[00:00:00] Speaker 03: case number 23-3198 et al. [00:00:03] Speaker 03: United States of America versus Cynthia Bellinger at balance. [00:00:07] Speaker 03: Mr. Ken Karamath for the balance. [00:00:10] Speaker 03: Mr. Hill for the appellee. [00:00:13] Speaker 00: Good morning, counsel. [00:00:14] Speaker 00: Mr. Ken Karamath, please proceed when you're ready. [00:00:20] Speaker 01: Good morning and may it please the court. [00:00:22] Speaker 01: I'm Nanda and Ken Karamath. [00:00:23] Speaker 01: I represent Cynthia Ballinger and Christopher Price. [00:00:25] Speaker 01: They're a married couple. [00:00:27] Speaker 01: I may refer to them as the Price's. [00:00:28] Speaker 01: I've reserved two minutes for rebuttal. [00:00:31] Speaker 01: The Price's properly argue that their entry in less than one minute walks south of the hallway followed by five and a half minutes of standing in line to exit was in complete compliance with the police cordon that was right there at the door. [00:00:48] Speaker 01: As they entered, there was a police line to the left [00:00:51] Speaker 01: They walked to the right for a minute. [00:00:52] Speaker 01: They encountered officer a tax. [00:00:55] Speaker 01: Um, and there may have been another officer there. [00:00:58] Speaker 01: They never went that point. [00:00:59] Speaker 01: In fact, no one who entered in the video in that arena went past officer a tax. [00:01:06] Speaker 01: That was another side of the court. [00:01:07] Speaker 01: And so they walked through an open door and like any public building, it doesn't mean you're going to go any further. [00:01:14] Speaker 01: You'd be subject to whatever the police tell you. [00:01:16] Speaker 01: And they were in complete compliance with whatever the police told them. [00:01:20] Speaker 01: We're gonna highlight fundamental differences in statutory interpretation of restricted area, disruptive conduct, and the count to provision that there be in fact causation from disruptive conduct that leads to the delay of the proceeding in this case until 8 p.m. [00:01:37] Speaker 03: Mr. King-Karamath, can I ask you a particular question that I'm interested in? [00:01:42] Speaker 03: I'm particularly interested in your argument that there was insufficient evidence to support mens rea [00:01:50] Speaker 03: for counts two and three. [00:01:53] Speaker 03: More specifically, whether the evidence shows that the prices had an intent to disrupt official proceedings. [00:02:01] Speaker 03: Now, of course, it's very difficult to make out an insufficiency of the evidence [00:02:05] Speaker 01: argument and so I'm just wondering what is your strongest argument that there was insufficient evidence to support mens rea for counts two and three specifically so we think that the mens rea describes must be associated with the physical conduct [00:02:22] Speaker 01: of the prices. [00:02:23] Speaker 01: So you can assemble a lot of statements, right? [00:02:25] Speaker 01: But what is the physical conduct of the prices? [00:02:28] Speaker 01: So let's talk about the five minutes standing in line to exit. [00:02:31] Speaker 01: What is the mens rea of standing in line to exit? [00:02:34] Speaker 01: It is to stand in line to exit. [00:02:36] Speaker 01: So the only mens rea issue we have here is really the one minute walk and then [00:02:43] Speaker 01: the police officer asked them go no further and they do. [00:02:46] Speaker 01: So part of our point is all of this long conversation and all of these other issues, which are somewhat tangential, can't describe to the actual physical conduct. [00:02:55] Speaker 01: And the mens rea scope shouldn't be broader than the physical conduct. [00:02:59] Speaker 01: So in other words, first of all, you have to have the physical conduct and we're arguing that [00:03:03] Speaker 01: didn't occur and that there wasn't a restricted area. [00:03:06] Speaker 01: Beyond that, with respect to the intent requirement, we think you have to, again, think of the common sense situation here. [00:03:13] Speaker 01: They observed a door, they went into a door, all of the heightened mens rea requirements intent to disrupt all of these other things. [00:03:20] Speaker 01: There wasn't a lot of facts provided on that, but it all has to rest [00:03:24] Speaker 01: on the physical conduct of entering for a minute in front of a large number of police officers. [00:03:30] Speaker 