United States v. Stephens

• Decision Date: 19 August 2014
• Docket Number: No. 12–4625.,12–4625.
• Citation: 764 F.3d 327
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. Henry STEPHENS, Defendant–Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

764 F.3d 327

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff–Appellee,

v.Henry STEPHENS, Defendant–Appellant.

No. 12–4625.

United States Court of Appeals,Fourth Circuit.

Argued: Oct. 30, 2013.

Decided: Aug. 19, 2014.

ARGUED:Christopher Ford Cowan, Law Office of Chris F. Cowan, Columbus, Ohio, for Appellant. Albert David Copperthite, Office of the United States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee. ON BRIEF:Rod J. Rosenstein, United States Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee.

Before SHEDD and THACKER, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge.

Affirmed by published opinion. Judge SHEDD wrote the majority opinion, in which Senior Judge HAMILTON joined. Judge THACKER wrote a dissenting opinion.

SHEDD, Circuit Judge:

Convicted of illegal firearm possession, Henry Stephens contends that the district court erroneously denied his pretrial motion to suppress evidence. Caselaw decided after Stephens was indicted tends to establish that the search at issue is unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment, but we are not now concerned with the legality of the search. Rather, we must decide the separate issue of whether the district court correctly declined to apply the exclusionary rule because the search was conducted in “good faith.” Our consideration of this issue requires us to answer “the objectively ascertainable question whether a reasonably well trained officer would have known that the search was illegal in light of all of the circumstances.” Herring v. United States, 555 U.S. 135, 145, 129 S.Ct. 695, 172 L.Ed.2d 496 (2009) (citation and internal punctuation omitted). Because we find that the search was “conducted in objectively reasonable reliance on binding appellate precedent,” Davis v. United States, ––– U.S. ––––, 131 S.Ct. 2419, 2423–24, 180 L.Ed.2d 285 (2011), the answer to this question is “yes.” Therefore, the exclusionary rule does not apply, and we affirm Stephens' conviction.

I

The underlying facts are not disputed. In 2011, federal and state law enforcement officers in the Baltimore area were investigating Stephens for possible drug and firearms crimes. The investigation began as a result of information provided by a registered confidential informant, and it was spearheaded by Officer Paul Geare, who was a 13–year veteran of the Baltimore Police Department. Officer Geare was also deputized as an ATF agent and assigned to a “High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area” (“HIDTA”) task force unit, which was “a hybrid unit of federal agents as well as city police officers” operating pursuant to Baltimore City and HIDTA guidelines. J.A. 405. The HIDTA joint task force is “organized to conduct investigations into drug and gun violations of both federal and state law, and its investigations indeed [lead] to both federal and state prosecutions, determined on the basis of the facts uncovered.” United States v. Claridy, 601 F.3d 276, 283 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 131 S.Ct. 259, 178 L.Ed.2d 172 (2010) (emphasis in original).

On May 13, 2011, Officer Geare—acting without a warrant—installed a battery-powered Global–Positioning–System device (“GPS”) under the rear bumper of Stephens' vehicle, which was parked in a public lot in Parkville, Maryland. ¹ Officer Geare had information that Stephens was a convicted felon, that he would be working security at a nightclub known as “Club Unite” on the evening of May 16, and that he usually carried a firearm when he worked there. With this knowledge, Officer Geare—in conjunction with other officers—implemented a plan to detain Stephens and search him on May 16 at Club Unite.

During the evening of May 16, Officer Geare used the GPS to locate Stephens' vehicle at an area school. Officer Geare and another city police officer (Sergeant Johnson) then observed and followed Stephens as he drove the vehicle to his residence. Before Stephens left the residence to drive to Club Unite, Officer Geare and Sergeant Johnson saw Stephens, who was standing outside his vehicle, reach around to the back of his waistband. They interpreted this movement as being a check for a weapon. Based on this and other information they had previously obtained, the officers “had at least reasonable suspicion, if not probable cause, that [Stephens] was armed and was on his way to work at Club Unite.” J.A. 520.

