United States v. Concepcion, No. 08-3785 (2d Cir. 2009)
Annotate this Case
Download PDF
08-3785-cr United States v. Concepcion 1 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 2 FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT 3 -------- 4 August Term, 2008 5 (Argued: June 3, 2009; 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Decided: August 31, 2009) Docket No. 08-3785-cr -----------------------------------------------------------X United States of America, Appellant, - v. Alexander Concepcion, also known as Alex Concepcion Defendant-Appellee. -----------------------------------------------------------X Before: McLAUGHLIN, CALABRESI, and SACK, Circuit Judges. Appeal from an order of the United States District Court for 20 the Southern District of New York (Scheindlin, J.) suppressing 21 evidence obtained pursuant to a wiretap authorized under 18 22 U.S.C. § 2518. 23 support of its application for the wiretap set forth facts 24 minimally adequate to support the finding that a wiretap was 25 necessary to the Government s investigation. 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 We hold that the Government s affidavit in REVERSED AND REMANDED. WILLIAM J. HARRINGTON, Assistant United States Attorney, for Lev L. Dassin, Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York (John T. Zach, Jonathan S. Kolodner, on the brief), for Appellant. 1 2 3 4 5 DARRELL B. FIELDS, Federal Defenders of New York, for Defendant-Appellee. McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judge: 6 The United States appeals an order by the United States 7 District Court for the Southern District of New York (Scheindlin, 8 J.) suppressing evidence obtained pursuant to a wiretap. 9 wiretap had been authorized under 18 U.S.C. § 2518 by a different The 10 district judge in the Southern District of New York (Marrero, 11 J.). 12 Scheindlin found insufficient the same representations that Judge 13 Marrero had accepted: that normal investigative procedures ha[d] 14 been tried and ha[d] failed or reasonably appear[ed] to be 15 unlikely to succeed if tried or to be too dangerous. 16 § 2518(3)(c). In holding that the evidence should be suppressed, Judge 18 U.S.C. 17 The Government argues that its affidavit in support of its 18 wiretap application established that a wiretap was necessary to 19 its investigation. 20 in details as to whether other investigative techniques were 21 likely to succeed, we conclude, nonetheless, it did set forth 22 facts minimally adequate to support Judge Marrero s initial 23 determination. While the Government s affidavit was skimpy Accordingly, we reverse and remand. 2 1 BACKGROUND 2 In 2007, an incarcerated confidential informant ("CI") 3 informed the Government that his former cellmate, Alexander 4 Concepcion, planned to assist foreign terrorists in attacking the 5 United States. 6 Terrorism Task Force applied to the District Court for 7 authorization to wiretap Concepcion's cell phone under 18 U.S.C. 8 § 2518. 9 full and complete statement as to whether or not other Based on the CI's allegations, the FBI's Joint The Government was required to provide to the court a 10 investigative procedures ha[d] been tried and failed or why they 11 reasonably appear[ed] to be unlikely to succeed if tried or to be 12 too dangerous. 13 18 U.S.C. § 2518(1)(c). The district court granted the application on June 20, 2007, 14 with the wiretap to expire 30 days later. 15 evidence of terrorism, but the wiretap did lead the FBI to 16 believe that Concepcion was involved in drugs and weapons 17 trafficking. 18 The FBI found no On July 20, 2007, the Government submitted a second 19 application to the district court (Marrero, J.) that focused just 20 on Concepcion s alleged drugs and weapons trafficking. 21 Eric Paholsky of the FBI's Gangs, Criminal Enterprises, and Drugs 22 Group submitted an affidavit detailing how several investigative 23 techniques either had failed or were likely to fail. 24 first explained that the Government could not use its original CI 25 because he was in prison, and Concepcion, an experienced 3 Agent Paholsky 1 trafficker, would be unlikely to deal with a prisoner under 2 constant surveillance. 3 in its efforts to investigate the terrorism allegations, had 4 sought to introduce an undercover officer to Concepcion through 5 the CI, but Concepcion would not engage with the officer. 