United States v. Kelley, No. 10-2494 (8th Cir. 2011)
Annotate this CaseDefendant entered a conditional plea of guilty to possession of child pornography, reserving the right to appeal the district court's denial of his motion to suppress evidence gathered during a warrant search of his home. On appeal, he also argued that the court imposed a substantively unreasonable 20 year consecutive sentence. The court held that the motion to suppress was properly denied, despite a violation of Arkansas Criminal Procedure Rule 13.2(c), where law enforcement presented the state court judge with probable cause to issue a warrant and good cause to authorize an immediate, night-time search and that the warrant expressly authorized execution at any time. Therefore, the warrant and its execution were reasonable under the Fourth Amendment and complied with Federal Rule 41. The court also held that the district court did not abuse its substantial sentencing discretion where it carefully considered the serious nature of defendant's predatory offenses and the need to protect the public from these types of offenses, as well as defendant's history of absconding.
Court Description: Criminal case - Criminal law and sentencing. A violation of Arkansas Criminal Procedure Rule 13.2(c) did not require suppression of the evidence seized during a night-time search of defendant's residence; officer disclosed the need for a night-time search and the warrant authorized execution at any time; as a result, the warrant and its execution were reasonable under the Fourth Amendment; sentence was not substantively unreasonable.
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