[00:00:00] Speaker 01:
Okay. How much time would you like to reserve for rebuttal? Two minutes. Two minutes? Okay. Go ahead, please.

[00:00:07] Speaker 00:
You can move the podium down if you like.

[00:00:08] Speaker 01:
Yes.

[00:00:13] Speaker 00:
There's a switch there somewhere. There you go.

[00:00:15] Speaker 04:
That's better. Now we can see you.

[00:00:19] Speaker 00:
Yes.

[00:00:21] Speaker 04:
Great.

[00:00:22] Speaker 04:
May it please the court, my name is Lynn Hartfield, and I represent the appellant Kendall Hawkins.

[00:00:28] Speaker 04:
The question for the court today is, if a warrant is issued via evidence that falls woefully short of establishing probable cause, can the government use the fruits of that warrant to track a person, get more warrants, and use that information to detain the person? The circumstances in this case establish an unbroken chain from the bare-bones affidavit to an orchestrated stop on I-5 that led to the charges against Mr. Hawkins.

[00:00:58] Speaker 04:
Now, the government argues you don't need to bother with the affidavit because Hawkins' companion was speeding, and that provided an independent basis. But the problem with that argument is that this traffic stopped with anything but independence. We know that because the government said as much, said that in their affidavits to get a subsequent warrant. It said that in incident reports, and it even said that in filings in the district court.

[00:01:25] Speaker 03:
But as I understand it, you don't contest that the traffic stop itself was legitimate?

[00:01:33] Speaker 04:
No. Under Wren, the police can stop somebody for speeding. That's not the issue. The issue is whether the traffic stop was independent of the tainted warrants and the tainted evidence that came from the warrants.

[00:01:44] Speaker 03:
Did you make the argument that anybody else speeding down I-5 at the same time would not have been stopped?

[00:01:51] Speaker 04:
No, I mean, the issue is under Murray, Murray versus United States, the Supreme Court explained what makes something independent. And what makes it independent is that law enforcement's decision to do the legal conduct wasn't tainted, was not the product of the tainted evidence or conduct. And so here, there's no way this traffic stop would have happened on that date in that spot had it not been for the GPS tracking data.

[00:02:18] Speaker 00:
But I thought Wren foreclosed that argument. I mean, the Wren stop, as I view it, is a pretextual stop, but it's permitted because there's a traffic violation.

[00:02:28] Speaker 04:
So Wren is a very different question. Wren says the officer's motivation in stopping somebody has nothing to do with whether the stop is illegal. Independent source under Murray is looking at what the officers are thinking. And so it's a completely different question. Under Murray, we have to look at whether the officer's decision to do something legal, which is stop somebody speeding, was driven by other illegal conduct, earlier illegal conduct.

[00:02:55] Speaker 01:
But what's the evidence that that was the case here? Because if you look at Orozco, the court actually pointed to three pieces of evidence that the officers would not have done that. administrative stop but for this other investigation. Like they had an AUSA concession that, yes, we wouldn't have stopped that person if it weren't for our ongoing investigation. But there's nothing here that says the officers would not have made the traffic stop if they weren't doing this drug narcotics investigation.

[00:03:24] Speaker 04:
There absolutely was because in the affidavit to get the cell site simulator warrant, they said... They intended to conduct this traffic stop because they thought they had reason to believe there were drugs in this car. So they conceded right there. That's the reason they did the traffic stop. They also have this multi-agency team of agents with a dog at the ready.

[00:03:46] Speaker 04:
So they knew exactly why they were stopping him. It had nothing to do with the speeding. That was just a pretext to get to the stop. But the reason they stopped him was very clear from the affidavit in the cell site warrant. It was clear in the police reports. It was clear because they had this whole team, you know, why would you have Seattle police and FBI agents, you know, participating in a traffic stop in Centralia? It just doesn't, it wouldn't have happened, nor would they have deployed the dog immediately.

[00:04:17] Speaker 04:
So you can absolutely tell from the circumstances of this offense and from their own words that the reason they executed this traffic stop was to investigate the drug crime.

