Court Opinion

ID: 9495516
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:04:36.544046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:03.710765
License: Public Domain

KENNEDY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting with respect to Part VIII.
I agree with Judge Keith’s majority opinion on this issue that Carnes has standing to challenge the search of the tapes seized in his briefcase during the warrantless search. I also agree that the authorities needed Fourth Amendment justification both to seize and to listen to the tapes found at Lisa Kellum’s residence. However, I would hold that reasonable suspicion of the commission of a crime or parole violation satisfies the Fourth Amendment when a parolee is subject to a search condition, and furthermore that reasonable suspicion was present in this case.
The Supreme Court has held that the expectation of privacy of a parolee is far more limited than that of ordinary citizens. The special needs of the parole system justify warrantless searches pursuant to reasonable state regulations. Parolees’ residences and property may be searched without warrants when, under the totality of the circumstances, government agents possess reasonable suspicion that the parolee is in violation of a condition of his parole. Griffin v. Wisconsin, 483 U.S. 868, 107 S.Ct. 3164, 97 L.Ed.2d 709 (1987). The Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Knights, 534 U.S. 112, 122 S.Ct. 587, 151 L.Ed.2d 497 (2001), augmented Griffin by establishing that war-rantless searches of probationers’ residences and property are permissible when supported by reasonable suspicion and authorized by a condition of probation, even when the object of the search is investigatory, rather than probationary. The Court noted that a reduction in certain liberties is “inherent in the very nature of’ probation and parole, and the state has an important interest in focusing on probationers and parolees because of the high probability of recidivism as a class. Id. at 591-92. As a consequence, “the balance of governmental and private interests ... warrant a lesser than probable cause standard here. When an officer has reasonable suspicion that a probationer subject to a search condition is engaged in criminal activity, there is enough-likelihood that criminal conduct is occurring that an intrusion on the probationer’s significantly diminished privacy interests is reasonable.” Id. at 592-93.1
As in the Knights case, Carnes was subject to a search condition. Michigan law *965provides, in relevant part, that a parole agent may conduct a warrantless search of a parolee’s person and property in conjunction with a lawful arrest or when there is “reasonable cause to believe that a violation of parole exists.” Mich. Admin. Code § R 791.7735.2 I agree with the district judge that such conditions existed during the arrest of Carnes and the search of his belongings because the tapes were seized in a briefcase containing papers that provided evidence that Carnes was not living in the location specified by the conditions of his parole. The tapes could have had his voice on them, and if so would have tied him to the location from which they were seized. The district court held that where a parole officer could reasonably suspect that cassettes found during a search “might constitute evidence that Defendant was living at an address in violation of his parole conditions,” then seizing those cassettes (without a warrant) would be appropriate.
The majority correctly points out, however, that the government is required to demonstrate reasonable suspicion not only to seize the tapes, but also to listen to them. See United States v. Johnson, 994 F.2d 980 (2d Cir.1993), cert. denied, 510 U.S. 959, 114 S.Ct. 418, 126 L.Ed.2d 364 (1993) (requiring independent probable cause to listen to properly seized audio tapes). The tapes were listened to “sometime after” — perhaps several months after — their seizure on January 14, 1997. The listener was the Assistant United States Attorney prosecuting the weapons charges, not a parole officer. There are no objective indicia that the tapes were listened to for the purpose of establishing a violation of the residency condition of Carnes’s parole; indeed, what little objective indicia there are suggests that this was not the intended purpose.3
Nonetheless, the reviewing officers had reasonable suspicion to believe that the tapes would tie Carnes to the room in which the tapes were found. The government points out that tying Carnes to that room was important to establish that the gun and ammunition, also found in that room, belonged to Carnes as well. The search, therefore, was supported by reasonable suspicion that evidence relating to a criminal act would be uncovered. Under Knights, there is no longer a requirement that the object of the search relate exclusively to a parole violation.4 Knights, 122 S.Ct. at 593. Therefore, in light of the lessened Fourth Amendment protections accorded to parolees, I agree with the district court’s ultimate conclusion that both seizing and listening to the tapes were reasonable in light of the totality of the circumstances.

. Unlike the majority, I do not think the Supreme Court's articulation of a "less than probable cause standard” is limited to the specific facts of Knights's case. The Court was describing the statistical evidence demonstrating recidivism among parolees and probationers as a class, not Knights as an individual. Although the question of whether there exists reasonable suspicion remains a case-by-case, totality of the circumstances analysis, I read Knights as creating a categorical rule that searches of parolees and probationers subject to search conditions require reasonable suspicion of the commission of a crime or parole violation, not probable cause.

. This valid state regulation was a condition on Carnes's liberty and privacy interests in as much as it subjected him to searches based only on reasonable cause, rather than probable cause, and dispensed with the warrant requirement. I do not agree with Judge Keith that there is a significant distinction between this and the search condition as read by the Supreme Court in Knights that would distinguish this case from Knights.

. The United States suggested at oral argument that the tapes were listened to perhaps three months after they were initially seized, some time after Carnes had already been convicted of violating his parole conditions. The tapes were in the custody of federal agents prosecuting Carnes for felon-in-possession crimes and not parole violations.

.Nonetheless, the search fell within the scope of searches authorized by Carnes's parole conditions, since the express terms of his parole instructed him not to "own or possess a weapon of any type or ... ammunition,” and not to "engage in behavior that constitutes a violation of any criminal law of any unit of government.”