US v. Griffin: In 2019, Maryland investigators executed a search warrant a Griffin’s home in an area known as Kent Bottom. The warrant affidavit provided a length recitation of drug activity that occurred in Kent Bottom, which was surrounded by several homes, some dating back 20 years. Very little of it (none of it in the recent past) actually implicated Griffin’s home, although Griffin himself was noted as being in the area. The warrant uncovered drugs and a firearm in a SUV outside the home (there were no drugs in the home itself). After an unsuccessful motion to suppress, Griffin was convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm by a jury (acquitted on the drug-related charges) and sentenced to 180 months in prison.
On appeal, a divided Fourth Circuit reversed the denial of Griffin’s motion to suppress. The warrant affidavit, the court concluded, was deficient in two ways. First, while it provided information suggesting that drug dealing occurred in the area of Kent Bottom and some of the homes there, Griffin’s was not one of them. There was insufficient evidence of nexus between the alleged illegal activity and the home. Second, what evidence there was about activities at the home was stale. Because the affidavit was so deficient, the Leon good-faith exception did not apply.
Judge Heytens dissented, arguing that good-faith did apply, as the officers executing the warrant had a reasonable basis to rely on the warrant.
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