United States v. Cunningham
| Decision Date | 24 June 2021 |
| Docket Number | No. 20-CR-104-CJW-MAR,20-CR-104-CJW-MAR |
| Parties | UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff, v. SYLVESTER CUNNINGHAM, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Iowa |
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. INTRODUCTION .......................................................................... 3
II. STANDARD OF REVIEW ................................................................ 3
III. FACTUAL BACKGROUND ............................................................. 6
IV. ANALYSIS .................................................................................. 10
V. CONCLUSION ............................................................................. 33
I. INTRODUCTION
This matter is before the Court on defendant's Objections (Doc. 40) to the Report and Recommendation (Doc. 37) of the Honorable Mark A. Roberts, United States Magistrate Judge. On March 4, 2021, defendant filed a Motion to Suppress (Doc. 15) and a Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 16). The government timely resisted both motions. (Docs. 22, 23). On March 22, 2021, Judge Roberts held a hearing on the motions and requested supplemental briefing from the parties. (See Doc. 24). The parties submitted supplemental briefing (Docs. 25, 26, 27), and on April 29, 2021, Judge Roberts issued his Report and Recommendation ("R&R"), recommending that the Court deny defendant's motions. (Doc. 37). On May 13, 2021, defendant timely filed his objections to the R&R. (Doc. 40).
For the following reasons, the Court sustains in part and overrules in part defendant's objections, adopts Judge Roberts' R&R with modification, and denies defendant's Motion to Suppress and Motion to Dismiss.
II. STANDARD OF REVIEW
The Court reviews Judge Roberts' R&R under the statutory standards found in Title 28, United States Code, Section 636(b)(1):
A judge of the court shall make a de novo determination of those portions of the report or specified proposed findings or recommendations to which objection is made. A judge of the court may accept, reject, or modify, in whole or in part, the findings or recommendations made by the magistrate judge. The judge may also receive further evidence or recommit the matter to the magistrate judge with instructions.
See also FED. R. CIV. P. 72(b) ( identical requirements). While examining these statutory standards, the United States Supreme Court explained:
Any party that desires plenary consideration by the Article III judge of any issue need only ask. Moreover, while the statute does not require the judge to review an issue de novo if no objections are filed, it does notpreclude further review by the district judge, sua sponte or at the request of a party, under a de novo or any other standard.
Thomas v. Arn, 474 U.S. 140, 154 (1985). Thus, a district court may review de novo any issue in a magistrate judge's report and recommendation at any time. Id. If a party files an objection to the magistrate judge's report and recommendation, the district court must review the objected portions de novo. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1). In the absence of an objection, the district court is not required "to give any more consideration to the magistrate [judge]'s report than the court considers appropriate." Thomas, 474 U.S. at 150.
De novo review is non-deferential and generally allows a reviewing court to make an "independent review" of the entire matter. Salve Regina Coll. v. Russell, 499 U.S. 225, 238 (1991); see also Doe v. Chao, 540 U.S. 614, 620-19 (2004) (). The de novo review of a magistrate judge's report and recommendation, however, only means a district court "'give[s] fresh consideration to those issues to which specific objection has been made."' United States v. Raddatz, 447 U.S. 667, 675 (1980) (). Thus, although de novo review generally entails review of an entire matter, in the context of Section 636 a district court's required de novo review is limited to "de novo determination[s]" of only "those portions" or "specified proposed findings" to which objections have been made. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1).
Consequently, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has indicated de novo review would only be required if objections were "specific enough to trigger de novo review." Branch v. Martin, 886 F.2d 1043, 1046 (8th Cir. 1989). Despite this "specificity" requirement to trigger de novo review, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has "emphasized the necessity . . . of retention by the district court of substantial controlover the ultimate disposition of matters referred to a magistrate [judge]." Belk v. Purkett, 15 F.3d 803, 815 (8th Cir. 1994). As a result, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has concluded that general objections require "full de novo review" if the record is concise. Id. Even if the reviewing court must construe objections liberally to require de novo review, it is clear to this Court that there is a distinction between making an objection and making no objection at all. See Coop. Fin. Ass'n, Inc. v. Garst, 917 F. Supp. 1356, 1373 (N.D. Iowa 1996).
In the absence of any objection, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has indicated a district court should review a magistrate judge's report and recommendation under a clearly erroneous standard of review. See Grinder v. Gammon, 73 F.3d 793, 795 (8th Cir. 1996); see also Taylor v. Farrier, 910 F.2d 518, 520 (8th Cir. 1990) (); Branch, 886 F.2d at 1046 ().
The Court is unaware of any case that has described the clearly erroneous standard of review in the context of a district court's review of a magistrate judge's report and recommendation to which no objection has been filed. In other contexts, however, the Supreme Court has stated the "foremost" principle under this standard of review "is that '[a] finding is "clearly erroneous" when although there is evidence to support it, the reviewing court on the entire evidence is left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed.'" Anderson v. City of Bessemer City, 470 U.S. 564, 573-74 (1985) (citation omitted). Thus, the clearly erroneous standard of review is deferential, see Dixon v. Crete Med. Clinic, P.C., 498 F.3d 837, 847 (8th Cir. 2007), but a district court may still reject the magistrate judge's report and recommendationwhen the district court is "left with a definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed." United States v. U.S. Gypsum Co., 333 U.S. 364, 395 (1948).
Even though some "lesser review" than de novo is not "positively require[d]" by statute, Thomas, 474 U.S. at 150, Eighth Circuit precedent leads this Court to believe that a clearly erroneous standard of review should generally be used as the baseline standard to review all findings in a magistrate judge's report and recommendation that are not objected to or when the parties fail to file any timely objections, see Grinder, 73 F.3d at 795; Taylor, 910 F.2d at 520; Branch, 886 F.2d at 1046; see also FED. R. CIV. P. 72(b) advisory committee's note ("When no timely objection is filed, the court need only satisfy itself that there is no clear error on the face of the record in order to accept the recommendation."). In the context of the review of a magistrate judge's report and recommendation, the Court believes one further caveat is necessary: a district court always remains free to render its own decision under de novo review, regardless of whether it feels a mistake has been committed. See Thomas, 474 U.S. at 153-54. Thus, although a clearly erroneous standard of review is deferential and the minimum standard appropriate in this context, it is not mandatory, and the district court may choose to apply a less deferential standard.
III. FACTUAL BACKGROUND
Defendant "generally accepts the factual findings" as recited in Judge Roberts' R&R, with three notable exceptions: (1) the finding that Officer Matthes was the sole officer present at the scene, (2) the finding that Officer Matthes "did not know the extent of Defendant's disability at the time of the seizure," and (3) the finding that Walmart manager Lisa Schmitt's act of pointing at defendant's wheelchair constituted consent to search the wheelchair. (Doc. 40, at 1-2). Although defendant styles this third objection as a factual objection, it has more to do with Judge Roberts' legal conclusion about whatbehavior constitutes consent to search in this context. Accordingly, the Court will address this objection in the sections below.
Defendant's other factual objections are overruled. These objections relate to facts that are crucial to Judge Roberts' finding that exigent circumstances existed...
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