{"id":8567,"date":"2013-05-30T09:49:37","date_gmt":"2013-04-03T08:59:14","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2013-04-03T08:59:14","slug":"en-US","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/?p=8567","title":{"rendered":"CA10: Girlfriend seeing child porn on a computer and calling police to show it was private search"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Defendant\u2019s girlfriend saw child pornography on his computer and called the police. She showed it to them, and it was reasonable for the police to seize the computer at that point without a warrant. They got a warrant to search it. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ca10.uscourts.gov\/opinions\/12\/12-5013.pdf\">United States v. Benoit<\/a>, 713 F.3d 1 (10th Cir. 2013):<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Accordingly, the question before us is whether the search conducted by DeGraffenreid and Kidd could be construed as a governmental search directed by Officer Moore. We have delineated a two-step inquiry to determine whether a search by a private individual constitutes state action: <\/p>\n<blockquote><p>First, we determine whether the government knew of and acquiesced in the [private person\u2019s] intrusive conduct. Second, we consider whether the party performing the search intended to assist law enforcement efforts or to further his own ends. Both prongs must be satisfied considering the totality of the circumstances before the seemingly private search may be deemed a government search. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>[United States v. Poe, 556 F.3d 1113, 1123 (10th Cir. 2009)] (quotations and citations omitted). We have additionally held that \u201cknowledge and acquiescence &#8230; encompass the requirement that the government agent must also affirmatively encourage, initiate or instigate the private action.\u201d United States v. Smythe, 84 F.3d 1240, 1243 (10th Cir. 1996). \u201c[I]f a government agent is involved merely as a witness, the requisite government action implicating Fourth Amendment concerns is absent.\u201d Id. (quotation omitted). Police must, in \u201csome affirmative way &#8230; instigate, orchestrate, encourage or exceed the scope of the private search to trigger application of the Fourth Amendment.\u201d Id. (citation omitted). <\/p>\n<p>Applying this test, we conclude that neither DeGraffenreid nor Kidd acted as a government agent in discovering child pornography files on Benoit\u2019s computer. &#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.fourthamendment.com\/blog\">Back to blog<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>b2evALnk.b2WPAutP <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/?p=8567\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/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-8567","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8567","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=8567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8567\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}