On Point: B. Search warrants

State v. Michael Anthony King, 2008 WI App 129
For King: Mark S. Rosen

Issue/Holding: A search warrant that conditions its execution on verification of the target’s address violates the 4th amendment’s particularity requirement:

¶25      … The Fourth Amendment clearly sets forth the particularity requirement that must be satisfied prior to issuance of a warrant. … The particularity requirement is necessary “to direct the officer to the exact place to be searched and to guard against abuses that prevailed under the old writs of assistance which left the place to be searched to the discretion of the searching officer.” Rainey v.

State v. Adrian J. Jackson, 2008 WI App 109
For Jackson: Craig S. Powell; Brian Kinstler

Issue/Holding: A warrant describing the building to be searched only as “a two-story duplex residence” did not satisfy the particularity requirement:

¶9    If the location to be searched is not described with sufficient particularity to inform officers which unit in a multi-unit building they are to search, the particularity required by the Fourth Amendment has not been satisfied. 

State v. Louis H. LaCount, 2008 WI 59, affirming 2007 WI App 116
For LaCount: T. Christopher Kelly

Issue: Whether execution of a search warrant for business records exceeded the warrant’s scope in that the warrant: authorized only the search for and seizure of records that related to a specific business with specifically named clients; and also authorized only a search of that business’s office space and not the defendant’s personal office within that space.

State v. Michael Anthony King, 2008 WI App 129
For King: Mark S. Rosen

Issue/Holding: Search warrant based on drug transaction occurring 30 days earlier lacked probable cause, ¶32 n. 7:

… From our review of the record, it would appear that probable cause as to the search of his residence was stale. The most recent information directly tied to King was thirty days old.

State v. Eric Dwayne Rogers, 2008 WI App 176, PFR filed 12/12/08
For Rogers: Mark D. Richards

Issue/Holding: Incorrect identification of automobile on face of warrant was mere technical irregularity based on “scrivener’s error”:

¶15      In this case, the executing officer had personal knowledge and the officer attached and incorporated a correct affidavit. The affidavit correctly identified Rogers’ car three times, describing the correct color,

State v. Willie B. Cole, 2008 WI App 178
For Cole: Scott A. Szabrowicz

Issue: Whether the action of a police officer in opening a letter misaddressed to the officer’s residence from a House of Correction inmate was private and therefore outside fourth amendment scrutiny.

Holding:

¶13   There appears to be no Wisconsin case addressing the issue when an off-duty law enforcement officer acts in a private capacity rather than as a government agent for purposes of the Fourth Amendment.

State v. Christopher D. Sloan, 2007 WI App 146
For Sloan: Thomas E. Hayes

Issue/Holding: Immaterial differences of memory don’t establish the “deliberate falsity or reckless disregard” for truth required to trigger a Franks hearing, ¶¶17-21; nor is such a hearing mandated in the absence of specific request, ¶22.

State v. Christopher D. Sloan, 2007 WI App 146

Issue/Holding:

¶26 The trial court here did not find a nexus in the affidavit between the items sought and the house to be searched. Nonetheless, the trial court concluded, in deference to the judge who signed the warrant, that “[t]here’s the good faith exception here. If I were confronted with this affidavit, I think I would have issued the warrant.”

¶27 … “Good faith” is not a doctrine that absolves the neutral and detached judge or magistrate from a careful,

State v. Thomas William Brady, 2007 WI App 33, PFR filed 2/13/07
For Brady: Suzanne L. Hagopian, SPD, Madison Appellate

Issue/Holding: Where the target of a search was not at home when the police forcibly entered pursuant to a search warrant, their unannounced entry did not, although not authorized by the warrant, violate the fourth amendment.

¶13   The first consideration is the safety of the police and others.

State v. Dennis M. Gralinski, 2007 WI App 233
For Gralinski: Martin Kohler; Craig Powell, PFR filed 10/5/07

Issue: Whether use of the defendant’s credit card number to purchase online membership to a child pornography site established probable cause for a search warrant of the defendant’s home.

Holding:

 ¶12     Gralinski argues that the special agent’s affidavit did not demonstrate probable cause for searching his home.