{"id":1377,"date":"2007-11-15T21:39:01","date_gmt":"2007-09-21T10:48:07","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2007-09-21T10:48:07","slug":"en-US","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/?p=1377","title":{"rendered":"Magistrate need not determine defendant inside under Payton<\/em>; officers do"},"content":{"rendered":"

An independent finding of probable cause by a magistrate that defendant is in the house is not required. Payton<\/em><\/a> only requires that the officers have reason to believe that the defendant is inside. Brown v. United States<\/a>, 932 A.2d 521 (D.C. App. 2007):<\/p>\n

Appellant argues that even if Payton<\/em> is applicable by extension, the Payton warrant exception requires an independent magistrate to determine that appellant is in the dwelling to be entered. See Steagald<\/em>, 451 U.S. at 214 n.7 (“[T]he magistrate, rather than the police officer, must make the decision that probable cause exists to believe that the person or object to be seized is within a particular place.”). Because an independent magistrate did not determine that there was probable cause to believe that appellant was in Ms. Powell’s home, appellant argues, his Fourth Amendment rights were violated.<\/p>\n

We find this argument unpersuasive. Payton<\/em> mandates that officers have a “reason to believe the suspect is within.” 445 U.S. at 603. As the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has observed, while<\/p>\n

Probable cause . . . must always be determined by a magistrate unless exigent circumstances excuse a warrant. . . . Reasonable belief embodies the same standards of reasonableness but allows the officer, who has already been to the magistrate to secure an arrest warrant, to determine that the suspect is probably within certain premises without an additional trip to the magistrate.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

United States v. Woods<\/em>, 560 F.2d 660, 665 (5th Cir. 1977) (internal citation and quotation omitted). See also United States v. Route<\/em>, 104 F.3d 59, 62 (5th Cir. 1997). We agree with the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and other courts that a “reasonable belief standard, and not probable cause, is sufficient to allow officers to enter a residence to enforce an arrest warrant ….” Pruitt<\/em>, 458 F.3d at 482. See also Valdez v. McPheters<\/em>, 172 F.3d 1220, 1226 (10th Cir. 1999) (identifying several factors that could indicate that a defendant was on the specified premises); Route<\/em>, 104 F.3d at 62 n.3 (collecting cases adopting the “reasonable belief” standard from the Second, Third, Eighth, Tenth, and Eleventh Circuits); United States v. Magluta<\/em>, 44 F.3d 1530, 1534-35 (11th Cir. 1995) (quoting Woods<\/em>, 560 F.2d at 665); United States v. Terry<\/em>, 702 F.2d 299, 319 (2d Cir. 1983) (detailing the evidence officers used to conclude there was a “reasonable basis for believing” appellant was in the apartment).<\/p>\n

In this case, two undercover police officers actually saw appellant in Powell’s apartment and stood only about five feet away from him. Investigator Parker knew appellant from previous police contact. On his way from the apartment, Parker even addressed appellant by name and appellant responded. When he returned to his vehicle, Parker radioed the arrest team and mentioned appellant by name. This was sufficient evidence to provide the investigators and arrest team with a reasonable belief that appellant was in Powell’s apartment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Defendant’s stop by a park ranger was not unreasonable because the ranger was unaware of which person in the car was involved in an altercation. There is no requirement for the reasonable suspicion standard that it be based on personal knowledge. Knowledge from another law enforcement officer suffices. United States v. Cuesta, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 69293 (E.D. Cal. September 13, 2007).*<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

b2evALnk.b2WPAutP Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"pingsdone","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1377\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}