E.D.Mo.: SW description was defective but reference to affidavit and GFE saves it

The warrant was defective on its face, only authorizing a search of the person of the accused. The affidavit for the warrant, however, was more detailed and described places and things: a hotel room and a Mercedes. The officer sought consent, but it was refused. She then seized the room, and applied for a search warrant. Reading the affidavit together with the warrant and applying the good faith exception, the court finds that the search should not be suppressed. United States v. Edwards, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 180694 (E.D.Mo. Oct. 26, 2016):

Defendant Edwards cites Groh v. Ramirez, 540 U.S. 551, 124 S. Ct. 1284, 157 L. Ed. 2d 1068 (2004), for the disqualification of the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule. That case is inapposite to this one. Groh involved a § 1983 civil claim that Fourth Amendment rights were violated by the execution of a search warrant that failed to describe the persons or things to be seized pursuant to the warrant. In the place for the list of items to be seized the warrant described the house to be searched. 540 U.S. at 554. As in the case at bar, the Supreme Court described the subject warrant as “plainly invalid” under the Fourth Amendment. Id. at 557-63. The next issue ruled by the Supreme Court was not whether the Leon good-faith exception to exclusionary rule should be applied but whether the officer who executed the warrant “is [*22] entitled to qualified immunity despite that violation [of the Fourth Amendment].” Id. at 563. The Court determined that the officer who executed the warrant was not entitled to qualified immunity. Id. at 566.

The issue before this court is not whether the officer may avoid civil liability for conducting a search pursuant to a constitutionally deficient warrant but rather whether the court should suppress the government’s use at trial of evidence seized pursuant to the constitutionally deficient warrant or apply the good-faith Leon exception. The principles and essential elements of each are different. As set forth above, the application of the Leon exception depends on an analysis of the objective reasonableness of the officer’s conduct and a social cost-benefit analysis, Herring, 555 U.S. at 141-45, and the application of the qualified immunity doctrine depends almost entirely on whether an effectively warrantless search of a home was “presumptively unconstitutional.” Groh, 540 U.S. at 564.

In United States v. Curry, 911 F.2d 72 (8th Cir. 1990), the Court of Appeals applied the Leon good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule to a case involving a “search warrant that did not identify the premises to be searched because the space for filling in that information was left blank.” 911 F.2d at 76. …

In the case at bar, Sgt. Nijkamp and the other officers who searched Room 359 and the gold Mercedes reasonably relied on the search warrant as authority for their searches. While paragraphs [b] and [c] of the warrant, which clearly focus on Room 359 and the gold Mercedes, appear detached from the rest of the warrant, they clearly and immediately present to the reader’s eye the two locations that Sgt. Nijkamp knew were the subjects of her affidavit and were the expected locations for authorized searches. While paragraph [e] refers to searching “the said person above described,” Sgt. Nijkamp knew that Keisha Edwards was a suspect in the investigation. Further, the warrant refers to (although it does not incorporate) Sgt. Nijkamp’s affidavit, which clearly describes the locations to be searched (the hotel room and the vehicle) and the items to be seized (cell phones, lap top computers, large amounts of cash, condoms, lubricant, and the receipts and paperwork relating to the alleged crime). (Doc. 102-1 at 3.)

Furthermore, Sgt. Nijkamp was most mindful of the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement. She first asked the two suspects whether they would consent to a search of Room 359 to avoid her having to apply for a warrant. When they refused to consent, she secured both the hotel room and the vehicle and then applied for a search warrant. Her affidavit concealed no facts from the judge. No hearing evidence other than the warrant document itself indicated that the issuing judge did not act as a neutral and detached judicial officer. There was ample probable cause in the supporting affidavit for the issuance of a constitutionally valid warrant for the hotel room and the Mercedes automobile. Therefore, even with the defective language of the warrant, the good-faith doctrine of Leon should be applied to avoid the exclusionary rule.