Robert Craig Light v. United States
Opinion
OPINION
In United States v. King, 478 F.2d 494 (9th Cir. 1973), this court held that certain telephone taps had been conducted in violation of law and that the conversations overheard were inadmissible as to those whose privacy had been invaded. Standing to suppress, however, was not extended to all defendants. We stated: “[A] defendant may move to suppress the fruits of a wire-tap only if his privacy was actually invaded; that is, if he was a participant in an intercepted conversation, or if such conversation occurred on his premises * * *478 F.2d at 506. Standing was, however, extended to one Maack who was not party to a conversation. As to him, we stated: “On at least one occasion a message sent at his direction and a reply thereto were intercepted by Government agents. His privacy was thus invaded to the same extent as if he had taken the phone in hand and spoken on the line himself.” Id.
Robert Craig Light, appellant here, was a party to United States v. King who, not having participated in any conversation, was held not to have standing to suppress the overheard conversations. Judgment against him was affirmed.
Subsequently, Light sought to show that two of the conversations overheard had had reference to him. He contended that he should have been granted standing for the same reason that standing had been granted to Maack; that he had in substance sent a message and received an answer. Light has unsuccessfully sought review of the question of standing by means including motion for new trial on the ground of newly discovered evidence (denied), and petition for relief *95 under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (denied without hearing). This appeal is taken from denial of his petition under § 2255. Questions are presented as to his right to press his claims under that section. These we need not reach. Assuming ar-guendo that he could, we conclude that the Maack rule would not apply on the facts here.
The conversations to which Light refers in relevant part are set forth in the margin. 1 In conversation 22, James Olson, in charge of one of the ships engaged in the criminal enterprise, is talking to King, the principal conspirator. He says that a young couple wanted to “charter” the boat; that they had lost out on their own charter when their boat was involved in an accident; that “Bill” was very insistent on it (from the conversation had the next morning we learn that the couple had been helpful to Bill and that he felt indebted to them); that Olson felt that taking the couple on would not interfere with the “other charter” and that they looked okay to him but that he had said he would have to have King’s approval. King tells Olson to get in touch with him the next morning.
In the next recorded conversation, King says that he had gotten in touch with Bill about the other “charter party”; that he will leave it to Olson as he is the one who will have to put up with them. Olson expresses pleasure, “[I]f it pleases Bill * * * that’s fine because * * * he’s doin’ a good job.”
Light asserts that he was one of the persons to whom Olson referred as the “charter party.” He contends that an evidentiary hearing would have es *96 tablished that fact and that Olson’s conversation with King was instigated by him. In our judgment these conversations on their face show that they cannot serve to bring Light within application of the Maack rule.
The question, under United States v. King-, supra, is whether Light’s privacy was invaded; that is, whether he was a participant in an intercepted conversation, directly, or through the sending of a message. We hold he was not. He was not himself speaking to King through Olson. He was simply the subject of the conversation. He had sought action from Olson for which Olson needed authority and it was to ascertain whether or not that authority would be forthcoming that the call was made. A business call with reference to the needs of a customer is not a message from the customer in the sense of the Maack rule. Even if the call was made at Light’s instance, Olson was speaking on behalf of himself. It was his privacy (and King’s) that was.invaded.
Affirmed.
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529 F.2d 94 (Robert Craig Light v. United States) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.