United States v. Thompson

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 10-4321
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
ANTONIO THOMPSON,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
Maryland, at Baltimore. Catherine C. Blake, District Judge.
(1:09-cr-00128-CCB-1)
Submitted: March 30, 2011 Decided: April 12, 2011
Before NIEMEYER, KING, and SHEDD, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Michael E. Lawlor, Andrew R. Szekely, LAWLOR & ENGLERT, LLC,
Greenbelt, Maryland, for Appellant. Rod J. Rosenstein, United
States Attorney, Christine Celeste, Special Assistant United
States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Antonio Thompson was charged in a two-count indictment
with possession with intent to distribute more than fifty grams
of crack cocaine, 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) (2006), and possessing a
firearm after having been convicted of a felony, 18 U.S.C.
§ 922(g) (2006). He moved to suppress the evidence seized from
his home pursuant to a search warrant, arguing that the warrant
was unsupported by probable cause. The district court concluded
that even if the warrant was unsupported by probable cause, the
good faith exception to the exclusionary rule applied, and
denied Thompson’s motion. A jury later convicted him of both
counts, and Thompson was sentenced to 300 months of
imprisonment. He noted a timely appeal, challenging the denial
of his motion to suppress. Finding no error, we affirm.
“Generally, evidence seized in violation of the Fourth
Amendment is subject to suppression under the exclusionary rule,
the overarching purpose of which is to deter future unlawful
police conduct.” United States v. Andrews, 577 F.3d 231, 235
(4th Cir.) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted),
cert. denied, 130 S. Ct. 1031 (2009). “The deterrence
objective, however, is not achieved through the suppression of
evidence obtained by an officer acting with objective good faith
within the scope of a search warrant issued by a magistrate.”
Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, “under . . .
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[the] good faith exception [in United States v. Leon, 468 U.S.
897 (1984)], evidence obtained pursuant to a search warrant
issued by a neutral magistrate does not need to be excluded if
the officer’s reliance on the warrant was objectively
reasonable.” Andrews, 577 F.3d at 236 (internal quotation marks
omitted).
An officer’s reliance on a warrant will not be
“objectively reasonable,” however, in four circumstances: “where
(1) probable cause is based on statements in an affidavit that
are knowingly or recklessly false; (2) the magistrate fails to
perform a neutral and detached function and instead merely
rubber stamps the warrant,” United States v. Gary, 528 F.3d 324,
329 (4th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted) (citing
Leon, 468 U.S. at 914-15); (3) the affidavit is “so lacking in
indicia of probable cause as to render official belief in its
existence entirely unreasonable,” Leon, 468 U.S. at 923
(internal quotation marks omitted); or “(4) the warrant was so
facially deficient that the executing officer could not
reasonably have assumed it was valid.” Gary, 528 F.3d at 329.
We may proceed directly to the question of good faith without
first considering the underlying validity of the warrant.
United States v. Legg, 18 F.3d 240, 243 (4th Cir. 1994) (citing
Leon, 468 U.S. at 925). This court reviews a district court’s
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application of the Leon exception de novo. United States v.
DeQuasie, 373 F.3d 509, 520 (4th Cir. 2004).
We find that the officers here reasonably relied on
the warrant and that the district court properly found that the
Leon good faith exception should apply, even assuming that
probable cause was not established. First, there is no evidence
or suggestion that the magistrate was misled by false
information or that he “wholly abandoned his detached and
neutral role.” See United States v. Bynum, 293 F.3d 192, 195
(4th Cir. 2002). Nor was the warrant “so lacking in indicia of
probable cause as to render official belief in its existence
entirely unreasonable.” Leon, 468 U.S. at 923. As noted by the
district court, there was sufficient indicia of ongoing
narcotics trafficking that the officers would have had an
objectively reasonable belief in the existence of probable
cause. Finally, there is no evidence that the warrant itself
was so facially deficient that the executing officer could not
reasonably have assumed it was valid. Accordingly, the district
court did not err in denying Thompson’s motion to suppress.
We therefore affirm Thompson’s conviction. We
dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the
court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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