D.Minn.: Because tracking order affiant was fired for falsifying other tracking requests doesn’t mean this one was false when def can’t show anything

Defense counsel wasn’t ineffective for not challenging the tracking warrant in defendant’s case based on the fact the officer who got it was fired for falsifying other tracking orders. “Bettis alleges that his counsel was ineffective by failing to challenge the tracking warrant. But the tracking warrant and the underlying affidavit are not facially defective, nor does Bettis credibly identify a specific defect in the tracking warrant or the underlying affidavit that his counsel failed to challenge.” A second search issue was defense counsel’s failure to challenge the probable cause for search of his rental vehicle. The dispute in the facts was thoroughly explored in the suppression hearing and it doesn’t undermine materiality of the facts in the affidavit. United States v. Bettis, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 63986 (D. Minn. Apr. 1, 2021).*

2254 petitioner convicted of murder claimed defense counsel was ineffective for not challenging the probable cause for the search warrant for the gun he buried on his property on the ground it should have been argued he wasn’t the aggressor. Defense counsel’s decision not to was strategic, and the state court’s finding on that wasn’t an unreasonable application of constitutional law. White v. Ames, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 63796 (S.D. W.Va. Feb. 9, 2021).* [Whether he was the aggressor or not, that wouldn’t be a defense to issuance of a search warrant.]