00: You're talking about the intent to disrupt the proceeding. [00:03:32] Speaker 00: That's the mens rea question. [00:03:34] Speaker 01: Correct. [00:03:35] Speaker 01: The key mens rea questions that were challenging are on counts two through four, your honor, disruptive conduct and demonstrative conduct. [00:03:42] Speaker 00: Was it not the intent of the entire gathering to disrupt the proceeding? [00:03:49] Speaker 01: You know, we believe that the charges are against individuals. [00:03:53] Speaker 01: And the question is, what is the individual right. [00:03:55] Speaker 00: So those individuals who are part of the gathering. [00:03:58] Speaker 01: Well, this was an argument made by the district court as a different element, even on the issue of physical conduct, which is that they quote unquote joined the bob now that argument is not [00:04:11] Speaker 01: opposed or not discussed in the government's brief at this time, we think that is a fundamental point that the district court has this sort of joining construct. [00:04:20] Speaker 01: We think that joining construct is not legal because the charging documents talk about individual conduct. [00:04:28] Speaker 01: They could have charged aiding, abetting, conspiring, [00:04:32] Speaker 01: They could have charged a group that is permissible under 5104E, but they did not. [00:04:37] Speaker 01: So the relationship to the group issue, first of all, we don't think there's any evidence of it. [00:04:43] Speaker 01: They don't know any of these people. [00:04:46] Speaker 01: The conduct at issue is their disruptive conduct for the individuals, not their relationship to a group. [00:04:53] Speaker 01: So we would argue that. [00:04:54] Speaker 01: And as a point of legal interpretation, we think that's different. [00:04:57] Speaker 01: Also, we would point out that none of that relationship issue was raised in the charging documents. [00:05:03] Speaker 01: And so we had no opportunity. [00:05:05] Speaker 01: The notion of joining a mob was never raised during the trial until closing arguments. [00:05:11] Speaker 01: So I had no opportunity for discovery. [00:05:14] Speaker 01: I had no opportunities to talk about the issues. [00:05:16] Speaker 01: We supplied a joint statement of elements, never discussed this term, this concept of joining. [00:05:28] Speaker 01: With respect to [00:05:29] Speaker 03: How should we understand the district court's credibility determinations here? [00:05:35] Speaker 03: Because the district court did make some determinations that that Ms. [00:05:40] Speaker 03: Ballinger, Ms. [00:05:41] Speaker 03: Price was not credible in describing her motives for participating in the events of January 6. [00:05:48] Speaker 03: How should we how should we view that? [00:05:49] Speaker 03: I mean, you know, because we you know, the standard of review here is very, very stringent. [00:05:54] Speaker 01: So we agree with that, your honor. [00:05:57] Speaker 01: We disagree with the assessment, but we're not really asserting that here. [00:06:00] Speaker 01: We think we're just asserting that the government has the obligation to show what the mens rea is. [00:06:07] Speaker 01: And so even if you don't agree with anything, Ms. [00:06:12] Speaker 01: Ballinger said, it probably wouldn't be relevant. [00:06:13] Speaker 01: All of this is on camera. [00:06:15] Speaker 01: Certainly the physical conduct is all on camera. [00:06:21] Speaker 01: Again, with respect to restricted area, we think the minimum definition of a restricted area is that boundaries reflecting government designations must beyond a reasonable doubt be materially present and identifiable for general observation at the time. [00:06:38] Speaker 01: Now that is not the government's position. [00:06:39] Speaker 01: The government holds that if restricted boundaries were established in the morning, whether they are existent later at the time that the prices walk [00:06:49] Speaker 01: is not material. [00:06:51] Speaker 01: We disagree with that legal interpretation. [00:06:54] Speaker 01: We think the fundamental reason for the restricted area is notice. [00:06:58] Speaker 01: It's not authority. [00:06:59] Speaker 01: It's notice to the public of what is an ascertainable standard of guilt. [00:07:04] Speaker 01: We think that's the common reading. [00:07:05] Speaker 00: So the district court found that there were bike racks