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E.D.Pa.: Complete absence of "things to be seized" voided warrant and required exclusion even in face of GFE

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

The search warrant’s failure to include a list of things to be seized or an attachment made it a general warrant. The affidavit could not be relied upon where it was sealed an unavailable. This situation is close to the situation in Groh. With a full analysis of the situation and case law, the complete failure to include a list of things to be seized required application of the exclusionary rule. United States v. Wright, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 77284 (E.D. Pa. July 29, 2010)*: In this case, we are presented with a warrant that, on its face, contains no description of the items to be seized and includes no attachment meeting the particularization requirement. In Groh, the Supreme Court recognized that a search conducted pursuant to such a warrant is an unconstitutional warrantless search, even when the warrant application sets forth the items to be seized during the search and the agent executing the search limits himself to the scope of the application...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on August 04, 2010 (boomark / email).