State Of Me. v. Nadeau.

• Citation: 1 A.3d 445
• Decision Date: 29 July 2010
• Docket Number: Docket No. Fra-09-540.
• Parties: STATE of Maine v. Keith R. NADEAU.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

1 A.3d 445

STATE of Maine

v.Keith R. NADEAU.

Docket No. Fra-09-540.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued: April 13, 2010.

Decided: July 29, 2010.

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Michael A. Cunniff, Esq. (orally), McCloskey, Mina & Cunniff, LLC, Portland, ME, for Keith R. Nadeau.

Andrew S. Robinson, Asst. Dist. Atty. (orally), Franklin County District Attorney's Office, Farmington, ME, for the State of Maine.

Panel: SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, LEVY, SILVER, MEAD, GORMAN, and JABAR, JJ.

LEVY, J.

[¶ 1] Keith R. Nadeau appeals from a judgment of conviction of two counts of possession of sexually explicit material (Class D), 17-A M.R.S. § 284(1)(A) (2009), entered in the Superior Court (Franklin County, Murphy, J.) after his conditional guilty plea. Nadeau contends that the court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence, asserting that (1) the warrantless searches and seizures of his personal computer and flash drive were unlawful and not justified by any exception to the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution; (2) once a search warrant was issued, the officers' failure to return the warrant and a written inventory within ten days violated M.R.Crim. P. 41(d); and (3) his oral and written statements were made before he received the requisite Miranda warnings and were involuntary. We affirm the judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

[¶ 2] Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the court's judgment, State v. Bailey, 2010 ME 15, ¶ 3, 989 A.2d 716, 718, the record supports the following facts.

[¶ 3] In December 2007, Nadeau was an undergraduate student at the University of Maine at Farmington. On December 5, the University's police department received a report from another student that, on December 4, Nadeau had shown child pornography to the student on Nadeau's personal computer in Nadeau's dorm room. University Police Officers John Irving and Dean Hart proceeded to Nadeau's dorm room. Officer Hart wore a hidden recording device, and both were armed and in uniform.

[¶ 4] Nadeau opened his door in response to the officers' knocking. The officers asked if they could enter the room, and Nadeau responded, “Yeah. Sure.” The officers informed Nadeau that they had received a complaint that he was in possession of child pornography. Nadeau responded by asking the officers if he could shut his door, and they agreed. Nadeau then stated that his parents had taken him to court the previous year after child pornography was found on his home computer. Officer Irving then suggested that the images on Nadeau's computer might be “preexisting” and from that earlier case, to which Nadeau responded: “That's what I, I found it and then I haven't had a chance to delete 'em.” The officers then requested the pornographic images and Nadeau consented:

[Nadeau]: I was going to delete 'em.

PO Hart: Ah, we, we need to have that.

PO Irving: Absolutely. Yeah.

PO Hart: Alright?

[Nadeau]: Yup. I I haven't, I was, I found them on my laptop key and I need to delete them and I haven't had a chance.

As this colloquy was occurring, Nadeau turned toward his desk, took the flash drive out of a drawer, and handed it to Officer Hart.

[¶ 5] Nadeau became extremely emotional during the interview, both crying at times and stating that he did not want to go to jail. The officers sought to calm him by explaining that he was not going to jail at that time, and they asked him whether he wanted to continue the interview at their office where the setting would be more private. He declined. Next, the officers asked Nadeau whether he was going to hurt himself, and he promised that he would not. Nadeau did express concern, however, that his parents were “gonna kill” him. Again, the officers told Nadeau that he could accompany them to their office, but, once again, he declined. Despite his emotional state, Nadeau's answers were coherent and responsive to the questions asked.

[¶ 6] The officers asked Nadeau if he wanted to write an explanation of the circumstances that led to his possession of the images, and he agreed. When Officer Hart informed Nadeau that he did not have a Miranda card with him but that anything he said could be used against him, Nadeau interrupted and stated, “I've already been through all this.” Officer Hart did not complete the rest of the Miranda warnings. Officer Hart then replied, “But the more cooperative you are, the better things are for you.” This first segment of the interview lasted approximately twelve minutes.