[00:04:28] Speaker 01:
And do you think the drug investigation extended the stop? Yes. But if they were already running Mr. Appleton's for warrants, they were trying to learn Mr. Hawkins' ID, it seems like the regular traffic stop investigation was ongoing. Yes. when they did the dog sniff.

[00:04:47] Speaker 04:
Well, if the court were to find this was not independent, then we don't even get to Rodriguez. The only way we get to Rodriguez is if the court finds that the stop was completely independent, which it wasn't. But if the court finds that this stop was independent, the issue with Rodriguez is that it says you cannot extend the mission of the traffic stop beyond the time it would take to do that or reasonably would be doing it. The problem we have here is that because this was never a traffic stop, the police weren't doing anything attendant with the traffic stop.

[00:05:24] Speaker 04:
And I think you have to look at it. They weren't running?

[00:05:28] Speaker 04:
You know, there's nothing in here that says that because I went back and looked at this.

[00:05:33] Speaker 04:
If you look at the report of the officer, it's Officer Summers. And I can give you a record site on that.

[00:05:42] Speaker 04:
If you look at 2ER263 and 2ER261, those are the reports. One is by the officer who actually did the stop, and the other was by an FBI 302, I believe, by Agent McCann, who wasn't there. wasn't at the stop, they don't say anything about what was going on during that dog sniff. They had pulled these guys out of the car, but the reason they pulled them out of the car was to do the dog sniff. So, you know, the only place where it says that they were conducting traffic-related warrants checks and things – is the affidavit of McCann after the motion to suppress is filed.

[00:06:21] Speaker 04:
So the reports on scene don't talk about any traffic-related activity. They talk about we pulled them out of the car and we bring the dog out.

[00:06:30] Speaker 04:
There was never any traffic citation issued. The driver himself wasn't arrested, so it seems to me that if they were actually – going about the motions of a traffic stop, we would have seen a citation. We would have seen something in the report saying we were running warrants checks. We were doing that. The only place it says that is Agent McCann's affidavit after the motion is suppressed is filed.

[00:06:57] Speaker 04:
So we're supposed to discount that? I mean, just...

[00:07:00] Speaker 04:
I think it's a little – it doesn't – she wasn't there, and the reports from the day of the event don't mention anything about it, nor was there ever any traffic citation actually issued. And if the guy was speeding and he was let go, why wouldn't they have issued a traffic citation?

[00:07:18] Speaker 00:
Well, it's very clear this is a pretextual stop. I mean, it just jumps out at you that the 78 miles an hour was a pretext for a stop, and the only question of whether that's permissible –

[00:07:29] Speaker 04:
Well, again, it's permissible. It's whether it was independent of the tainted evidence. Those are two different questions. Wren says it's permissible to do a pretextual stop, but that doesn't answer the question of whether it's independent from the tainted evidence that they gained from the GPS warrant.

[00:07:48] Speaker 03:
So it's a pretextual stop, and they do have probable cause with respect to the speeding, right?

[00:08:01] Speaker 04:
Again, yes. Under Wren, that stop is okay because of the speeding. The question is, was it independent of the tainted evidence obtained from the GPS warrant? That's the question we have here. Not Wren, but Murray.

[00:08:16] Speaker 03:
So you're really trying to give different meaning to the word pretextual. Absolutely. What is your best case that would say that even though this was pretextual, it wasn't independent?

[00:08:31] Speaker 03:
and that's what's required.

[00:08:32] Speaker 04:
Well, Murray is the case that you should look at because Murray says when we're deciding whether something is independent of prior illegal conduct, we have to look at what the officers were thinking.

[00:08:46] Speaker 04:
Under Wren, that's a completely different question. Wren is looking at could the police stop somebody even if it was a pretext, but that has nothing to do with independent source.

[00:08:59] Speaker 04:
So that's why Murray is the case you should be looking at, not Wren.

[00:09:05] Speaker 01:
Let me ask, are you also contesting that the officers couldn't take Mr. Appleton and Mr. Hawkins out of the car for safety because of the unloaded magazine?

