurate statement in the affidavit was material to the issue of probable cause, the evidence uncovered during the search was admissible because the affidavit was made in good faith, the warrant was issued by a detached and neutral magistrate, and the warrant was reasonably relied on in good faith by the police officers.”), cert. denied, 489 U.S. 1058, 109 S.Ct. 1325, 103 L.Ed.2d 593 (1989). Vanness has not argued that the magistrate who issued the warrant was not neutral and detached or that the officers conducting the search were not acting reasonably and in good faith. The court’s upholding of the district court’s determination that the affiant did not act in bad faith is therefore sufficient to justify affirmance of Vanness’s conviction.