United States v. Carroll
| Decision Date | 29 October 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. 7:12-CR-57-F,7:12-CR-57-F |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of North Carolina |
| Parties | UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. COREY CONNELL CARROLL, Defendant. |
This matter is before the court on the Government's Motion for Reconsideration of the Court's Granting of the Defendant's Motion to Suppress [DE-39], The Government moves for reconsideration of this court's Order dated 31 August 2012 [DE-37], United States v. Carroll, No. 7:12-CR-57-F, 2012 WL 3780449 (E.D.N.C. Aug. 31, 2012) [hereinafter "Original Order"]. In the Original Order, the court suppressed evidence collected pursuant to a warrant that the court found was not supported by probable cause. The Government contends that this ruling was erroneous and moves for reconsideration.
The court will not reproduce the findings of fact in this Order, as they are adequately described in the Original Order. See Original Order [DE-37] at 1-5. The court will note the relevant facts as necessary in the analysis.
On August 31, 2012, this court allowed Carroll's motion to suppress on two grounds: (1) that the warrant was not supported by sufficient probable cause because it did not provide any dates on which the informants observed the criminal activity; and (2) that the good faith exception to the exclusionary rule did not apply because an objectively reasonable police officerwould not have relied on the warrant. Original Order [DE-37] at 10-11. In its motion for reconsideration, the Government launches a number of legal challenges to the Original Order.
The Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure do not address whether a party may move for reconsideration of a decided motion. United States v. Srivistan, 476 F. Supp. 2d 509, 511 (D. Md. 2008), rev d on other grounds, Unitd States v. Srivistan, 540 F.3d 277 (4th Cir. 2007); United States v. Greenwood, 974 F.2d 1449, 1468 (5th Cir. 1992). Federal courts that have addressed the issue have borrowed the standard from Rule 59 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Srivistan, 476 F. Supp. 2d at 511; Greenwood, 974 F.2d at 1468; United States v. Fell, 372 F. Supp. 2d 773, 779-80 (D. Vt. 2005). Thus, in deciding the Government's Motion, the court will adopt the standard from Rule 59(e) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which allows for motions to alter or amend a judgment. Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e).
The standard of review for a Rule 59(e) motion is well established. The movant (here, the Government) must established one of three grounds: " '(1) to accommodate an intervening change in controlling law; (2) to account for new evidence not previously available; or (3) to correct a clear error of law or prevent manifest injustice.' " Zinkland v. Brown, 478 F.3d 634, 637 (4th Cir. 2007) (quoting Ingle v, Yelton, 439 F.3d 191, 197 (4th Cir. 2006)); Pac. Ins. Co. v. Am. Nat'l Fire Ins. Co., 148 F.3d 396, 403 (4th Cir. 1998). The Government does not specifically address this standard in their brief. However, it appears the Government moves under Ground three—to correct a clear error of law or prevent manifest injustice. The Government has not argued that the controlling legal principles have changed since the court's Original Order, and the Government has not produced evidence that was not previously available. Thus, the court willconsider whether it committed a "clear error of law" in the Original Order, or if the Court needs to change the Original Order to prevent "manifest injustice." Zinkland, 478 F.3d at 637; Pac. Ins., 148 F.3d at 403.
Under ground three, the Government has a particularly high burden. "Rule 59(e) motions may not be used ... to raise arguments which could have been raised prior to the issuance of the judgment, nor may they be used to argue a case under a novel legal theory that the party had the ability to address in the first instance." Pac. Ins., 148 F.3d at 403. In addition, " 'reconsideration of a judgment after its entry is an extraordinary remedy that should be used sparingly.' " Id. (quoting 11 Charles Alan Wright et al, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2810.1, at 124); Hughes v. Bedsole, 48 F.3d 1376, 1382 (4th Cir. 1995); Williams v. Horn. Auth. of the City of Raleigh, 595 F. Supp. 2d 627, 630 (E.D.N.C 2008).