that had signs on them that had been pushed down, but that your clients noticed that when they walked past. [00:07:18] Speaker 01: So the district court, I don't believe made that particular finding your honor, but we showed in the brief that there were three bike racks across an area and those three bike racks got pushed to the side before my clients got there. [00:07:32] Speaker 01: There was one separate bike rack in the middle sort of of a tee just on its own standing and it wasn't blocking anything. [00:07:41] Speaker 01: It was off to the side. [00:07:42] Speaker 01: So this falls under a sort of separate issue of the district court's analysis, which is sort of a series of observations could substitute. [00:07:51] Speaker 01: So there was a single bike rack. [00:07:54] Speaker 01: it was not connected to anything. [00:07:56] Speaker 01: There were many people, police and everybody else sort of passing it by. [00:08:00] Speaker 01: So we don't think that constitutes identification of the restricted area. [00:08:05] Speaker 00: Your view is that on January 6th, notwithstanding everything that was going on at the Capitol building, the sirens are blaring, the tear gas is flowing. [00:08:13] Speaker 00: There's commotion that it was not sufficiently clear that you're not supposed to go into the Capitol building. [00:08:20] Speaker 01: Well, you're speaking to a mens rea question. [00:08:23] Speaker 01: First of all, we're starting with the question of is there a restricted area which is completely separate from mens rea and we're stating that the way to define restricted area is materially present at the time for observation. [00:08:38] Speaker 01: Now there are other tools that the police have for dispersal orders, all kinds of things. [00:08:43] Speaker 01: And we're just referring to our client situation here. [00:08:47] Speaker 01: So for example, at the Senate wing door, we have a very specific situation with the police cordon there. [00:08:53] Speaker 01: We're not, we have no idea what happens in the rest of the Capitol and we're not really speaking to that. [00:08:58] Speaker 01: But in that very specific situation, we do have an actual material police cordon and we're consistent with the general definition of police cordons at the time. [00:09:08] Speaker 01: Or, you know, in America, which is you can walk in front of police. [00:09:12] Speaker 01: And that's all they did so they entered an open door and walked in front of police and then left that's their entire crime. [00:09:20] Speaker 01: I would like to turn to. [00:09:23] Speaker 01: the disruptive conduct finding. [00:09:25] Speaker 01: And what I want to do is articulate the distinction between the DC circuit case of United States v. Alford and the district court's opinion. [00:09:36] Speaker 01: So the district court's opinion was very specific. [00:09:39] Speaker 01: They said this would not have been disruptive conduct except for the prices joined a mob. [00:09:45] Speaker 01: We've already argued that that is incorrect as a matter of law. [00:09:48] Speaker 01: We've argued it in the brief. [00:09:49] Speaker 01: It's a separate legal argument. [00:09:52] Speaker 01: The case of Alfred doesn't necessarily make that argument. [00:09:58] Speaker 01: But I think an important distinction between Alfred in this case is, Alfred did not on appeal. [00:10:04] Speaker 01: argue that there wasn't the restricted area where he walked or that he didn't have knowledge of a restricted area. [00:10:11] Speaker 01: And we're arguing that specifically on the facts. [00:10:13] Speaker 01: And the key holding in it, Alfred, is that things should be context specific, a point that we agree with. [00:10:20] Speaker 01: And we just simply state the context of this case is very different. [00:10:24] Speaker 01: And you have to look at our specific facts to determine whether there's disruptive conduct and that there really isn't a join the mob construct available to the court. [00:10:35] Speaker 00: I want to make sure you get your rebuttal time too, but let me see if my colleagues have additional questions for you at this time. [00:10:42] Speaker 00: We'll make sure that you get the two minutes of rebuttal time that you asked for. [00:10:45] Speaker 00: Thank you. [00:10:47] Speaker 00: We'll hear from the government now. [00:10:52] Speaker 00: Mr. Hill. [00:10:53] Speaker 02: May it please the