United States v. Cobb, No. 19-4172 (4th Cir. 2020)
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The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's motion to suppress child pornography images that were seized from his computer pursuant to a search warrant issued by a state magistrate judge. The court held that, even if the Fourth Amendment might require more specificity as to the place to be searched or the items to be seized in some computer searches, defendant failed to convince the court that the Fourth Amendment demanded that the descriptions of the place to be searched and the things to be seized needed to be more specific in this case.
The court also affirmed the district court's ruling that the constitutionality of the warrant was unaffected by the superfluous language included at the end of the warrant; affirmed the district court's application of the plain view doctrine to the evidence of child pornography; and rejected defendant's belated request that the court not follow its own prior holding in United States v. Williams, and hold instead that ordinary principles of Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, including the plain view doctrine, should not apply to computer searches.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on August 17, 2020.
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