[00:09:19] Speaker 04:
They could have taken them out of the car, but the question is, again, when they ran the dog, were they doing traffic-related things? activity. And the answer to that is there's no evidence they were because they knew they were going to stop this car. They brought the dog out within a minute or two and started going around the car. So whether they could have ordered them out of the car is not the issue. The issue is whether the dog was part of the traffic stop.

[00:09:51] Speaker 04:
And it wasn't. The dog was part of the drug investigation.

[00:09:56] Speaker 00:
Once they've seen the so-called drum magazine in the glove compartment when he's getting out his registration documents, is that enough to trigger the dog? I understand the dog was triggered for different reasons, but would that have been enough?

[00:10:10] Speaker 04:
No. Because? Because, one, a drum magazine by itself is not illegal. There's nothing illegal about having that under Washington law at that time.

[00:10:19] Speaker 04:
Secondly, dogs don't sniff guns. They sniff drugs. So the fact that somebody has a loaded drum magazine doesn't give any reason why you would bring a drug-sniffing dog.

[00:10:33] Speaker 04:
So no.

[00:10:37] Speaker 04:
I think just going back to the GPS warrant itself, the district court correctly found there was no probable cause of And what we have is an extremely bare bones tip. We have a guy who says there's somebody named Kendall. This is his phone number. He lives in Arizona and he drives drugs up to Seattle. The problem with that is that the, Agents did no corroboration, virtually none. All they did was find out that there was somebody named Kendall Hawkins who lived in Arizona and that he lived at addresses that were associated with that phone number.

[00:11:11] Speaker 04:
That says nothing about drug dealing. It says nothing about anything, really. Anybody who's ever lived with somebody else has an address associated with that person's phone. It just doesn't. cut it. But the circumstances of this warrant are extremely telling, which is we have two paragraphs in a 37-page warrant application, which had to do with a very large drug trafficking organization that the government had been investigating for two years. And the only connection of Mr. Hawkins to that DTO was the informant said he was selling drugs to this guy named Kenneth Lee.

[00:11:50] Speaker 04:
Kenneth Lee had been arrested six weeks earlier. So there was at that time really no connection between Mr. Hawkins and this DTO. And yet the government chose to put or the agent chose to put that in this big warrant application. And that goes to good faith. Not only was this a bare-bones two-paragraph recitation, but the way the agent structured the affidavit evidences a lack of good faith. And that is to say, putting this person who's not really connected to this organization, and as an aside, he was never even indicted in connection with this organization, putting that in with all this, knowing that the magistrate has seen multiple warrant affidavits, multiple requests for permission to track from this organization, sticking him in there was deceptive.

[00:12:44] Speaker 04:
Not noting that the one alleged connection had been arrested six weeks earlier, not putting that anywhere in the section with Mr. Hawkins.

[00:12:55] Speaker 01:
But it's in there, right? You're just saying it's not in a prominent location or a location that's satisfactory to you.

[00:13:01] Speaker 04:
correct that's that's why there's no frank's violation but we're talking about good faith which is again a different question than frank's we're talking about whether the government can take advantage of the good faith exception and and if you if you look at those two paragraphs and you think about whether those two paragraphs if they had been submitted as a standalone affidavit which i doubt any prosecutor would have bothered to do that but i don't think any magistrate judge would have issued a warrant based on those two paragraphs um And for those reasons, the government should not or the agent should not have been able to take advantage of the good faith exception, and the district court was wrong on that.

[00:13:42] Speaker 04:
So given that we have this invalid warrant, which leads directly to tracking Mr. Hawkins, leads directly to the cell site simulator warrant, leads directly to this multi-agency team of agents and officers stopping him, It's through the poisonous tree. There's no break in the chain.

[00:14:01] Speaker 01:
And if we think probable cause is close, why shouldn't we just defer to the magistrate judge?

[00:14:08] Speaker 04:
Well, you know, the district court also knew that law and the district court said, you know, giving deference to the magistrate, this was too thin. And the district court also agreed that the evidence relating to Kenneth Lee was too stale. And this court should uphold the district court's finding because it was based on a much more thorough examination of this warrant. It had the benefit of the adversarial system, um, You know, this court has recognized that magistrates are very hurried, and the circumstances of this case show why this happens.