When Stephens drove away from his residence, Officer Geare alerted other officers who had been briefed on the plan to go to Club Unite. Using visual observation and a portable laptop computer to monitor the GPS, Officer Geare and Sergeant Johnson followed Stephens' vehicle as he drove on public roads to Club Unite. Upon Stephens' arrival at Club Unite, the officers who had been alerted approached him and conducted a patdown, which revealed an empty holster in the middle of his back. Within a matter of minutes, a Baltimore city police officer arrived and conducted a canine inspection of the vehicle exterior. After the canine alerted, the officers searched the vehicle and found (among other things) a loaded pistol. The officers then arrested Stephens and charged him with one or more state-law crimes. Stephens remained in state custody for approximately three months, until a federal grand jury indicted him for illegal firearm possession by a convicted felon. See18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). After the federal indictment, the state charges were dismissed. See Presentence Report, No. JKB–11–0447, at 1 (D.Md.).²

While this case was pending below, the Supreme Court held in United States v. Jones, ––– U.S. ––––, 132 S.Ct. 945, 949, 181 L.Ed.2d 911 (2012), that the government's “installation of a GPS device on a target's vehicle, and its use of that device to monitor the vehicle's movements, constitutes a ‘search’ ” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Because the officers in Jones did not have a valid warrant authorizing the GPS usage, the search— i.e., GPS usage—violated the Fourth Amendment. The Court did not, however, rule that all warrantless GPS searches violate the Fourth Amendment; instead, the Court expressly declined to decide whether reasonable suspicion or probable cause may justify warrantless GPS attachment to vehicles, and that remains an open question. Id. at 954.

Based on Jones, Stephens moved to suppress the firearm and other evidence seized on May 16. Following a hearing, the district court denied the motion. The court concluded that in light of Jones, Officer Geare's warrantless use of the GPS on Stephens' vehicle was an unconstitutional search that led to the seizure of the challenged evidence. However, the court held that the exclusionary rule does not apply because Officer Geare used the GPS in good faith. Thereafter, Stephens entered a conditional guilty plea, reserving the right to appeal the suppression order. SeeFed.R.Crim.P. 11(a)(2).

II

In May 2011, at the time of Stephens' arrest and before Jones was decided, it was not uncommon for law enforcement officers in Maryland to attach tracking devices to vehicles without a warrant. See J.A. 364. Indeed, caselaw in our circuit shows that officers in Maryland had been doing so since at least 1976. See United States v. Woodward, 546 F.2d 576 (4th Cir.1976) (declining to address the defendant's argument that the warrantless attachment of a “beeper” to his truck was an illegal search under the Fourth Amendment). Before Officer Geare attached the GPS to Stephens' vehicle, he had attached a GPS to other vehicles in public areas without a warrant, and it was his understanding that a warrant was needed only when (unlike here) the GPS was wired into the vehicle's battery system. See J.A. 364–65. Consistent with Officer Geare's understanding, the district judge—who had been a United States Magistrate Judge in Maryland for 12 years before being elevated to the district court bench—observed that had Officer Geare applied for a federal warrant to attach a GPS to Stephens' vehicle, it was “quite likely” that “the magistrate judge would have said ... you don't need a warrant for that.” J.A. 454. As we explain below, Officer Geare's and the district judge's understanding of the state of the law as it existed in 2011 is understandable.

The Fourth Amendment provides in relevant part that “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated.” The “threshold question” in every Fourth Amendment case is whether a search or seizure occurred, and “not every observation made by a law enforcement officer—even if consciously intended to disclose evidence of criminal activity—constitutes a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.” United States v. Taylor, 90 F.3d 903, 908 (4th Cir.1996). Rather, a search occurs for constitutional purposes only “when an expectation of privacy that society is prepared to consider reasonable is infringed,” United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109, 113, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 80 L.Ed.2d 85 (1984), and “[o]fficial conduct that does not compromise any legitimate interest in privacy is not a search subject to the Fourth Amendment,” Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 408, 125 S.Ct. 834, 160 L.Ed.2d 842 (2005) (citation and internal punctuation omitted). Under this principle, “[w]hat a person knowingly exposes to the public ... is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection.” Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967).

It was well-established by 2011 that “one's expectation of privacy in an automobile and of freedom in its operation are significantly different from the traditional expectation of privacy and freedom in one's residence.” United States v. Martinez–Fuerte, 428 U.S. 543, 561, 96 S.Ct. 3074, 49 L.Ed.2d 1116 (1976). In accord with this principle, we recognized in United States v. George, 971 F.2d 1113, 1119 (4th Cir.1992), that “there can be no reasonable expectation of privacy in a vehicle's exterior.” Moreover, we...