American Samoa Government v. Samana

3 Am. Samoa 3d 27
CourtHigh Court of American Samoa
DecidedJune 25, 1999
DocketAP No. 20-97
StatusPublished

This text of 3 Am. Samoa 3d 27 (American Samoa Government v. Samana) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering High Court of American Samoa primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
American Samoa Government v. Samana, 3 Am. Samoa 3d 27 (amsamoa 1999).

Opinion

OPINION

GOODWIN, Acting Associate Justice:

Abe Samana appeals his conviction for Unlawful Production of a Controlled Substance (ASCA § 13.1020) and Unlawful Possession of a Controlled Substance (ASCA § 13.1022). He was sentenced to a 20-year term on the offenses, with an additional ten years added pursuant to ASCA 13. 1023, a recidivist statute. Samana is presently serving his sentence, and his appeal challenges the judgment on a number of grounds.

The charges arose out of an incident that occurred in April of 1997. Officers of the Department of Public Safety procured a search warrant authorizing them to search certain premises, allegedly occupied by Samana, for cut and growing marijuana. When the officers arrived to serve the warrant, Samana engaged in an armed standoff with the officers, ultimately shooting at one of the officers. After several hours, Samana surrendered.

After Samana was removed from the premises, officers executed the warrant and found cut and growing marijuana in and around the premises, in addition to some drug paraphernalia, and expended and live ammunition. No handgun was recovered at the scene.

Samana contests the validity of the search warrant, the court’s denial of his pre-trial motions concerning the warrant, the jury instructions, the verdict, and the sentence. A trial court’s factual determinations are reviewed for clear error. The reviewing court affords particular weight to the trial judge’s assessment of conflicting and ambiguous facts, especially where the findings are based in part on the trial court’s evaluation of conflicting evidence and live testimony. Questions of law or mixed questions of law and fact are reviewed de novo. Roman Catholic Diocese of Samoa Pago Pago v. Avegalio, 20 A.S.R.2d 70, 73 (App. Div. 1992).

Analysis

A. Search Warrant

1. Probable Cause

The Revised Constitution of American Samoa provides that “no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause. . . .” Art. I, § 5. When [30]*30considering whether probable cause exists based on information provided by a confidential informant, the issuing judge should consider whether the circumstances suggest that the informant had some basis for his alleged knowledge, and whether the information and the informant are reliable. See ASG v. Samana, 8 A.S.R.2d 1, 6 (Trial Div. 1988). Review of the initial probable cause assessment is deferential. Id. at 7 (The reviewing court “may only address whether the evidence viewed as a whole provided a substantial basis for the magistrate’s finding of probable cause as opposed to an after the fact de novo assessment of probable cause.”)

In this case, Agent Sunia, of the Office of Territorial and International Criminal Intelligence and Drag Enforcement, submitted an affidavit to a magistrate in support of his application for a warrant. Samana argues that the affidavit was insufficient to support the search warrant. We have examined the warrant, and on its face, it supports probable cause to believe that marijuana is growing at the place described in the affidavit. Samana offers only conclusory assertions about the possible motives of law enforcement officers involved in this case, and speculation about facts apparently not contained in the affidavit, in the absence of some specific offer of proof by Samana, that the affidavit is false, his argument fails.

2. Error to deny Franks hearing?

A criminal defendant may challenge the accuracy of the statements made in the affidavit supporting a request for a warrant, but must meet a high standard to show he is entitled to a hearing on the issue. The defendant may be entitled to a hearing if he meets three conditions: (1) defendant must allege that specific statements in the affidavit were made with reckless disregard for the truth, and must provide reliable, sworn statements of supporting witnesses; (2) defendant may challenge the statement of the affiant only, not of the informant; (3) defendant must also show that the remaining information in the warrant, apart from the information the defendant ■ alleges to be false, would not support a finding of probable cause. Franks v. Delaware, 438 U.S. 154, 171-72 (1978).

Samana argues that he was entitled to a Franks hearing because (a) the affidavit did not contain an adequate statement of the confidential informant’s basis of knowledge, and (b) the affidavit failed to inform the magistrate that an informant used in the past by Lt. Leuma had provided false testimony. [Brief at 15-16] The first argument is clearly off base— in a request for a Franks hearing, a defendant may challenge only the veracity of statements made by the affiant. Whether the informant has an adequate basis for his alleged knowledge should be addressed in a direct challenge to the probable cause finding. See, e.g., American [31]*31Samoa Gov’t v. Samana, 8 A.S.R. 2d at 6.

The second argument concerns parties entirely unrelated to this proceeding, and is therefore irrelevant. Samana seems to argue that the affiant in this case, Officer Sunia, was merely a puppet of Lt. Leuma. He therefore suggests that it was materially misleading for the affidavit to omit any discussion of a prior incident involving Lt. Leuma, who was not the affiant in this case, and a confidential informant who provided false testimony in a different case, and who is not alleged to be the informant in this case. Samana has not provided any case law suggesting that this information is remotely relevant to the proceedings in this case, He also has not come forward with any evidence that he presented to the trial court at the time of his request for a Franks hearing. In the absence of supporting evidence contradicting the affidavit, this argument also fails.

3. Error to deny in camera hearing?

“Where a defendant makes a showing that identification of the government’s confidential informant may be relevant and helpful to a possible defense at trial, a district court abuses its discretion if it fails to hold an in camera hearing on disclosure.” United States v. Spires, 3 F.3d 1234, 1239 (9th Cir. 1993).

Samana argues that he presented information to the trial division, in his pretrial motion for an in camera hearing on the identity of the informant, demonstrating that the identity of the informant would be relevant to his defense at trial. It appears, from the Government’s brief, that the court heard testimony from Samana’s wife in support of his request for an in camera hearing. The court initially granted the motion, but vacated the decision after reconsideration of the facts.

Samana’s failure to provide a transcript of the relevant testimony, a copy of the court order granting the motion or vacating same, or any other evidence in the record pertaining to this issue, makes it virtually impossible to evaluate this argument. While the standard a defendant must meet to receive an in camera hearing is relatively low, see Spires, 3 F.3d at 1238, and it is conceivable that the record could support such an argument, the burden is on the appellant to produce a record which shows that the court abused its discretion. Samana has provided this court nothing upon which this corut can base a conclusion that trial court abused its discretion.

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Related

Oyler v. Boles
368 U.S. 448 (Supreme Court, 1962)
Franks v. Delaware
438 U.S. 154 (Supreme Court, 1978)
Jackson v. Virginia
443 U.S. 307 (Supreme Court, 1979)
United States v. David M. Belanger
970 F.2d 416 (Seventh Circuit, 1992)
United States v. Gary Lee Spires
3 F.3d 1234 (Ninth Circuit, 1993)

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Bluebook (online)
3 Am. Samoa 3d 27, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/american-samoa-government-v-samana-amsamoa-1999.