court, Dietrich Hill on behalf of the United States. [00:10:58] Speaker 02: I do want to start with what I think is an important distinction here, which is whether there was in fact a restricted area versus the knowledge element of the 1752 offenses, whether the defendants knew that there was a restricted area. [00:11:12] Speaker 02: With respect to the first, there's not a real dispute here that at the beginning of the day on January 6th, the government restricted this entire perimeter with barriers, with fencing, with area closed signs, and with police officers stationed around this perimeter. [00:11:28] Speaker 02: So with respect to whether the area was in fact restricted later, the defendants have to be relying on the idea that when rioters moved aside these barriers, forced the police officers to retreat [00:11:41] Speaker 02: tore down many of the area closed signs that had a legal effect, that legally de-restricted the area. [00:11:47] Speaker 02: That's not a sensible way to read a statute about the lawful authority of law enforcement agencies restricting an area. [00:11:56] Speaker 03: Mr. Hill, if I can ask you, I mean, do you think for counts two and three, does the government agree that there is a separate element to demonstrate intent to disrupt an official proceeding? [00:12:10] Speaker 02: Yes, we think there has to be well, at the very least, knowledge that your conduct is going to be. [00:12:15] Speaker 03: I mean, both statutory provisions use the term intent to disrupt. [00:12:20] Speaker 03: So that seems to be an element of the crime. [00:12:23] Speaker 02: Yes. [00:12:23] Speaker 03: And so, of course, while it's a high bar to demonstrate that the evidence was insufficient to support the conviction, it's not impossible. [00:12:30] Speaker 03: We have a number of cases in the DC circuit finding evidence insufficient. [00:12:35] Speaker ?: So [00:12:36] Speaker 03: Um, I guess I'm just wondering, I mean, it seems that the district court piece together a lot of evidence, some of it from before days before January six and Some of the idea that there was an intent to disrupt an official proceeding may be characterized as mere speculation. [00:12:55] Speaker 03: So I'm wondering how the government would respond to that. [00:12:58] Speaker 02: Well, I certainly would agree that there were a lot of different pieces of evidence of intent here. [00:13:03] Speaker 02: And of course, as your honor referred to on a sufficiency challenge, we're entitled to the most favorable inference that can be drawn from any of those pieces of evidence. [00:13:12] Speaker 03: It's the most favorable inference, but it still can't be speculation. [00:13:16] Speaker 03: There still has to be a demonstrate. [00:13:17] Speaker 03: The government still has to demonstrate there was intent to disrupt an official proceeding. [00:13:21] Speaker 03: And here the prices walked in. [00:13:24] Speaker 03: when there was no official proceeding going on, they stayed for a few minutes and walked out when directed by an officer. [00:13:31] Speaker 02: Right. [00:13:31] Speaker 02: Well, I would start with what I think is an undisputed fact that the prices understood that there was a certification going on on the day. [00:13:39] Speaker 02: So I don't. [00:13:40] Speaker 03: OK. [00:13:41] Speaker 03: You know, even assuming that's true, they knew there was a certification. [00:13:43] Speaker 03: They knew there was an official proceeding. [00:13:45] Speaker 03: You know, the government has probably shown that they knew they were entering a restricted area of the Capitol building. [00:13:50] Speaker 03: But where is the intent to disrupt an official proceeding? [00:13:53] Speaker 03: for these defendants in particular? [00:13:55] Speaker 02: Right. [00:13:55] Speaker 02: Well, if there's an official proceeding going on at the Capitol on the day, the certification of the election, and you go into the Capitol understanding that that's a restricted area, understanding being able to see that you're augmenting a mob which is occupying the Capitol, you have to know that that mob is preventing Congress from resuming its proceeding. [00:14:16] Speaker 02: In other words, you have to know when you go in, [00:14:19] Speaker 02: that you're going to help these other people impede the official proceeding. [00:14:24] Speaker 00: So you could have a situation conceptually in which somebody goes