6 on that experience, Paholsky asserted that it would be impossible 7 to introduce yet another agent to Concepcion with the aid of the 8 CI. 9 associates of Concepcion, the Government could not investigate 10 11 The Affidavit also recounted how the FBI, Based Because the Government was unable to identify other his drug activities through the use of informants. The Paholsky Affidavit next discussed the Government s 12 limited surveillance of Concepcion, explaining that because 13 none of the TARGET SUBJECTS except for . . . CONCEPCION have been 14 definitively identified, surveillance is of limited utility at 15 this time. The Affidavit continued, 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 [S]ince the June 20th Order was issued, agents have attempted to conduct physical surveillance of CONCEPCION on numerous occasions. They have seen CONCEPCION repeatedly change cars over this time period . . . [and] seen him drive in an erratic manner. These things have made surveillance difficult. In addition, based on my training, I know that narcotics and weapons traffickers are extremely surveillance conscious. 25 Finally, the Affidavit evaluated a variety of other 26 traditional investigative techniques: telephone records and pen 27 registries would be ineffective because they would not reveal the 28 actual content of conversations or the identities of speakers; 29 interviews or grand jury subpoenas would be ineffective given 4 1 that witnesses who could provide relevant evidence had not been 2 identified; and search warrants were not appropriate because the 3 locations where Concepcion and his cohorts stored documents, 4 weapons, or narcotics had yet to be identified. 5 Based on these representations, Judge Marrero authorized the 6 second wiretap application. 7 Government used the wiretap to record conversations that, 8 according to the Government, indicated Concepcion was indeed 9 involved in a drug conspiracy. 10 In the following month, the In November 2007, Concepcion was arrested and charged in the 11 Southern District of New York with 1 count of conspiracy to 12 possess with intent to distribute over 50 grams of crack cocaine. 13 The case was assigned to Judge Scheindlin. 14 suppress the recordings of his conversations intercepted pursuant 15 to the second wiretap authorization. 16 Concepcion moved to Concluding that the Government had failed to establish that 17 other investigative techniques had failed or were likely to fail, 18 Judge Scheindlin granted Concepcion's motion. 19 Judge Scheindlin discounted many of the Paholsky Affidavit s 20 assertions, finding that "[t]he Government has shown that it has 21 done little, other than the wiretap, in its investigation of 22 Concepcion's drug-trafficking activities." 23 In her decision, As to the Government's attempts to use its CI to introduce 24 an undercover agent, the court noted that the Government made no 25 attempt to introduce an undercover officer "for the purpose of 5 1 2 buying drugs from, or selling drugs to, Concepcion." Judge Scheindlin also discounted the Paholsky Affidavit's 3 discussion of surveillance, finding that based on her experience 4 in "numerous drug cases," techniques such as photographing 5 Concepcion with his cohorts and trying to match those photographs 6 to FBI databases were "underutilized." 7 Judge Scheindlin thus concluded that "the Government simply 8 bypassed other more conventional techniques in favor of an 9 already existing wiretap," which was an "impermissible shortcut." 10 The Government now appeals. DISCUSSION 11 12 We have jurisdiction to review a district judge s decision 13 to suppress evidence, 18 U.S.C. § 3731, and we grant considerable 14 deference to the district court s decision whether to allow a 15 wiretap, ensuring only that the facts set forth in the 16 application were minimally adequate to support the determination 17 that was made," United States v. Miller, 116 F.3d 641, 663 (2d 18 Cir. 1997) (internal quotation marks omitted). 19 Here, this deference standard is complicated by the fact 20 that the district judge deciding the motion to suppress (Judge 21 Scheindlin) essentially reversed the district judge who initially 22 authorized the wiretap (Judge Marrero), leaving us with the 23 Solomonic question: to which district judge do we owe this 24 deference? 25 parties agreed during oral argument that the decision we must However, we need not decide this issue because the 6 1 make is whether Judge Marrero abused his discretion in approving 2 the Government s application. 3 facts set forth by the Government were minimally adequate to 4 support Judge Marrero s decision.1 5 Thus, we focus on whether the We turn to the substantive requirements of a wiretap 6 application. In Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe 7 Streets Act of 1968 ("Title III"), 18 U.S.C. § 2510 et seq., 8 Congress struck a balance between the needs of law enforcement 9 officials [and] the privacy rights of the individual. See 10 Miller, 116 F.3d at 663. While Title III allows for wiretaps in 11 limited circumstances, law enforcement must apply for a court 12 order before conducting such surveillance, 18 U.S.C. § 2518, and 13 set forth "a full and complete statement as to whether or not 14 other investigative procedures have been tried and failed or why 15 they reasonably appear to be unlikely to succeed if tried or to 16 be too dangerous," id. § 2518(1)(c). 