CA10: A person can live in two places at once for Payton/Steagald purposes

It is possible for somebody to have two residences, and then the court must decide whether Payton or Steagald applies if a third party is involved. Here, the officers had a reasonable belief defendant would be found in the place they entered under Steagald. United States v. Thompson, 402 Fed. Appx. 378 (10th Cir. 2010) (unpublished):

The Payton/Steagald distinction does not lend itself to resolving the situation where a suspect lives in more than one dwelling. Here, for example, the officers had information suggesting that, on the one hand, Thompson lived at 2213 N. Kelham and, on the other, that he lived at 4619 Creek Court. Can officers reasonably believe that a suspect lives at two or more places? The language in Payton suggests the answer is yes. Justice Stevens, writing on behalf of the Court, stated that, “an arrest warrant founded on probable cause carries with it the limited authority to enter a dwelling in which the suspect lives when there is reason to believe the suspect is within.” Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 603, 100 S. Ct. 1371, 63 L. Ed. 2d 639 (1980) (emphasis added). The use of the indefinite article “a” before “dwelling” suggests the “dwelling” need not be a specific dwelling. See Bryan A. Garner, Garner’s Modern American Usage (3rd ed. 2009) (“Each of these [indefinite articles] points to a non-specific object, thing, or person that is not distinguished from the other members of a class.”) The members of this class — as suggested by the language in Payton — would be the various dwellings in which the suspect lives. Had the Court contemplated a particular dwelling, that is, had the Court limited the reach of its rule to one dwelling per suspect, then it would have used the definite article “the,” which refers to a particular thing, in this case, a particular dwelling. See id. Given the Court’s choice of the indefinite article in writing “a dwelling,” the Court must have contemplated that a suspect can live in more than one dwelling. See also, e.g., United States v. Risse, 83 F.3d 212, 217 (8th Cir. 1996) (“We have found no authority to support [the defendant’s] implicit assumption that a person can have only one residence for Fourth Amendment purposes.”).

We conclude, then, that Payton does not void as “unreasonable” an officer’s belief that a suspect lives in a given dwelling merely because that suspect also “lives” in another. Here, although police may have reasonably believed Thompson lived at 2213 N. Kelham, it was also reasonable for them to believe he lived at 4619 Creek Court. This point is underscored by this court’s gloss on Payton. In Valdez v. McPheters, we stated that “[t]he rule announced in Payton is applicable so long as the suspect ‘possesses common authority over, or some other significant relationship to,’ the residence entered by police.” Valdez v. McPheters, 172 F.3d 1220, 1225 (10th Cir. 1999) (quoting United States v. Risse, 83 F.3d 212, 217 (8th Cir. 1996)). We acknowledge the term “significant relationship” lacks ideal utility. At what point, for example, does a suspect’s relationship with a residence become “significant” such that he or she can be said to be living there? This question could flummox law enforcement. We trust, however, that law enforcement will take the plain meaning of the word “significant” — important, notable — and not abuse this admittedly permissive standard. Whether they do so, unfortunately, we must address on a case-by-case basis. In any event, given the totality of the information the officers had in this case, we find that the officers reasonably believed Thompson had a “significant relationship” with the 4619 Creek Court address. Accordingly, under this analysis the officers did not require a search warrant to enter that residence.