DC: Cell phone SW was overbroad and exceeded the PC; no GFE

“We conclude that Mr. Burns has established violations of his rights under both the Fourth and the Sixth Amendments. Police sought search warrants that authorized an unlimited review of the contents of his cell phones for “any evidence” of murder even though the warrants were supported by affidavits that established probable cause for only three narrow and discrete items of data. The warrants were thus overbroad and lacking in probable cause and particularity, and the warrant judge should not have issued them. The warrants’ deficiencies, moreover, were so extreme and apparent that a reasonably well-trained police officer, with reasonable knowledge of what the law prohibits, would have known the warrants were invalid notwithstanding their approval by a judge. The good faith exception to the exclusionary rule therefore does not apply, and the trial judge should have granted Mr. Burns’s motion to suppress all of the data collected from both phones.” Burns v. United States, 2020 D.C. App. LEXIS 329 (Aug. 20, 2020).

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