United States v. Andrew Kowalczyk

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: June 25, 2024
• Docket: 19-30216
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS JUN 25 2024 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, No. 19-30216

Plaintiff-Appellee, D.C. No. 3:08-cr-00095-MO-1

v. MEMORANDUM* ANDREW FRANKLIN KOWALCZYK,

Defendant-Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Oregon Michael W. Mosman, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted June 5, 2024 Portland, Oregon

Before: GRABER, RAWLINSON, and SUNG, Circuit Judges.

Andrew Kowalczyk (Kowalczyk) appeals his conviction for nine counts of

sexual exploitation of children in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2251(a), 2251(e), and

2253. Kowalczyk challenges the district court’s denial of his motions to suppress

evidence discovered during the searches of his luggage and his storage unit. We

have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. “We review de novo motions to suppress, and any factual findings made at

the suppression hearing for clear error.” United States v. Sapalasan, 97 F.4th 657,

659-60 (9th Cir. 2024) (citation omitted).

1. The district court did not err in denying Kowalczyk’s motion to

suppress evidence discovered during the search of his luggage.1 Contrary to

Kowalczyk’s contention, federal law governs our application of the inevitable

discovery doctrine. See United States v. Cormier, 220 F.3d 1103, 1111 (9th Cir.

2000) (“The general rule . . . is that evidence will only be excluded in federal court

when it violates federal protections . . . and not in cases where it is tainted solely

under state law.”) (citations omitted). Under federal law, an inventory search must

comply with “the official procedures of the relevant state or local police

department.” Id. (citation omitted).

Officers Kleffman and Pihl, and Detective Visnaw testified that standard

procedure of the Puyallup Police Department included inventorying the contents of

any bag and checking for “contraband, valuables, and weapons.” The officers

reasonably believed that Kowalczyk’s luggage contained a firearm. They had been

informed that Kowalczyk had an “armed and dangerous warrant” from Oregon,

1 Because we conclude that the evidence would have been inevitably discovered during the officers’ inventory search, we need not address the search made incident to Kowalczyk’s arrest. See United States v. Ruckes, 586 F.3d 713, 719 (9th Cir. 2009) (explaining that “a lawful alternative justification for discovering the evidence” can save an otherwise unlawful search).

2 and that he had previously possessed a handgun. Therefore, the officers’ inventory

search complied with the Puyallup Police Department’s standardized policies and

practices, see Cormier, 220 F.3d at 1111, and the inevitable discovery doctrine

“permit[ted] the government to rely on evidence that ultimately would have been

discovered.” Ruckes, 586 F.3d at 718 (citation omitted). The district court

correctly denied the motion to suppress. See id. at 719 (“[T]he deterrent rationale

for the exclusionary rule is not applicable where the evidence would have

ultimately been discovered during a police inventory . . .”).

2. The district court did not erroneously deny Kowalczyk’s motion to

suppress evidence found during the search of his storage unit. Kowalczyk argues

that the two-month delay between seizure of the storage unit and issuance of a

search warrant was unreasonable. However, any error in admitting the evidence

discovered during the search of the storage unit was harmless given the amount of

other evidence that supported Kowalczyk’s conviction. See United States v.

Obendorf, 894 F.3d 1094, 1098 (9th Cir. 2018) (noting that “we will affirm” the

district court’s evidentiary ruling “unless the erroneous evidentiary ruling more

likely than not affected the verdict”) (citation and internal quotation marks

omitted).

AFFIRMED.