'Seize-it-all-and-sort-it-out-later warrant' struck down by court

In United States v. Schesso, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 129993 (W.D. Wash. 2011), a search warrant was struck down for being too broad after applying CDT III.

German authorities discovered an IP address in the U.S. sharing child pornography in October 2008, and a search warrant was obtained in June 2010. The application sought "broad authorization to seize and examine every sort of computer storage device." Applying Ninth Circuit precdent in U.S. v. Comprehensive Drug Testing, Inc., 621 F.3d 1162 (9th Cir. 2010) (referred to as CDT III), the court found that the general search in the case was not justified by the application. "To rule to the contrary would be to say that if any person ever had a child pornography file or made such a file available to download on a peer-to-peer network, that person is subject to a general search of all of that person's computer-related equipment without reference to the particular crime or crimes that are known to law enforcement."

Let's look at the errors made as determined by the court:

• Waiting 20 months
• Lack of information connecting generic child pornographers to the defendant
• Lack of information showing that the named storage devices sought are those typically used with peer-to-peer file sharing
• Not naming specific crimes (though they did cite violations of two statutes)

The court also found a lack of good faith and required exclusion of the evidence (six images of the defendant's prepubescent niece and over 3,400 other images of child pornography).