Probable Cause Suppression of Evidence.

Byline: Derek Hawkins

7th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: United States of America v. Finas J. Glenn

Case No.: 19-2802

Officials: SYKES, Chief Judge, and EASTERBROOK and KANNE, Circuit Judges.

Focus: Probable Cause Suppression of Evidence

Police investigating drug trafficking in Vermilion County, Illinois, sent an informant to buy two ounces of cocaine at the home of Finas Glenn. The transaction was recorded on audio and video. About a month later the police asked for a warrant to search Glenn's home. A state judge put agent Pat Alblinger under oath, took his testimony (which was recorded), and issued a warrant. A search turned up cocaine and guns. Indicted on drug and weapons charges, Glenn moved to suppress the evidence seized in the search. A district judge held a hearing and concluded that the warrant was supported by probable cause. 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 89507 (C.D. Ill. May 29, 2019). Glenn then pleaded guilty to one firearms charge, see 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1), and the prosecutor dismissed the remaining counts. The plea reserved Glenn's right to contest on appeal the denial of his motion to suppress. See Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(a)(2). The judge sentenced Glenn to 102 months' imprisonment.

A judge in a criminal prosecution must afford "great deference" to the probable-cause finding by the judge who issued a warrant. See Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 236 (1983); United States v. McIntire, 516 F.3d 576 (7th Cir. 2008). That norm is as applicable to warrants based on live testimony as it is to warrants based on affidavits. See United States v. Patton, 962 F.3d 972 (7th Cir. 2020). This warrant rests on the "controlled buy" plus Alblinger's testimony that the informant had for more than a decade provided reliable information. Glenn contends that this is not enough to show probable cause, because Alblinger did not tell the state judge whether agents had searched the informant before the transaction, that the informant had a long criminal record and was cooperating to earn lenience, and that the informant's record of providing accurate information was with the local police as a whole rather than with Alblinger personally. Like the district judge, we think these omissions unfortunate. But they do not negate probable cause, when, as Gates requires, the evidence is viewed as a whole and the federal court gives the state judge great deference.

The principal reason to search an informant before a controlled buy is to make sure that he does not...