A prosecution of a police officer for perjury during a Franks hearing

United States v. Johnson, 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 203218 (S.D. Fla. Oct. 15, 2025) involved prosecution of a police officer for perjury during a Franks hearing:

The proceeding during which the Defendant’s false statements were made was a Franks hearing. “Under the Franks doctrine, ‘a warrant affidavit violates the Fourth Amendment when it contains omissions made intentionally or with a reckless disregard for the accuracy of the affidavit.”‘ United States v. Valetine, 347 F.R.D. 658, 660 (M.D. Fla. 2024) (quoting United States v. Taylor, No. 14-0303-CG, 2015 WL 5923580, at *2 (S.D. Ala. Oct. 12, 2015)). During a Franks hearing, the “defendant has the burden to present evidence of intentional or reckless omissions of material information from the affidavit” and, therefore, the truthfulness and credibility of the affiant is of critical importance. Id. at 661. In the Jones case, Johnson was the affiant who applied for the warrant in question. Accordingly, as the sole witness for the Government, Johnson’s statements were material to the Franks hearing because his false statements had the potential to undermine the credibility of the rest of his testimony and thus the credibility of his assertions in the warrant affidavit. If Judge Altonaga were to find Johnson was not credible, she could have rejected Johnson’s testimony that he did not intentionally omit the alleged material missing information from the warrant affidavit. Indeed, Judge Altonaga’s statements during the Franks hearing highlight the significance of Johnson’s testimony. Because Johnson’s credibility was a critical issue, Judge Altonaga decided she would wait to issue a ruling on the motion to suppress until the AUSA prosecuting the Jones case answered additional questions about the 8005 number. The Defendant’s argument that Johnson’s misrepresentations about the phone number did not have the capacity to influence the Court’s decision-making process is contrary to Judge Altonaga’s statements and the record presented to the jury.

Although Johnson’s testimony about the 8005 number did not bear directly on the issue of whether the warrant affidavit contained intentional omission or inaccuracies, that does not alter the Court’s conclusion that Johnson’s false statements were material. As binding precedent in this Circuit has made clear, the alleged perjurious “statements need not be material to a particular issue, but may be material to collateral matters that might influence the outcome of decisions[.]” Cosby, 601 F.2d at 757. Because Johnson’s statements could have reasonably impacted Judge Altonaga’s decision to suppress the evidence in question, the Government carried it burden to establish materiality.

The Court is also unconvinced that the Government’s failure to introduce the warrant affidavit into evidence precluded the jury from finding that Johnson’s statements during the Franks hearing were material. …