Court Opinion

ID: 9439070
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 06:20:26.049694+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:26:08.262298
License: Public Domain

RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
It should have been simple enough to explain why the officers’ seizure of the ear key complied with the Fourth Amendment. Sophia Garces’ consent to the search of her car carried with it her consent to using the key to open the ear door. See Florida v. Jimeno, 500 U.S. 248, 250, 111 S.Ct. 1801, 1803, 114 L.Ed.2d 297 (1991). The officers had already lawfully discovered the key in the defendant’s clothing during the search authorized by the warrant. When the officers opened the car with the key, they found a gun. Upon completing their search of the ear, they relocked the door, had the ear towed to an FBI lot, and seized the key.
It does not take any intricate analysis to conclude that in addition to towing the car away, the officers could take the key as well. They could lawfully seize both items for the same reason: the car and the key were plainly evidence of defendant’s criminal activity. Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 307, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 1650, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967), is directly on point. As the Court put it in Soldal v. Cook County, 506 U.S. 56, 65-66, 113 S.Ct. 538, 545-46, 121 L.Ed.2d 450 (1992), a plain view seizure is valid so long as the probable cause standard is met — it was here — and so long as the seizure is “unac*78companied by unlawful trespass” — which it was in view of Sophia Garces’ consent to the search. Other decisions sustaining seizures of the sort we have in this case are cited in 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 8.1(e), at 623-24 (3d ed.1996).
The majority gets itself into an unnecessary tangle by supposing that the validity of the seizure of the key rests on “the consent of someone with authority over the property, United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164, 170-71 [94 S.Ct. 988, 992-93, 39 L.Ed.2d 242] (1974).” Maj. op. at 74. In the first place,. Matlock dealt only with the validity of a search not a seizure. In the second place, the legality of the seizure of the key (or the car for that matter) rested on the principles explained in Soldal, not on Sophia Garces’ consent. Her permission enabled the officers to look for evidence of criminal activity without getting a warrant, but once they discovered such evidence, they did not need her consent to seize it.
One other point is worth mentioning. I entirely agree that the officers had not seized the key within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment during their search of the premises, even though they had removed it from its original location. It is true that the Supreme Court has defined a Fourth Amendment seizure as a “meaningful interference” with an individual’s possessory interests. E.g., United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109, 113, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 1656, 80 L.Ed.2d 85 (1984). But I do not believe the Court meant this test to apply while a lawful search is ongoing. Whenever federal officers conduct a search of premises pursuant to a warrant, there is “a meaningful interference with” everyone’s “possessory interests” in everything in the line of the search. Those present must stand aside. Until the search has ended, they cannot grab things, proclaim “these are mine,” and walk away with the objects. If they tried anything- of the sort, they could be prosecuted. See 18 U.S.C. § 2231. The “meaningful interference” test should be applied only after the search has ended and the officers have taken property away or have “secured” the premises from entry. This of course means that the key was not seized until after the officers used it to open the ear door, at which point its evidentiary value was plain.