[00:14:42] Speaker 04:
I mean, you've got a magistrate judge who's presented with a 37-page affidavit about an organization for which multiple warrants have been issued over the last two years, and then you've got these two paragraphs buried in these 37 pages. So, no, while you give deference to the magistrate, I think the circumstances of this case don't make it close.

[00:15:04] Speaker 01:
All right, any further questions? You have only like 22 seconds left, but we'll give you two minutes for rebuttal. All right, thank you. Thank you.

[00:15:11] Speaker 02:
Okay, go ahead, please. Good morning, Your Honors, and may it please the Court. Lauren Watts Stanier for the United States. There are really three separate paths this court can take to uphold the vehicle search warrant and affirm the district court.

[00:15:42] Speaker 02:
Any one of those is sufficient. The first is that there was probable cause to support the initial GPS warrant. The second is that even if there wasn't probable cause, there certainly was good faith on behalf of the agents who executed that warrant. And the third, which is where this court started with my friend on the other side, is that Setting aside the GPS warrant and the issue of good faith, there is a lawful, an undeniably lawful vehicle stop, a canine sniff that gave rise to probable cause to search the vehicle.

[00:16:15] Speaker 02:
So I think that's where I'll start. It's where you spent the bulk of your time with my friend on the other side, and then I'll address the search warrants at the end of my time.

[00:16:25] Speaker 02:
Now, as the court recognized that Below, the defendant conceded, as they really needed to, that the vehicle stop based on speeding was entirely lawful, and that's at ER 55. That lawful vehicle stop gave rise to a canine sniff within six minutes of Officer Summers pacing the car.

[00:16:50] Speaker 00:
Can you do a dog sniff after just any old run stop, or do you need something beyond the just flat-out run stop?

[00:16:59] Speaker 02:
Yeah, I think Illinois v. Caballos really answers this question for us, Your Honor. So long as that dog sniff doesn't extend the other incidents of the traffic violation. So as long as someone's running the warrants and writing up that traffic violation, then a canine sniff within that time.

[00:17:16] Speaker 00:
And were they writing up a traffic violation?

[00:17:21] Speaker 02:
They were running the warrants, Your Honor. And I think we know that from ER 216, which Judge McEwen pointed out. That's the place in the record where Agent McCann explains that while the K-9 was being applied, another officer, another task force officer, was doing things incident to the traffic stop.

[00:17:41] Speaker 00:
Doing what things incident to the traffic stop?

[00:17:44] Speaker 02:
And the record is not entirely clear on that point. It's one line in an affidavit that says, You know, he was attending to the traffic stop while the canine was being applied. This worked on other aspects of the traffic stop. That's very vague.

[00:17:57] Speaker 00:
But I think the court can also— And it's clear they weren't writing up a traffic violation.

[00:18:01] Speaker 02:
Well, I think, you know, two responses to that, Your Honor. The first is we can look to the duration of the stop between, you know, when the officer paced the car and when the canine alerted. As evidence that this was happening quickly and that there wasn't an extension of the traffic stop.

[00:18:19] Speaker 01:
But I don't think Rodriguez focuses on the amount of time, right? It's just if there's any extension that's for an investigation that is completely independent of the stop, that's a problem, right? It doesn't say six minutes is – OK, but 10 minutes is not. And I guess I'm just concerned that if I do look at Officer Summers' statement, he doesn't mention anything about the traffic stop happening or traffic investigation taking place during the dog sniff.

[00:18:51] Speaker 01:
And similar to the FBI 302, there's nothing about an ongoing traffic investigation.

[00:18:59] Speaker 02:
You're right, Your Honor. So what we have in the record is that ER 216, but as the court also discussed with my friend on the other side, as soon as Officer Summers asked for the rental agreement and that glove compartment was open and the officers saw the drum magazine, that really changed the tenor of the stop here. So that turned this kind of rent speeding stop into something that raised concerns about officer safety and

[00:19:28] Speaker 01:
But the dog is not sniffing for guns. The dog is not even sniffing for fentanyl.