Here, both parties presented briefs to the court on Carroll's motion to suppress and participated in an evidentiary hearing on the motion. The court has thus provided the parties with ample opportunity to present their arguments. In addition, Carroll's motion to suppress specifically cited to the primary case relied upon by the Court in its Original Order, United States v. Doyle, 650 F.3d 460 (4th Cir. 2011). In his motion, Carroll stated: "Paragraphs five through nine similarly fail to provide legally sufficient temporal specifics: while those passages provide information from recently-dated interviews, the text of the affidavit itself fails to offer the reviewing judicial official any information from which to establish the dates of the relevant events." Mot. to Suppress Evidence from Search of 405 New River Drive, Jacksonville, NC, and Incorporated Mem. of Law [DE-25] at 4. Then, on the same page of the motion, Carroll stated"These failures do not satisfy the temporal proximity standard the Fourth Circuit established in ... United States v. Doyle, 650 F.3d 460 (4th Cir, 2011)." Id. Similarly, the court in the Original Order relied on Doyle in holding that the warrant was not supported by probable cause. The Original Order explained Original Order [DE-37] at 7.
The Government in its brief on the original motion to suppress neither cited to Doyle nor addressed Carroll's argument that the dates provided in the affidavit relate only to the dates the informants spoke to police. Thus, the court will not consider at length a number of the government's arguments because the Government had the opportunity to present these arguments in its initial briefing. See Pac. Ins., 148 F.3d at 403 ().
Specifically, the court will not consider: (1) the argument that the court interpreted the affidavit in a "hypertechnical manner" rather than in a "commonsense and realistic" fashion when it focused on the fact that the affidavit did not provide any dates on which the informants actually observed the criminal activity; and (2) the Governments arguments based on United States v. Lewis, 332 Fed. Appx. 951 (5th Cir. 2009) and United States v. McKeever, 5 F.3d 863 (5th Cir. 1993), which the Government contends involve facts that are more similar to Carroll than the facts in Doyle. See Government's Mot. for Reconsideration of the Ct.'s Granting of the Def.'s Mot. To Suppress [DE-39] at 11-18. As to the Government's first argument, in his motionto suppress Carroll specifically argued that the court should consider the fact that the affidavit provided the dates the police interviewed informants and not the dates the informants observed the criminal activity. The Government has had its opportunity to argue that interpreting the affidavit in this manner constitutes a hypertechnical, rather than commonsense interpretation of the affidavit. As to the second argument, the Government has had its opportunity to distinguish Doyle and provide the court with alternative case law. The Rule 59(e) standard does not allow the Government to make those arguments on a motion for reconsideration. See Pac. Ins., 148 F.3d at 403 ().
However, the Government arguably has not had the opportunity to make its arguments regarding: 1) how the court applied Doyle in the Original Order and 2) the applicability of the exclusionary rule.1 Thus, the court will address those arguments. However, the court will only review its Original Order for a "clear error of law," Zinkland, 478 F.3d at 637, and the court remains mindful that reconsideration is "an extraordinary remedy that should be used sparingly." Pac. Ins., 148 F.3d at 403. The court will separately address these arguments.
The Government makes two attacks on this court's application of Doyle in the Original Order: (1) that the Doyle court held the warrant lacked probable cause because, in addition to the lack of relevant dates, the crimes described by the informants did not relate to the crime for which the search warrant was sought, a circumstance that is not at issue in the Carroll affidavit;and (2) in Doyle, the affidavit failed to provide any date at all, whereas the Carroll affidavit provides numerous dates the informants spoke to police. The court does not share the Government's interpretation of Doyle.
The Government's first argument is contradicted by the plain language of Doyle. It is true that the Doyle court held the warrant lacked probable cause because the "bulk of the crimes described in the warrant (child sexual abuse) did not provide probable cause to search for the distinct crime of possession of child pornography.2 Doyle, 650 F.3d at 472-73. However, the Doyle court also held, as an alternative and distinct ground, that the warrant was not supported by probable cause because it provided no indication as to when the defendant possessed child pornography. The Doyle court put it this way: "[m]oreover, even assuming arguendo that a reasonable officer...
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