Eastman v. United States

• Decision Date: 14 October 2022
• Docket Number: 1:22-mc-00023 RB/KK
• Parties: JOHN EASTMAN, Plaintiff, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of New Mexico

JOHN EASTMAN, Plaintiff,
v.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Defendant.

No. 1:22-mc-00023 RB/KK

United States District Court, D. New Mexico

October 14, 2022

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

ROBERT C. BRACK SENIOR U.S. DISTRICT JUDGE.

This matter is before the Court on Plaintiff John Eastman's Amended Motion for Return of Seized Property Under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 41(g) and Request for Injunctive and Other Relief, filed on July 8, 2022. (Doc. 6.) Eastman alleges that federal agents violated his constitutional rights when they served a search warrant on him on June 22, 2022, and seized his phone. He asks the Court to order the Government to return his phone and destroy any information seized to date and to enjoin the Government from searching the phone. Because Eastman fails to demonstrate an irreparable injury redressable by Rule 41(g) and the lack of an adequate remedy at law, the Court declines to exercise equitable jurisdiction and denies his requested relief.

I. Factual and Procedural Background

Federal agents served a warrant on Eastman on June 22, 2022, as he exited a restaurant. (See Doc. 6 at 8.) The warrant authorized agents to search “[t]he person of John Eastman and the area within his immediate control, including any clothing, garments, bags, or personal effects.” (Doc. 6-1 at 2.) The warrant described the things to be seized as “[a]ny electronic or digital devices-including cell phones, USB devices, iPads, and computers identified in the affidavit- and all information in such devices.” (Id. at 3.) Pursuant to the warrant, agents seized Eastman's

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iPhone Pro 12. (Doc. 6 at 8.) Eastman “was forced to provide biometric data to open said phone” and “was not provided a copy of the warrant until after his phone was seized ....” (Id.) The warrant states that after seizure, “law enforcement intends to transport the device(s) to Washington, D.C. or to the [Department of Justice (DOJ)-Office of the Inspector General (OIG)] forensic laboratory in Northern Virginia.” (Doc. 6-1 at 3.)

Eastman filed a Motion for Return of Property Under Rule 41(g) in this Court on June 27, 2022. (Doc. 1.) He filed an amended motion on July 8, 2022, which is fully briefed. (See Docs. 6; 15-17; 22-23.) The Court denied Eastman's motion for a temporary restraining order on July 15, 2022, (see Doc. 8) and takes up the rest of his motion in this Opinion.

II. Legal Standard

“Rule 41(g) allows a person ‘aggrieved by an unlawful search and seizure of property or by the deprivation of property' to ‘move for the property's return.'” United States v. Riccardi, No. 20-3205, 2021 WL 3732261, at *2 (10th Cir. Aug. 24, 2021) (quoting Fed. R. Crim. P. 41(g)). “Attempts to use Rule 41(g) motions to obtain relief other than the return of unlawfully seized property in the government's possession have failed.” Id. (citing Clymore v. United States, 415 F.3d 1113, 1120 (10th Cir. 2005) (discussing former Rule 41(e), now found at Rule 41(g), and holding that a motion for return of property cannot be used to obtain compensatory damages for property that can no longer be returned); United States v. Rodriguez-Aguirre, 414 F.3d 1177, 1182 (10th Cir. 2005) (holding that a motion for return of property is “an inappropriate vehicle” for attacking a civil forfeiture judgment); United States v. Burton, 167 F.3d 410, 410 (8th Cir. 1999) (holding that a motion for return of property may not be used to collaterally attack a guilty plea)).