[00:19:34] Speaker 02:
No, that's true. And kind of two responses. First, the officers—this is reasonable suspicion we're talking about here when we are looking to whether we can prolong the traffic stop. And again, we don't think it was prolonged, but even if it was, reasonable suspicion of drugs— you know, officer agents know based on their training and experience that drugs and guns go together. So that enough, that could give rise to reasonable suspicion.

[00:19:59] Speaker 01:
But also, you know, we have the CI tip that had told agents... Though anytime there's an empty magazine cartridge, you can do a dog sniff for drugs?

[00:20:09] Speaker 02:
As you know, within a very short period of time, and I think in the circumstances of what happened in this traffic stop, Certainly, Your Honor. And the fact that, you know, the individuals were removed from the car and the quick time in which that dog sniff happened, that tells me it wasn't extended in the first place. And if it was, it was extended for a lawful reason under Rodriguez, which was either officer safety or, you know, the agents did at this point, you know, even if the court... How is the presence of...

[00:20:43] Speaker 01:
A dog sniffing for drugs, how is that officer safety?

[00:20:48] Speaker 02:
The officer safety is the individuals being removed from the car. So that just takes time is what I'm talking about.

[00:20:53] Speaker 01:
Okay, but relate the dog sniff to officer safety if you can.

[00:20:58] Speaker 02:
I think what I was about to say is the dog sniff can relate to pre-existing concerns about drug trafficking. Now remember, this individual had been identified by a confidential informant who was reliable and saying this person is trafficking in drugs. So even if the court finds that that doesn't give rise to probable cause, it certainly gives rise to reasonable suspicion. And that's throughout the record here, that the point of the stop, it was predominantly a traffic stop. That is enough evidence.

[00:21:29] Speaker 02:
The traffic stop wasn't extended. But even if the court finds that it was extended, there was reason to investigate drug trafficking and there was reason to remove the individuals from the car for officer safety.

[00:21:44] Speaker 03:
We have the district court basically saying to put it all together, the traffic stop was valid. The officers had reasonable suspicion of a crime. They extended the stop consistent with their larger mission. which was not invalidated by the lack of probable cause on the GPS warrant. And after the dog alerted, they had probable cause to conduct a subsequent search. So those are kind of a mixture of findings and legal conclusions. How do we, on what standard of review do we take this district court decision?

[00:22:16] Speaker 02:
I think that to the extent there are factual findings embedded in there, that's obviously reviewed for clear error. But the legal conclusion about whether probable cause existed in the stop, et cetera, that's reviewed de novo.

[00:22:30] Speaker 01:
And is the finding that the stop was extended, is that a fact finding or is that a legal finding?

[00:22:40] Speaker 02:
I think that would be a mixed finding of law and fact. So I think that would be reviewed for clear error.

[00:22:46] Speaker 02:
But again, you know, we think that it would be clear error because the only evidence in the record is that ER 216, which says the stop wasn't extended. But what the district court did get right is that to the extent it was extended ever so slightly, that was consistent with the overall mission of the stop, which was really threefold traffic officer safety. and investigating drug trafficking. And again, we're at a reasonable suspicion standard. It's a low standard. It's lower than probable cause.

[00:23:14] Speaker 01:
Is there any evidence in the record that the officers would have done this traffic stop absent this drug investigation?

[00:23:21] Speaker 02:
I don't think so, Your Honor. I was thinking about that when you asked my colleague, and I don't think that matters. That's the point of Wren, is that the subjective intent of the officer is doesn't matter in a stop like this. So whether they would or wouldn't have done the stop, that doesn't matter. What matters is that this individual was speeding, he committed a traffic violation, and Wren says we can pull him over for that.

[00:23:44] Speaker 03:
I want to go back to the CI, and basically we have a phone that's associated with that address of Kendall Hawkins, but it has a different name. And so...