into a restricted area, but they don't intend to disrupt the proceeding that's going on in the area, right? [00:14:35] Speaker 00: I mean, you could have somebody who just wants to come in and observe, even though it's restricted, they want to come in and observe and they want to take a picture to show that they were there, but they don't want to actually disrupt it. [00:14:49] Speaker 02: I agree that that's conceptually possible, but here you have a lot of different evidence, including communications from the defendants, like just taking over the Capitol. [00:14:58] Speaker 02: That was a text from Mr. Price. [00:15:00] Speaker 02: We just stormed the Capitol. [00:15:01] Speaker 02: That's a text from these Ballinger. [00:15:03] Speaker 03: These things strongly suggest- In context, doesn't that suggest they were joking since they were just walking into the Capitol without, I mean, doesn't it [00:15:12] Speaker 02: That's one conceivable inference, but again, we're entitled to the more favorable inferences, which they were not joking. [00:15:18] Speaker 02: They understood that they had joined a mob to take over the Capitol with the specific intent of disrupting what was going on inside the Capitol. [00:15:26] Speaker 02: That's the more favorable inference to the government from, we just stormed the Capitol. [00:15:31] Speaker 00: And of course, the defense- And the district court did make those findings. [00:15:33] Speaker 02: And the district court did make those findings, correct. [00:15:36] Speaker 02: Discrediting Ms. [00:15:37] Speaker 02: Ballinger's testimony that she was joking when she said, we stormed the Capitol. [00:15:41] Speaker 02: And I would also point to a text message exchange from before they walked to the Capitol, where Ms. [00:15:46] Speaker 02: Ballinger texted a friend, there was a breach at the Capitol. [00:15:50] Speaker 02: I would have been there, except that we had to stop so I could use the bathroom. [00:15:53] Speaker 02: Again, that shows this isn't just walking in as a tourist. [00:15:56] Speaker 02: They understand that the Capitol is closed. [00:15:59] Speaker 02: There's been a breach. [00:16:00] Speaker 02: She wanted to be there and wasn't, and then they go right over there to help the mom occupy the Capitol so that Congress can't continue the certification proceedings. [00:16:11] Speaker 03: But based on their behavior, there was arguably an intent to enter a restricted building, the Capitol. [00:16:19] Speaker 03: But based on their behavior, where's the intent to disrupt? [00:16:23] Speaker 03: So maybe there were other people there who were intending to disrupt the official proceedings, but the prices walked in and walked out. [00:16:33] Speaker 02: Right, but I think when you put together knowledge that the certification is going on and knowledge that the area is restricted because of the certification with going in to take over the capital to storm the capital. [00:16:47] Speaker 02: When you put those together you have an intent to disrupt the certification by occupying the capital. [00:16:57] Speaker 02: And I would like again to return to this idea of whether there was knowledge as opposed to whether there was a restricted area because there were a lot of elements showing knowledge of the certification and the fact that there was a restricted area. [00:17:10] Speaker 02: As your honor pointed out, maybe one or two of these elements alone would not have been sufficient. [00:17:15] Speaker 02: And the district court acknowledged that as well and said, when the prices entered the restricted area at the very beginning at the perimeter, [00:17:22] Speaker 02: It's conceivable that they didn't understand yet they were in a restricted area. [00:17:27] Speaker 02: By the time they're entering the Capitol, they can see people trying to break in to the Capitol through the windows clearly disruptive conduct and their choice is to go into the Capitol where people have been breaking through the windows there's glass on the floor there's a blaring alarm. [00:17:43] Speaker 02: Joining those people who have set off the alarm is virtually certain to increase the disruptive conduct and the disruptive effect of this mob on certification proceedings. [00:17:54] Speaker 02: And I would also like to point out that the intent here and the conduct here is to disrupt or impede. [00:18:00] Speaker 02: And we think that impede