CA3: Payton’s “reason to believe” language from Payton/Steagald amounts to probable cause, noting conflict

Payton’s “reason to believe” language from Payton/Steagald amounts to probable cause, such that officers who have an arrest warrant for a suspect have to show “probable cause” that the suspect resides at or is present at a particular address before forcing entry into a private dwelling that is not the suspect’s home, following what it finds the constitutionally mandated rule. Here, police officers violated defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights when they forcibly entered an apartment with an arrest warrant for a homicide suspect who they believed was “staying” or “residing” there, as information from another officer and street informants, and noises inside the apartment, did not provide probable cause. As the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule did not apply, so suppression of seized evidence was required. United States v. Vasquez-Algarin, 2016 U.S. App. LEXIS 7889 (3d Cir. May 2, 2016):

Having considered the different approaches of our sister Circuits and their reasoning where provided, we join the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Ninth Circuits in holding that Payton’s “reason to believe” language amounts to a probable cause standard. As explained more fully below, we do so for two reasons. First, the Supreme Court’s use of the phrase “reason to believe,” when considered in the context of Payton and more generally the Court’s Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, supports a probable cause standard. Second, and more fundamentally, requiring that law enforcement officers have probable cause to believe their suspect resides at and is present within the dwelling before making a forced entry is the only conclusion commensurate with the constitutional protections the Supreme Court has accorded to the home.