United States v. Siegert
In United States v. Siegert, No. 23-50907 (5th Cir. Jan. 14, 2025) (unpublished), the Fifth Circuit rejected the defendant’s challenges to a police search of his property pursuant to a search warrant and the related questioning by police.
Background: Police saw a stolen truck on Siegert’s property, and on that basis, they applied for a search warrant to search his property for the truck, keys, and related items, including cell phones (which could potentially have been “associated with the theft”). A court issued a search warrant authorizing a search of the entire property, including Siegert’s home.
Inside the home, officers smelled marijuana and saw drugs and drug paraphernalia in plain view. At the same time outside the home, officers talked to Siegert for about 10 minutes before taking him inside for a “brief walkthrough of the home, where Siegert identified hidden guns and drugs.” At that point, officers conducted a more thorough search of the home, after which they handcuffed Siegert and advised him of his Miranda rights.
At the time, the stolen truck was actually “just over the property line” on property belonging to Siegert’s father. Siegert lived on a one-acre plot “carved out of the northwest corner of his father’s” 20-acre property. Siegert’s property was bordered by fencing, but his father’s property was empty except for a barn. “A large livestock gate in the fence between the two properties was kept open.”
Siegert moved to suppress evidence on a variety of theories, but the district court denied his motion. Siegert entered a conditional guilty plea and subsequently appealed the denial of his motion.
Warrant Issues: Siegert raised three challenges to the search warrant and its accompanying affidavit: “(1) the affidavit contained a false statement made intentionally or with reckless disregard for its truth, (2) the affidavit and search warrant were not sufficiently particular, and (3) the affidavit and search warrant were ‘bare bones.’” Rejecting each argument, the Fifth Circuit held that the good faith exception applied “because the affidavit did not contain a false statement made intentionally or with reckless disregard for its truth, the warrant was not deficient in particularizing the place to be searched, and the warrant was not so lacking in probable cause as to render belief in its existence unreasonable.”
First, Siegert alleged that the warrant affidavit included a false statement that the truck would be found on Siegert’s property—instead of on his father’s. The court disagreed because the “precise language of the affidavit” did not “explicitly link the stolen truck to Siegert’s property.” Instead, it identified an address that applied to both properties, and it said that Siegert controlled the location. But even if the statement was false, it was not “made intentionally or with reckless disregard for the truth.” An agent testified that he spent an hour surveilling the property and believed Siegert had full access to both properties.
Second, contrary to Siegert’s argument, the warrant described the place to be searched with sufficient particularity. The warrant explained that the stolen truck “was taken” to that address, and it “described with significant specificity the property and residence to be searched.” Regardless, the officers acted in good faith in assuming that the warrant applied to both Siegert and his father’s property, which from “all outward appearances … was only one property, not two.”
Third, the warrant was not “bare bones.” It explained “in detail the circumstances from which law enforcement located the stolen truck on Siegert’s property.” There was little evidence, however, to show why evidence of the stolen property would be found on cell phones—which were covered by the warrant—but “close calls do not make an affidavit ‘bare bones’ or ‘wholly conclusory.’”
Search and Statement Issues: Siegert raised three more challenges, which related to the search and his related statements to officers: “(1) the ‘protective sweep’ of his home was unlawful, (2) he did not provide voluntary consent for officers to search his home, and (3) statements he made to officers were the product of an un-Mirandized custodial interrogation.” The Fifth Circuit rejected all three arguments.
First, the search warrant authorized a complete search of Siegert’s home, so it did not matter whether officers had grounds to conduct a protective sweep of the same home.
Second, Siegert did not need to provide consent because officers had a valid warrant authorizing them to search the home.
Third, Siegert was not “in custody” for Miranda purposes, so officers were not required to advise him of his Miranda rights before questioning him. The Miranda custody analysis asks whether there has been a formal arrest or whether “a reasonable person in the suspect’s position would have understood the situation to constitute a restraint on freedom of movement to the degree which the law associates with formal arrest.” United States v. Ortiz, 781 F.3d 221, 229 (5th Cir. 2015) (citation omitted).
While no fact is dispositive, this court generally considers “(1) the length of the questioning, (2) the location of the questioning, (3) the accusatory, or non-accusatory, nature of the questioning, (4) the amount of restraint on the individual’s physical movement, [and] (5) statements made by officers regarding the individual’s freedom to move or leave.” Id. at 229–30 (citation omitted) (alteration in original).
Here, (1) the questioning was brief—about 10 minutes; (2) Siegert was questioned in broad daylight in his own front yard; (3) the questioning may have been somewhat accusatory, but not sufficiently so that a reasonable person would have “equated it with formal arrest”; (4) Siegert was not handcuffed or physically restrained during the questioning; and (5) officers did not say either that Siegert was free to leave or that he was not free to leave. Combined, those facts meant that Siegert was not “in custody,” so officers were not required to read him Miranda warnings.