does some work here because you can impede a proceeding before it's even begun. [00:18:07] Speaker 02: And certainly you can impede a proceeding while it's been suspended by preventing it from restarting [00:18:13] Speaker 02: within a reasonable period of time. [00:18:15] Speaker 02: The fact that they were in the building, every person in the building was a person that the Capitol Police had to clear out of the building. [00:18:22] Speaker 02: And that's in the record. [00:18:23] Speaker 02: There's testimony from the Capitol Police captain saying even one unauthorized person in the building was impeding Congress from restarting the certification proceedings. [00:18:33] Speaker 00: Your view of it is as if there were, you know, a bulletin sent out in advance that said, [00:18:39] Speaker 00: Look, we want to, on the part of the people who come to the Capitol and want to disrupt the proceeding, let's just assume there's at least some. [00:18:46] Speaker 00: And they sent out a bullet and they say, we want to impede this proceeding. [00:18:49] Speaker 00: We want to at least stop it for a little while. [00:18:51] Speaker 00: The more people that we get to show up and go in the Capitol, the more likely it is that we're actually going to be successful in impeding the proceeding. [00:18:57] Speaker 00: And so therefore everybody who signs up and signs onto that cause is part of that effort to impede the proceeding. [00:19:04] Speaker 02: Right. [00:19:04] Speaker 02: Now, of course, there's no evidence that these defendants saw a bulletin, but I'm just I'm saying that's the effective. [00:19:10] Speaker 02: That's exactly the effect of that is what you think was going on, that the effect of seeing this and knowing that, you know, it wasn't like the Capitol was open to tourists. [00:19:18] Speaker 02: There was a breach of the Capitol. [00:19:19] Speaker 02: That's Miss Ballinger's own text. [00:19:21] Speaker 02: And so she understands that people do want to disrupt the proceeding and that therefore the more people who go into the Capitol, the greater that disruption is going to be. [00:19:31] Speaker 00: and the longer it's gonna take to disperse it. [00:19:34] Speaker 02: And the longer it's going to take to disperse all the people. [00:19:39] Speaker 02: With respect to the other issues, well, I think with Alford, I do wanna point out that this court in Alford explicitly acknowledged that Alford's conduct alone, like the defendant's conduct in this case, would not necessarily have been disruptive. [00:19:55] Speaker 02: So there's no distinction there between Alford and this case. [00:19:58] Speaker 03: But that case was about whether there was knowingly disruptive conduct. [00:20:02] Speaker 03: It wasn't about intent. [00:20:05] Speaker 03: And I went back and looked at the briefing. [00:20:07] Speaker 03: Alfred didn't argue the intent wrong separately the way the prices have in this case. [00:20:14] Speaker 02: Your honor, I guess I don't see a strong distinction between knowing that your conduct is going to disrupt and then intentionally engaging in that disruptive conduct as opposed to a separate intent to disrupt. [00:20:29] Speaker 02: I would think that if you're knowingly engaging in conduct, if you know that that conduct is going to be disruptive, that evinces an intent to disrupt. [00:20:37] Speaker 02: I'm not sure I see a strong distinction there. [00:20:39] Speaker 03: Well, I mean, there seem to be like under 1752A, you have to knowingly and with intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of government business or official function, engage in disorderly or disruptive conduct. [00:20:53] Speaker 03: So Alford seems to go to the element that they engaged in disorderly or disruptive conduct simply by being part [00:21:00] Speaker 03: of the people who entered the Capitol on January 6th. [00:21:02] Speaker 03: But the statute seems to have, and this was the first question I asked you, whether there's a separate element of an intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of government business. [00:21:12] Speaker 02: Right. [00:21:12] Speaker 02: So I think knowingly in that statute is doing several pieces of work because you also have to have knowledge that it's a restricted area. [00:21:20] Speaker 02: But I think if you, again, if you know that you're engaging in disruptive conduct, [00:21:24] Speaker 02: and you engage