[00:23:58] Speaker 03:
It appears they think that's a false name. But is there anything else in the record with respect to other people living at that address who also could have been associated with the phone or anything else beyond their assumption that it was a false name on the subscription to the phone?

[00:24:20] Speaker 02:
I'm not aware of anything else in the record indicating other individuals were living at that address, but there are two touch points between Kendall Hawkins and the phone. So when the agents got subscriber information for the phone, as you pointed out, Your Honor, it was in a different name from Kendall Hawkins, but associated with an address also associated with Kendall Hawkins. And then different... information or kind of subsequent information associated the phone and Mr. Hawkins with a second address. So, you know, that's significant. There are multiple touch points that are connecting this phone to Kendall Hawkins.

[00:24:54] Speaker 02:
And in addition to the fact that the CS knew the first name of the person that he said owns the phone. So I don't think it's correct at all to say that there was no corroboration of this confidential sources tip. The confidential source was known to law enforcement. They had a five-year relationship with a local law enforcement agency during which they provided reliable information. They were paid informant. That five-year paid informant relationship is really important because the CS has incentive to provide accurate information.

[00:25:30] Speaker 02:
So, you know, that's two of the Gates factors right there. And then the corroboration, you know, there was some corroboration. So the agents were able to see that this individual accurately, the CS accurately captured TT86, which was a telephone number associated with someone named Kendall. That Kendall lived in Arizona and two houses or two residences connected him with the phone. And we think that that's sufficient for probable cause. You know, it's close, but we think it's enough.

[00:26:01] Speaker 02:
And on an affidavit like this, there is significant deference owed to the magistrate judge, significant deference. But even if this court disagrees, there was at least a colorable argument for probable cause, which is what the good faith standard is. And the good faith standard is an important standard in this case because the agents went to the magistrate, They presented a warrant. They presented it in a really straightforward manner. Now, there's some suggestion from my friend on the other side that this was a lengthy or deceptive warrant somehow.

[00:26:34] Speaker 02:
But the court just needs to look at the warrant to know that that is not the case. There's a very clear header that says probable cause for TT86, Kendall Hawkins. And then below that header, there's the probable cause set out really clearly. So the magistrate judge had everything that she needed in this search warrant to determine make an evaluation of probable cause.

[00:26:56] Speaker 01:
And again, we- Can I ask you, what should we make of the fact that it's lawful to possess a magazine?

[00:27:02] Speaker 02:
I don't think that that really bears on this conclusion because when the individuals saw, officers can get shot with lawful guns. So when the officers saw a magazine in the glove compartment, they had every right to say, that raises some concerns for officer safety. We can take them out of the car. And we can make sure we're investigating or kind of taking concern for officer safety. So I don't think the lawful nature of the magazine really bears on the officer safety analysis.

[00:27:35] Speaker 01:
What about the fact that the dog wasn't trained to sniff for the narcotics that were actually in this car?

[00:27:42] Speaker 02:
That also is not relevant, Your Honor. What we look at when we look at probable cause is we look at what the facts giving rise to the circumstances may at the front end, not at the back end. So, for example, if the agent had found nothing in the car, that wouldn't invalidate probable cause just because in hindsight there wasn't anything in the car.

[00:28:05] Speaker 02:
And that's for good reason, Your Honor. We're not arguing just because something was found in the car that, you know, the dog, that the canine was valid. It's something that we look at kind of moving forward.

[00:28:18] Speaker 02:
Now, again, there are three ways that this court can affirm the district court, and we think any one of them is sufficient. First, given the deference owed to the magistrate judge here, there was enough to support probable cause. Second, even if this court finds there wasn't enough to support probable cause, there certainly was a colorable argument for probable cause. And the agents, you know, candidly did everything right here. And one of the things the courts can look at when they think about probable cause is they can think about kind of the whole duration of the investigation.

[00:28:51] Speaker 02:
One fact the court may consider is the agents didn't need a search warrant to search the vehicle on the side of the road that evening. But they decided to get one out of an abundance of caution. So that just goes to their good faith.

