United States v. Larry Leverett

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 14-4331
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
LARRY ALEXANDER LEVERETT,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle
District of North Carolina, at Greensboro. Catherine C. Eagles,
District Judge. (1:13-cr-00027-CCE-1)
Submitted: November 25, 2014 Decided: January 6, 2015
Before WYNN, DIAZ, and FLOYD, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Michael E. Archenbronn, LAW OFFICE OF MICHAEL E. ARCHENBRONN,
Winston-Salem, North Carolina, for Appellant. Michael A.
DeFranco, Assistant United States Attorney, Greensboro, North
Carolina, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Larry Alexander Leverett appeals the judgment imposed
following his conditional guilty plea to possession of a firearm
by a convicted felon, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1),
924(a)(2) (2012). Leverett received a forty-five-month
sentence. In accordance with Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738
(1967), Leverett’s counsel has filed a brief certifying that
there are no meritorious issues for appeal, but questioning
whether the district court erred in denying Leverett’s motion to
suppress evidence seized during execution of a search warrant,
the issue preserved in the conditional plea. Although notified
of his right to do so, Leverett has not filed a supplemental
brief. We affirm.
When considering the denial of a suppression motion,
we review de novo the district court’s legal conclusions, and we
review its factual findings for clear error. United States v.
Guijon-Ortiz, 660 F.3d 757, 762 (4th Cir. 2011). Because the
Government prevailed on the suppression issue below, we construe
the evidence in the light most favorable to the Government.
United States v. Perkins, 363 F.3d 317, 320 (4th Cir. 2004).
Rather than addressing the validity of the search
warrant at issue, we exercise our discretion to proceed directly
to Leverett’s challenge to the district court’s application of
the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule set forth in
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United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 919-21 (1984). United
States v. Andrews, 577 F.3d 231, 235 (4th Cir. 2009). When an
officer acts with objective good faith within the scope of a
search warrant issued by a magistrate, suppression of the
evidence obtained by the officer does not serve the exclusionary
rule’s deterrence objective because the officer has attempted to
comply with the law. United States v. Perez, 393 F.3d 457, 461
(4th Cir. 2004). Accordingly, evidence obtained pursuant to a
search warrant should not be suppressed unless the officer’s
reliance on the warrant is not objectively reasonable because,
among other circumstances not relevant here, the magistrate
“wholly abandoned his judicial role” when issuing the warrant or
the warrant was so facially deficient that the executing officer
could not reasonably presume it to be valid. Leon, 468 U.S. at
923.
Applying the foregoing standards to the facts of this
case, we hold that the district court did not err by applying
the good-faith exception. When police know the identity of a
confidential source, the warrant applicant’s statement attesting
to the source’s prior reliability in other investigations can be
sufficient to establish the source’s reliability in the present
case. United States v. Bynum, 293 F.3d 192, 193-94, 197-98 (4th
Cir. 2002). Thus, where the warrant applicant here attested
that the source had provided reliable information in prior
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investigations and that the applicant oversaw the source’s
controlled purchase of powder cocaine from Leverett, it cannot
be said that the magistrate “wholly abandoned his judicial role”
when issuing the warrant. For the same reasons, the applicant
could have reasonably presumed that the warrant was valid.
Therefore, under Leon, any possible constitutional defects in
the warrant would not require exclusion of the fruits of the
search. Accordingly, the district court properly denied the
motion to suppress.
In accordance with Anders, we have reviewed the record
in this case and have found no meritorious issues for appeal.
We therefore affirm Leverett’s conviction and sentence. This
court requires that counsel inform Leverett, in writing, of the
right to petition the Supreme Court of the United States for
further review. If Leverett requests that a petition be filed,
but counsel believes that such a petition would be frivolous,
then counsel may move in this court for leave to withdraw from
representation. Counsel’s motion must state that a copy thereof
was served on Leverett.
We dispense with oral argument because the facts and
legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials
before this court and argument would not aid the decisional
process.
AFFIRMED
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