United States v. Demontae Bell
925 F. 3d 362 (2019)
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Rule of Law:
Under the independent source doctrine, evidence obtained from a search warrant is admissible, even if the warrant application included illegally obtained information, provided that the application contained sufficient legally obtained facts to establish probable cause without the tainted information.
Facts:
- On November 6, 2014, Mark Turner stole several firearms from his coworker's home.
- Turner recruited Demontae Bell to help sell the stolen guns, and in return, Turner gave Bell two of the unsold firearms, including an AK-47.
- After being arrested for an unrelated crime, Turner began cooperating with law enforcement, confessing to the burglary and identifying Bell as the person who had the remaining guns.
- In February 2015, Turner participated in two audio- and video-recorded controlled transactions with Bell.
- During the second transaction, Bell stated he had a picture of the AK-47 on his phone and sent the photograph via text message to Turner.
- Immediately after the transaction, Turner showed FBI Special Agent Jason Nixon the photo of the AK-47 on his phone, which he stated Bell had just sent him.
- On April 9, 2015, Peoria police arrested Bell. During the arrest, Officer Justin Sinks opened Bell's flip phone without a warrant and saw a photo of an AK-47 on the home screen.
Procedural Posture:
- Prior to trial in the U.S. District Court, Demontae Bell moved to suppress the evidence obtained from his cellphone.
- Bell argued that an officer unconstitutionally searched his phone upon arrest and that this illegal search tainted the subsequent search warrants.
- The district court agreed that the initial warrantless search of the phone was unconstitutional.
- However, the district court denied the motion to suppress, ruling that the search warrants were supported by probable cause under the independent source doctrine, even after removing the illegally obtained information.
- Following a bench trial, Bell was convicted.
- Bell, as the appellant, appealed his conviction and the denial of his suppression motion to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
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Issue:
Does the independent source doctrine permit the admission of evidence obtained from a search warrant when the warrant's supporting affidavit includes information from an unconstitutional search, but the affidavit still establishes probable cause after excising the tainted information?
Opinions:
Majority - St. Eve, Circuit Judge.
Yes. The independent source doctrine allows for the admission of evidence obtained from the search warrants because they were supported by probable cause even without the information from the unconstitutional search. The court applies a two-part test for the independent source doctrine in the context of a tainted warrant: 1) would the warrant have been issued without the tainted information, and 2) was the officer's decision to seek the warrant prompted by the illegal search? Here, excising the information from Officer Sinks's illegal search of Bell's phone still leaves a sufficient basis for probable cause in the affidavit. The legally obtained facts included Turner's cooperation, the recorded conversations where Bell admitted to having the photo and sent it, and Agent Nixon's viewing of the photo on Turner's phone. This information established a probability that evidence of a crime would be found on Bell's phone. Furthermore, law enforcement would have sought the warrant regardless of the illegal search, as they already had significant evidence from the controlled transaction. Therefore, the evidence was not fruit of the poisonous tree and was properly admitted.
Analysis:
This decision provides a clear application of the independent source doctrine as an exception to the exclusionary rule, particularly in the context of digital evidence. It reinforces that a Fourth Amendment violation does not automatically taint all subsequent evidence if the government can demonstrate a parallel, lawful investigative path. The case serves as a crucial reminder for law students that the remedy for an illegal search is not a windfall for the defendant but rather aims to put the government in the same, not a worse, position it would have been in absent the misconduct. This ruling solidifies the 'excise and re-evaluate' method for analyzing probable cause in warrant affidavits that contain both legally and illegally obtained information.