17 ensure that this standard has been met, id. § 2518(3)(c), so that 18 "wiretapping is not resorted to in situations where traditional 19 investigative techniques would suffice to expose the crime," 1 The district court must We note that this concession finds support in our precedent. In United States v. Wagner, 989 F.2d 69 (2d Cir. 1993), we held, with respect to whether an affidavit for a wiretap had established probable cause, The reviewing court s determination should be limited to whether the issuing judicial officer had a substantial basis for the finding of probable cause. Id. at 72. We went on to reverse the district court s suppression of evidence because it had not accorded sufficient deference to the initial decision to authorize a wiretap, on which the Government had relied. Id. at 74. 7 1 2 United States v. Kahn, 415 U.S. 143, 153 n.12 (1974). We have acknowledged that it would be in some sense more 3 efficient to wiretap whenever a telephone was used to facilitate 4 the commission of a crime. 5 reflects a congressional judgment that the cost of such 6 efficiency in terms of privacy interests is too high. United 7 States v. Lilla, 699 F.2d 99, 105 n.7 (2d Cir. 1983). In other 8 words, the question is not whether a wiretap provides the 9 simplest, most efficient means of conducting an investigation; But the statutory requirement . . . 10 telephonic surveillance may only be used when it is necessary to 11 assist in law enforcement. 12 emphasized that "generalized and conclusory statements that other 13 investigative procedures would prove unsuccessful" will not 14 satisfy Title III. 15 With these concerns in mind, we have Id. at 104. To be sure, the Government is not required to exhaust all 16 conceivable investigative techniques before resorting to 17 electronic surveillance. 18 agents inform the authorizing judicial officer of the nature and 19 progress of the investigation and of the difficulties inherent in 20 the use of normal law enforcement methods. 21 Diaz, 176 F.3d 52, 111 (2d Cir. 1999) (alteration and internal 22 quotation marks omitted). 23 technique is theoretically possible, it does not follow that it 24 is likely. 25 tested in a practical and commonsense fashion. [T]he statute only requires that the United States v. Merely because a normal investigative What the provision envisions is that the showing be 8 S. Rep. No. 90- 1 1097 (1968), as reprinted in 1968 U.S.C.C.A.N. 2112, 2190 2 (citation omitted). 3 Applying this commonsense approach, we have approved of 4 wiretaps in complex and sprawling criminal cases involving large 5 conspiracies, see, e.g., United States v. Torres, 901 F.2d 205, 6 232 (2d Cir. 1990) ( [T]he affidavits here convincingly 7 established that the Torres Organization was a large scale 8 operation which could not be adequately surveilled by traditional 9 investigative methods. ), as well as in cases with peculiar 10 circumstances that made traditional investigative techniques 11 difficult, see, e.g., United States v. Ruggiero, 726 F.2d 913, 12 924 (2d Cir. 1984), abrogated on other grounds by Salinas v. 13 United States, 522 U.S. 52 (1997) (noting that the criminal 14 enterprises under investigation were in a homogenous 15 neighborhood in Brooklyn where normal surveillance was risky ). 16 Turning to the facts in this case, we begin by emphasizing 17 the unusual origin of the investigation into Concepcion s drug 18 activities. 19 trafficking, and appears to have had no information to provide. 20 Specifically, the Government could not obtain from the CI the 21 names of any of Concepcion s drug co-conspirators, the details as 22 to Concepcion s drug-trafficking methods, or the locations where 23 the drugs were stored or exchanged. 24 lead to one investigation of terrorism; that investigation, 25 fruitless in its own right, led to an unrelated investigation of The CI provided no information about drug 9 In sum, the CI provided a 1 drug trafficking. Having stumbled across the drug case, the 2 Government had but two limited avenues of investigation other 3 than the wiretap continue to use the CI or attempt physical 4 surveillance of Concepcion.2 5 Judge Scheindlin, who suppressed the wiretap evidence, 6 believed that these leads could have been better leveraged before 7 resorting to a wiretap. 8 disagree with her conclusion that the wiretap application was 9 insufficient to support Judge Marrero s wiretap authorization. 10 With respect to the CI, the Paholsky Affidavit aptly 11 demonstrated both how the Government had tried and failed to 12 use the CI to infiltrate Concepcion s operation, and why further 13 such attempts reasonably appear[ed] to be unlikely to succeed. 