in that disruptive conduct, I think that also covers the intent to disrupt. [00:21:31] Speaker 03: I'm not sure when there would be a separate, when you would be intentionally engaging in disruptive conduct without having- Well, you could be engaging in disruptive conduct without an intent to impede official proceedings. [00:21:43] Speaker 03: Or at least that seems to be how the Congress wrote this statute. [00:21:48] Speaker 03: And you agreed that it was a separate element of the crime, which the government has [00:21:53] Speaker 03: the burden to demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt. [00:21:55] Speaker 02: Yes. [00:21:56] Speaker 02: I guess I would say then that the evidence here, almost all the evidence of knowingly also goes to an intent to disrupt. [00:22:03] Speaker 02: When you know that there's a certification and you're walking in, it's hard to understand that differently than joining a mob that you know generally has the intent to disrupt. [00:22:12] Speaker 02: So you're augmenting not just the physical conduct, but also the intended result from that mob's actions. [00:22:23] Speaker 00: My colleagues don't have additional questions for you. [00:22:24] Speaker 02: Thank you. [00:22:25] Speaker 02: We would ask the court to affirm the judgment. [00:22:27] Speaker 00: Thank you, Mr. Hill. [00:22:29] Speaker 00: Mr. Kikirmath will give you the two minutes you asked for for rebuttal. [00:22:33] Speaker 01: Thank you, Your Honor. [00:22:34] Speaker 01: The police officers spent not one second on the prices. [00:22:39] Speaker 01: Immediately upon being told, don't go further, the prices get in line to exit. [00:22:44] Speaker 01: And this argument of mere presence and burden, you know, it has to be shown beyond a reasonable doubt [00:22:52] Speaker 01: that this is disruptive, whether it's on disruptive conduct or any other principle. [00:22:58] Speaker 01: And so the mens rea's issues related, there's really no evidence that they knew the state of the proceeding. [00:23:05] Speaker 01: We're basically making a very fundamental argument here, which is when you see a bunch of police officers right there at the door, you are assuming they're gonna tell you what to do. [00:23:17] Speaker 01: And that the notion that you're gonna do something kind of in their face to make it hard [00:23:23] Speaker 01: really needs to be borne out in some way. [00:23:26] Speaker 01: And there's just no evidence of this. [00:23:27] Speaker 01: This is all on video. [00:23:29] Speaker 01: And so all of these other statements, the one other point I would make, and this goes to the Fourth Amendment search warrant issue, I wanna make sure that it's clear to people, that the scope of the search warrant exclusion has to be based on the violation. [00:23:44] Speaker 01: The judge below simply claimed that the only issue was a single question. [00:23:50] Speaker 01: That's not the case. [00:23:53] Speaker 01: The case proved that the government ignored the central predicate in the search warrant formulation, which is there must be a filtering process. [00:24:04] Speaker 01: They ignored the filtering process. [00:24:06] Speaker 01: They included as evidence, 14,637 pages of Facebook message. [00:24:11] Speaker 01: So they violated the search warrant. [00:24:13] Speaker 01: There wasn't any- Defense counsel didn't object to the inclusion of that, right? [00:24:17] Speaker 01: Well, we did, but [00:24:21] Speaker 01: on certain things, but not the specific inclusion, but that's a procedural point that is not relevant to the scope of the exclusionary rule. [00:24:28] Speaker 01: The scope of the exclusionary rule is based on the violation of the fourth amendment, which in this case is not a specific application in the case. [00:24:37] Speaker 01: It is that they didn't run the filtering test at all. [00:24:41] Speaker 01: It's like there's a warrantless search. [00:24:43] Speaker 01: And so it's the full scope and the scope in the, we've pointed out on a certain page of the brief [00:24:49] Speaker 01: the number of places where Facebook evidence, all of these statements, all of these things we're talking about were relevant. [00:24:56] Speaker 01: So the case should be vacated on that ground as well. [00:25:00] Speaker 00: Thank you, counsel. [00:25:01] Speaker 00: Thank you to both counsel. [00:25:02] Speaker 00: We'll take this case under submission.