[¶ 7] While Nadeau was writing his statement, Officer Irving left the room to contact Edward Blais, the chief of the University's police department. After speaking with Chief Blais by phone, Officer Irving met briefly with Officer Hart outside the dorm room. When they reentered, Officer Hart told Nadeau that, after speaking with Chief Blais, they were “going to have to take [the] computer too.” Although Officer Hart explained that they would try to return the computer to Nadeau later that night, Nadeau expressed concerns because his computer contained his schoolwork and e-mails to his professors. At no time did Nadeau give the officers explicit verbal or written consent to search or seize his computer. This second segment of the interview, beginning when the officers reentered the dorm room to when they left in possession of Nadeau's computer, lasted less than a minute.

[¶ 8] Later that evening, Officer Hart returned to Nadeau's room to obtain the power cord for Nadeau's computer. When Officer Hart arrived, Nadeau and his mother, Kimberly Nadeau, were both present and Officer Hart spoke to Kimberly. She refused to give Officer Hart the power cord and asked him to call their attorney, which he did. The attorney did not request the return of the computer or flash drive during the phone conversation. Chief Blais delivered the flash drive and computer to the Maine State Police Computer Crimes Unit (the “Crime Lab”) in Vassalboro.

[¶ 9] Three days later, on December 7, Nadeau and Kimberly went to speak with Chief Blais. Kimberly requested that Chief Blais return Nadeau's computer, but the Chief declined, explaining that it had already been sent to the Crime Lab. Chief Blais also spoke by phone with Nadeau's attorney in the succeeding days, but the attorney never requested the return of the computer equipment.

[¶ 10] When the Crime Lab received the equipment, it was informed by Chief Blais that Nadeau had consented to the search and seizure of both the flash drive and the computer. Sergeant Glen Lang, who was assigned to the Crime Lab, informed Chief Blais that a preview search ¹ of the evidence should be conducted and that, based on the results of the preview search, they would then determine whether they would need a search warrant “to go further and do a forensic exam of the equipment.”

[¶ 11] The preview search revealed that the computer contained child pornography. Working with the assistance of Sergeant Lang, Assistant District Attorney Jim Andrews, and Assistant Attorney General Carlos Diaz, Chief Blais sought and obtained a search warrant on December 11, 2007. The warrant required that it be executed and an inventory be prepared and returned to the court within ten days of its issuance. On the same day, Chief Blais delivered the warrant to the Crime Lab where it was filed with the other pending cases. The Crime Lab had a significant backlog of requests for the forensic examination of computers at that time.

[¶ 12] The Crime Lab completed its examination of the computer in July 2008, approximately seven months after the search warrant was obtained. The State never sought an extension of the ten-day deadline to return the warrant. When Chief Blais received the report detailing the results of the forensic exam from the Crime Lab, he delivered it to the Franklin County District Attorney's Office. Chief Blais explained that, because the case was different from others that he had previously worked on, he “totally didn't think about the inventory that needed to go back to the Court.” An inventory was never prepared or filed with the court.

[¶ 13] Nadeau was indicted for possession of sexually explicit material (Class C), 17-A M.R.S. § 284(1)(C) (2009), and two counts of possession of sexually explicit material (Class D), 17-A M.R.S. § 284(1)(A). In denying Nadeau's motions to suppress evidence and his statements to the police, the Superior Court issued a detailed opinion setting forth its findings and conclusions. In summary, the court determined that (1) Nadeau was not in custody when he made statements to the University Police and that his statements were voluntary; (2) Nadeau consented to the seizure and search of the flash drive and that his consent was never revoked; ² (3) Nadeau did not consent to the seizure of his computer, but that the exclusionary rule did not apply to this evidence because the computer's discovery was inevitable; (4) the State “completely failed to timely file the return” of the warrant, but that the filing was ministerial and did not justify suppression of the evidence for noncompliance; and (5) although the search warrant had expired before the July search was completed, the good faith exception applied because the Crime Lab believed that there was consent to search the equipment and it had a valid warrant based on probable cause.

[¶ 14] After the denial of his motion to suppress, Nadeau entered a conditional guilty plea to the two counts of possession of sexually explicit material (Class D), 17-A M.R.S. § 284(1)(A), in contemplation of the State's dismissal of the felony possession of sexually explicit material (Class C), 17-A M.R.S. § 284(1)(C). For the first charge of possession of sexually explicit material, Nadeau was sentenced to 270 days in jail and ordered to register as a sex offender. Nadeau was also sentenced to 270 days in jail for the second charge-to...