The Tenth Circuit has “held that entertaining a preindictment Rule 41([g]) motion is an exercise of equitable jurisdiction which should be undertaken with ‘caution and restraint.'” Matter of Search of Kitty's E.,

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905 F.2d 1367, 1370-71 (10th Cir. 1990) (quoting Floyd v. United States, 860 F.2d 999, 1003 (10th Cir. 1988)). Before “a district court may assume jurisdiction over a preindictment Rule 41(e) motion[,]” the movant must satisfy two conditions: “a movant must demonstrate that being deprived of actual possession of the seized property causes ‘irreparable injury,' and must be otherwise without adequate remedy at law.” Id. at 1370-71 (citing Floyd, 860 F.2d at 1003). “[T]he district court should dismiss a Rule 41(g) motion if the movant has failed to make this showing.” Riccardi, 2021 WL 3732261, at *2 (quoting United States v. Bacon, 900 F.3d 1234, 1237 (10th Cir. 2018)).

III. The Court declines to exercise equitable jurisdiction over the Rule 41(g) motion.

While Eastman frames his motion as one for the return of his cell phone under Rule 41(g), the Government contends that Eastman “has filed a motion to suppress a search warrant that masquerades as a Rule 41(g) motion.” (Doc. 15 at 1.) Eastman does not disagree: he admits that he “has not asserted that he is aggrieved by the deprivation of his property . . .; rather, he has asserted that he has been aggrieved by the unlawful search and seizure itself” due to alleged constitutional violations. (Doc. 16 at 6.) Thus, in addition to the return of his cell phone, Eastman seeks an injunction to stop the Government from searching the phone and an order requiring the Government to destroy any copies of information obtained from the phone thus far. (See Docs. 6 at 8, 23; 16 at 1, 28.) The history of Rule 41(g) together with Tenth Circuit precedent, however, support a finding that the rule does not provide the appropriate procedural vehicle for any requested relief outside of the return of Eastman's property.

Prior to the 1989 amendments to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, the rule (then Rule 41(e)^[1]) “provided for return of property only if it was illegally seized[,]” and it also “required

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automatic suppression of any property returned.” Kitty's E., 905 F.2d at 1370 (citing 124 F.R.D. 397, 426-27 (1989)). “In 1989, the Advisory Committee to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure deleted the portion of the rule stating that where property was ordered returned, it also must be suppressed.” See Bennett v. United States, No. 12-61499-CIV, 2013 WL 3821625, at *10 (S.D. Fla. July 23, 2013). The Advisory Committee Note explains that the prior “language ha[d] not kept pace with the development of exclusionary rule doctrine ....” Fed. R. Crim. P. 41(g) advisory committee's note to 1989 amendment. Automatic suppression was no longer appropriate where Supreme Court precedent held, for example, that property deemed “inadmissible for one purpose (e.g., as part of the government's case-in-chief) may be admissible for another purpose (e.g., impeachment”), United States v. Havens, 446 U.S. 620 (1980), or “that evidence seized in violation of the fourth amendment, but in good faith pursuant to a warrant, may be used even against a person aggrieved by the constitutional violation[,]” United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897 (1984). See Fed. R. Crim. P. 41(g) advisory committee's note to 1989 amendment. The Advisory Committee Note makes clear that Rule 41(g) “is not intended to deny the United States the use of evidence permitted by the fourth amendment and federal statutes, even if the evidence might have been unlawfully seized.”

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Id. (emphasis added) (citing United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 349 n.6 (1978) (“Rule 41(e) does not constitute a statutory expansion of the exclusionary rule.”); United States v. Roberts, 852 F.2d 671 (2nd Cir. 1988) (exceptions to exclusionary rule applicable to Rule 41(e))). Accordingly, the Advisory Committee deleted the exclusionary provision and stated that it disagreed with a Sixth Circuit case that “held that the United States must return photocopies of lawfully seized business records unless it could demonstrate that the records were ‘necessary for a specific investigation.'” Id. (quoting Sovereign News Co. v. United States, 690 F.2d 569 (6th Cir. 1982), cert. denied, 464 U.S. 814 (1983)).

Following the 1989 amendments, the Tenth Circuit explicitly held that Rule 41(g) motions are now “solely for the return of property.” Kitty's E., 905 F.2d at 1370 (“Illegality of a search for purposes of Rule 41(e) and the scope...