Background
Ohio officers investigating Devin McFaul for methamphetamine trafficking linked Jared Metzger to McFaul’s residence and activities. Metzger lived at the residence, drove McFaul’s car, and posted on Facebook about an officer while tagging McFaul. During a stop of Metzger in McFaul’s car, a drug dog alerted and officers found what appeared to be a drug ledger.
A municipal judge issued warrants authorizing officers to search McFaul’s residence and related locations for evidence of drug trafficking, including cellphones and their contents. Officers seized two phones belonging to Metzger. After an investigator encountered an image depicting child sexual abuse, the investigator stopped searching and obtained a second warrant. The ensuing search revealed hundreds of child-pornography images and videos. Metzger conditionally pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography after the district court denied his suppression motion.
The Court’s Holding
The Sixth Circuit affirmed the denial of suppression based on the good-faith exception, without deciding whether the original warrant was supported by probable cause. The 14-page affidavit was not “bare bones” because it established at least a minimally sufficient nexus between Metzger’s phone and suspected drug trafficking. That nexus rested on Metzger’s residence with McFaul, his Facebook post and its apparent effect on McFaul’s conduct, his use of a car containing a suspected drug ledger, the drug dog’s alert, evidence that customers called McFaul to purchase drugs, and the affiant’s experience that traffickers use cellphones to facilitate transactions.
The court also rejected Metzger’s unpreserved particularity challenge under plain-error review. Given the investigation’s circumstances, the warrant could cover all cellphones at the residence without identifying particular devices or owners. Its authorization to examine phone contents was also sufficiently limited because the issuing judge approved the search for evidence of specified drug offenses, not an unrestricted search for unrelated information. The investigator’s decision to stop upon discovering suspected child pornography and obtain a new warrant reflected that limitation.
Key Takeaways
- Even if probable cause is disputed, suppression is unavailable when officers reasonably rely on a warrant supported by a minimally sufficient nexus between the device and suspected criminal activity.
- A warrant may cover all cellphones at a location when officers cannot know beforehand which devices are present and the affidavit connects the occupants and their likely phone use to the investigated crimes.
- Authorization to search an entire phone can satisfy the particularity requirement when the search remains tied to evidence of specified offenses and investigators may need to examine varied files or applications to locate that evidence.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces the Sixth Circuit’s low threshold for applying the good-faith exception when an affidavit supplies some concrete connection between a cellphone and criminal activity. Detailed facts linking a suspect to an investigation, combined with an experienced officer’s explanation of how phones facilitate the crime, may prevent suppression even when the underlying probable-cause question remains unresolved.
It also confirms that device warrants need not always identify phones by owner or physical description and may permit broad examination of their contents, provided the authorization is reasonably tailored to the crimes under investigation.