Kentucky district court applies good faith to warrantless use of GPS placed on vehicle in Seventh Circuit

In United States v. Shelburne, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 85368 (W.D. Ky. 2012), a federal district court has refused to suppress evidence acquired after the warrantless use of a GPS device because the device was placed on the vehicle in a circuit where GPS use was allowed pre-Jones. 

The GPS device was placed by Indiana (Seventh Circuit) law enforcement, and the defendants then traveled to Kentucky (Sixth Circuit) where they were arrested. The government argued, and the court accepted, that since the relevant actors were in the Seventh Circuit and relying on precedent there, the Davis good faith analysis should be based on Seventh Circuit law as opposed to the location of the arrest and trial.

Since the Supreme Court's decision in Jones, lower courts have generously applied the Davis good faith rule. Because the Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth Circuits had found GPS use without a warrant to be constitutional, there is no suppression requirement (see previous discussion here and here). Further, a district court in the Fifth Circuit has held that a 1981 case will allow the evidence use under Davis (applied to the old Fifth Circuit, which now also includes the Eleventh Circuit) (discussion here).