United States v. Darvill Bragg, No. 21-2096 (8th Cir. 2022)
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A jury convicted Defendant of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Defendant appealed, arguing that evidence from his iPhone should have been suppressed because the government delayed unreasonably before seeking a search warrant, and that prior firearm convictions were improperly admitted under Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b). He also appealed his sentence, arguing that neither his Iowa willful injury conviction nor his two Illinois armed robbery convictions qualifies as “violent felonies” under Section 924(e). He further argued the Illinois robbery convictions were not “committed on occasions different from one another,” Section 924(e)(1), and thus constitute only one prior violent felony conviction.
The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that although significantly longer delays have been upheld as not unreasonable, without question the twenty-four-day delay at issue is of concern. The court reasoned that because smartphones “retain data for long periods of time,” delay between the time a cell phone is seized and when it is searched is not likely to cause stored personal data to be lost, or data of potential evidentiary relevance to become stale. More important to the private interests at stake, Defendant was in police custody for the entire twenty-four-day period, and there is no evidence that either Defendant or anyone acting on his behalf made a request or demand for its return, or even inquired about it. Thus, the district court did not err in denying Defendant’s motion to suppress. Further, the court held that the district court properly determined that Defendant’s Section 708.4(1) willful injury conviction is an ACCA predicate violent felony.
Court Description: [Loken, Author, with Colloton and Shepherd, Circuit Judges] Criminal case - Criminal law and Sentencing. Given the totality of the circumstances, a twenty-four-day delay in applying for a warrant to search defendant's iPhone did not violate defendant's Fourth Amendment rights; the contents of the phone were unlikely to be lost or damaged because of the delay, and defendant was in custody for the entire period and never sought its return; further the phone was seized with probable cause and the delay was the result of the police officer's investigation of other complex cases, including two in which defendant was the primary suspect; the district court did not abuse its discretion in admitting evidence of defendant's 2010 armed robbery conviction and his 2014 willful injury conviction as the evidence was relevant to prove knowledge and intent; the district court did not err in sentencing defendant as an Armed Career Criminal because:(1) his Iowa conviction for willful injury in violation of Iowa Code 708.4(1) was a violent felony for ACCA purposes and (2) defendant's two Illinois convictions for armed robbery were also violent felonies for ACCA purposes; the government met its burden of showing the armed robberies occurred on different occasions and were two separate ACCA predicate offenses.
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