United States v. Kelvin Lee

972 F.2d 1345, 1992 U.S. App. LEXIS 27598, 1992 WL 175952
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
DecidedJuly 23, 1992
Docket91-10184
StatusUnpublished

This text of 972 F.2d 1345 (United States v. Kelvin Lee) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Kelvin Lee, 972 F.2d 1345, 1992 U.S. App. LEXIS 27598, 1992 WL 175952 (9th Cir. 1992).

Opinion

972 F.2d 1345

NOTICE: Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3 provides that dispositions other than opinions or orders designated for publication are not precedential and should not be cited except when relevant under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, or collateral estoppel.
UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
Kelvin LEE, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 91-10184.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted March 9, 1992.
Decided July 23, 1992.

Before BOOCHEVER, REINHARDT and BEEZER, Circuit Judges.

MEMORANDUM*

Kelvin Lee had a pager. He had the pager with him when he and five others were arrested for heroin distribution. The numbers stored in that pager were retrieved pursuant to a search warrant, and Lee moved to suppress the numbers.

The district court agreed with Lee that the affidavit filed in support of the warrant did not supply probable cause, that a previously filed affidavit could not lend additional support, that none of the proffered exceptions to the warrant requirement applied, and that Leon's good faith exception for invalid warrants was inapplicable. Accordingly, the district court ordered the numbers suppressed. The government timely filed an appeal pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3731. We hold that the good faith exception does apply here and we reverse.

* When "888" appeared on his pager, DEA Special Agent Heng knew the heroin had arrived. As arranged through a confidential informant, the undercover agent went to a room in San Francisco's Grosvenor Hotel. There he met Suen Man Tang and Ren Hai, the married couple who had given him that pager code, a small paper bindle with a heroin sample, and the promise of a major heroin sale. Tang and Hai displayed heroin; Heng displayed money; and the three waited. They waited for the couple's associates, who were to make the promised delivery. While they waited, Tang and Hai placed and received calls, using both the hotel room's telephone and a cellular telephone. Hai's dialing patterns suggested that he placed at least one call to a pager.

Kelvin Lee and three other men pulled up to the Grosvenor Hotel in an old VW Rabbit. Two of the men, Kelvin Lee and Shao Rong Li, conversed briefly with Hai in the hotel lobby. While Li followed Hai upstairs to the hotel room, Lee joined the other two men in the hotel bar. Upstairs, Li handed two plastic-wrapped packages to Agent Heng. Heng inspected the packages, inquired about subsequent heroin deliveries, and then gave the prearranged arrest signal. Meanwhile, agents arrested the three men in the hotel bar. Lee had a pager; another man had a loaded semiautomatic pistol; the third man had a loaded semiautomatic pistol, a pager and a cellular telephone.

The next day, November 7, 1990, Magistrate Judge Brennan reviewed Agent Heng's affidavit and issued a complaint charging Kelvin Lee with distribution of heroin and conspiracy to distribute heroin. Agent Heng's 21-page affidavit sets forth (in greater detail) the circumstances as described above, and includes background information about the overall heroin deal arranged with Tang and Hai.

On November 8, the same magistrate judge received a superceding affidavit which corrected errors in the first one.1 That day, she issued a superceding complaint.

Also on November 8, the government filed with Magistrate Judge Brennan an application for a warrant to search the memory banks of the four pagers and three cellular telephones taken during the arrests. The accompanying affidavit, signed by DEA Agent Plunkett, describes the overall drug transaction, with an emphasis on the use of pagers and cellular telephones.

This affidavit makes scant mention of Kelvin Lee. It does not reference Agent Heng's previously filed, and more detailed affidavit; it does not reference the previously issued complaint. It mentions Lee, either directly or arguably by innuendo, only as follows.

29. On November 6, 1990, TANG and HAI along with Shao Rong LI, Bob C. LEE, Kelvin LEE and Ronald Kam Tat YEE were arrested following the delivery of approximately one (1) pound of heroin to S/A Heng at the Grovesnor [sic] Hotel, So. San Francisco, California. At the time of their arrests, Bob C. LEE, Shao Rong LI and Ronald Kam Tat YEE were armed with handguns. In addition, Shao Rong LI, Ren HAI and Ronald Kam Tat YEE all possessed portable cellular telephones.

30. In addition to the telephones, Ren HAI, Shao Rong LI, Kelvin LEE and Ronald Kam Tat YEE all possessed digital pagers. During the course of the undercover conversations between S/A Heng and Ren HAI preceding his arrest, HAI placed at least one telephone call to a digital pager. Since the time of their arrests, the digital pagers seized from the above subjects have continued to receive signals indicating the receipt of phone calls.

31. Based upon the training and experience of your affiant [Special Agent Plunkett], it is common place in todays drug trafficking community for traffickers to utilize digital pagers and cellular telephones to communicate between each other and to avoid detection by law enforcement authorities.

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* * *

33. During the evening of November 6, 1990, Hai placed a phone call wherein he punched in numbers without speaking, actions your affiant believes to be consistent with the use of digital paging devices. After a short time, Hai received an incoming call.

34. Based on your affiant's experience and training, I know that the pagers held by Ren Hai, Shao Rong Li, Ronald Kam Tat YEE and Kelvin LEE, have the ability to store the telephone numbers pulsed into them. Your affiant seeks to retrieve those numbers as of the date and time of issuance of the warrant.

35. Based upon the above aforementioned facts, your affiant believes probable cause does exist to believe that the digital pagers referenced above contain stored electronic communications which are evidence of a conspiracy between those arrested and others yet unidentified....

The magistrate judge issued the requested search warrant. Agent Plunkett pressed a button on Lee's pager, and the pager displayed numbers entered by those who had accessed the pager. In a pretrial motion, Lee moved to suppress these numbers, as well as those retrieved from the other arrestees' pagers and cellular telephones. The district court granted the motion only as to the numbers retrieved from Lee's pager. This court stayed Lee's trial pending resolution of the government's appeal. Lee remains free on bail.

II

We review de novo the district court's determination that a search warrant was not supported by probable cause. United States v. Howard, 828 F.2d 552, 554 (9th Cir.1987). We also review de novo the district court's determination that the "good faith" exception to the exclusionary rule does not apply to this search. United States v.

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Bluebook (online)
972 F.2d 1345, 1992 U.S. App. LEXIS 27598, 1992 WL 175952, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-kelvin-lee-ca9-1992.