14 See 18 U.S.C. § 2518(1)(c). 15 the CI attempted to introduce an undercover agent to Concepcion, 16 but Concepcion refused to engage with the agent. 17 attempts to use the CI reasonably appeared unlikely to succeed 18 because Concepcion would not work with the CI, who was still 19 incarcerated. 20 difference that these initial attempts to use the CI were with 21 respect to the terrorism investigation. 22 or scope of those efforts, the Paholsky Affidavit established While an exceptionally close case, we First, the Affidavit explained that Second, further Further, we are not persuaded that it makes any 2 Regardless of the timing It is not disputed that the other techniques described in the Paholsky Affidavit convening a grand jury, seeking search warrants, or using a pen registry would have been either unhelpful or premature. 10 1 2 that the CI s usefulness had been exhausted. Accordingly, the Government was left with only traditional 3 surveillance as a means to investigate Concepcion. And it is 4 with respect to this technique that the Paholsky Affidavit was 5 less than thorough. 6 conspiracy that often requires the aid of a wiretap. 7 901 F.2d at 232. 8 surveillance, such as the statement that "narcotics and weapons 9 traffickers are extremely surveillance conscious," apply to all This was not the type of large criminal drug Cf. Torres, Many of the Affidavit s statements concerning 10 drug cases. 11 affidavit insufficient because it failed to explain how "this 12 narcotics case presented problems different from any other 13 small-time narcotics case"). 14 the Government s specific attempts at surveillance, the Affidavit 15 merely claimed that agents . . . attempted to conduct physical 16 surveillance of CONCEPCION on numerous occasions. 17 See Lilla, 699 F.2d at 104 (finding the Government s Additionally, instead of detailing These general explanations leave a reviewing court to wonder 18 how many times the Government attempted surveillance, at what 19 time, where exactly, and why the Government could not 20 definitively identif[y] any of Concepcion s associates. 21 Paholsky Affidavit seems to suggest that simply because other 22 unknown individuals were involved in Concepcion s activities, a 23 wiretap was necessary. 24 reason law enforcement performs physical surveillance is to 25 identify co-conspirators. The But we have been clear that part of the See Lilla, 699 F.2d at 105 n.6 ( The 11 1 individuals involved in this conspiracy . . . would obviously 2 remain unknown until some sort of investigative efforts were 3 attempted. ). 4 identified, the Government could have sought an informant or 5 introduced a different undercover agent. 6 Once co-conspirators had been definitively Still, while the Affidavit was not thorough in this respect, 7 we think it was at least minimally adequate to support Judge 8 Marrero s initial decision to grant the wiretap. See Miller, 116 9 F.3d at 663 (internal quotations marks omitted). The Affidavit 10 was far more detailed than the representations made by law 11 enforcement in Lilla, where the supporting affidavit indicated 12 that traditional investigative techniques not only appeared 13 likely to be effective, but were in fact effective, and thus we 14 ordered the evidence suppressed. 15 104. 16 facts to indicate that other techniques were not working, and 17 because of the unusual origin of the case, it could not find new 18 leads. 19 to continue the wiretap or forego its investigation of 20 Concepcion. See Lilla, 699 F.2d at 100-01, Unlike Lilla, the Government here set forth just enough Thus, the Government was faced with the decision either 21 We should add, however, that in coming to this conclusion, 22 we do not endorse the effort put forth by the Government in its 23 affidavit. 24 Government chose to reapply for the wiretap not because it was 25 necessary, but because it was easier than beginning a new A first read leaves the impression that the 12 1 investigation; since the wiretap was up and running and providing 2 valuable information, better to let it run its course than to 3 begin a new investigation into a low-level drug trafficker. 4 District courts must remain vigilant in ensuring that this kind 5 of reasoning, based more on efficiency and simplicity than 6 necessity, will not justify a wiretap. 7 avoid future suppression orders, it would do well to spell out in 8 more detail its investigative efforts. 9 to be turned to as an initial matter, but only where the 10 11 12 For the Government to A wiretap is not a device circumstances demonstrate that it is necessary. CONCLUSION For the foregoing reasons, we REVERSE the suppression order 13 and REMAND to the district court for further proceedings 14 consistent with this opinion. 13
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