[00:29:04] Speaker 02:
And then finally, the traffic stop, it was sufficiently attenuated from anything having to do with the GPS warrant. It was lawful. It wasn't extended or to the extent that it was.

[00:29:14] Speaker 01:
But why should we rely on the vague statement of somebody who wasn't there?

[00:29:19] Speaker 02:
Well, as Agent McCann says in her affidavit, she was in constant contact with the individuals who were there. She was also the lead investigator on this case. She had her thumb on the pulse of the entire case. That's also in her affidavit.

[00:29:34] Speaker 01:
But she would understand that the extension was going to be a key issue? And all she could say is they worked on other aspects of the traffic stop?

[00:29:43] Speaker 02:
I mean, I think that that's the record that the court has in front of them, and I think that that is sufficient. There's nothing in the record to invalidate Agent McCann's statement, and the duration of the stop, while I agree it's not sufficient, it's an important fact to look for. It's hard to imagine a six-minute stop that's been extended or kind of deviated in any way, and really what it looks like is that the individuals were removed from the car and kind of passed to the canine as the canine came back to the car and alerted on the drugs.

[00:30:18] Speaker 02:
I see I'm out of time. I'm happy to answer any additional questions the court has. We would respectfully ask the court affirm the district court.

[00:30:24] Speaker 01:
Thank you.

[00:30:26] Speaker 01:
Thank you. We don't have any more questions. All right, go ahead. You have two minutes.

[00:30:34] Speaker 04:
Just a few quick points. I think the government just conceded that this stop was to investigate drugs. That is a different question. I cannot highlight that enough. In spite of her calling this a Wren stop, Wren is a separate issue. from whether this stop was independent of the tainted evidence from the warrant. Those are two separate issues, and I want the court to make sure to look at those two questions separately. I'm not contesting that the police can't stop somebody for speeding, even if they want to stop them for a drug investigation.

[00:31:07] Speaker 04:
The question is whether it was independent of the evidence gathered from the warrant.

[00:31:13] Speaker 04:
Secondly, in terms of corroboration on the warrant, If you look closely again at the words in the Warren application, there was no corroboration that this was even Mr. Hawkins' phone. All they corroborated was that this phone number was subscribed under one person's name and that the addresses were associated with Mr. Hawkins. That could be true with anybody sitting here who's ever lived with somebody else, that their phone could be subscribed in one name and it could be associated with addresses where they once lived.

[00:31:45] Speaker 04:
So that's not sufficient to show anything about him other than that he has a phone and he somehow is associated with it at some point, but doesn't say anything about corroborating he's a drug dealer. Third, when we look at the informant himself, it is true, yes, that he was a known informant, but nothing else about him or his tip under Gates or any of the other cases would say that he is reliable. I mean, he's got convictions for false information.

[00:32:15] Speaker 04:
It doesn't say that he's actually made cases before. It says he just wasn't closed for cause. Those are two different things. He's a paid informant. He didn't give any predictive information. He didn't give any basis of knowledge. So when you look at the Gates factors, he wasn't a And the last thing I'd say regarding McCann's statement in her affidavit in response to the motion to suppress, McCann wrote a report right after this traffic stop happened, and she didn't mention anything about traffic-related work being done while the dog was being led around.

[00:32:53] Speaker 04:
and I think we have to look at what was written at the time, the police report by the police officer and the police report by McCann, who was supposedly talking to them on the phone. Nothing about them. Are you referring to the FBI 302? Yes. Okay. So there's the FBI 302, and then there's the report of Officer Summers, and neither of them mentions anything about traffic infraction-related activity taking place. So I'd ask the court to look at all of those things.

[00:33:19] Speaker 04:
And in closing, I'd say... Tracking somebody via GPS is an extremely intrusive thing to do.

[00:33:26] Speaker 04:
The government is basically tracking somebody's every movement for weeks on end, and they shouldn't be able to do that by taking shortcuts. And so this case is important, and I'd ask the court reverse Mr. Hawkins' convictions.

[00:33:41] Speaker 01:
Okay. I want to thank both counsel for your extremely helpful arguments, and we are adjourned for the day. Thank you.