United States v. Dontae Small
944 F.3d 490
| 4th Cir. | 2019Background
- On Oct. 4, 2015, Brandon Rowe was accosted by three masked men in Baltimore; one pointed a silver gun at his face, they patted him down and took his car keys; his Acura was later stolen.
- On the same night, a nearby armed robbery involved a white minivan and a similar silver gun; victims’ descriptions matched details in Rowe’s incident.
- On Oct. 7, 2015, Dontae Small drove Rowe’s stolen silver Acura into an Arundel Mills Mall lot; police set a perimeter, Small fled in the car, led police on a chase, entered Fort Meade and crashed through an NSA fence, then escaped on foot.
- Searchers found a bloody shirt and hat near the crash and, later, a cell phone about 50 yards away; without a warrant agents used the phone to call a contact who identified Small; warrants were later obtained for phone data used at trial.
- Small was tried and convicted of federal carjacking (18 U.S.C. § 2119), conspiracy (18 U.S.C. § 371), and destruction of government property (18 U.S.C. § 1361); he challenged (1) sufficiency of evidence as to § 2119 intent, (2) denial of suppression of phone-derived evidence (abandonment / warrantlessness), and (3) refusal to excuse/question two jurors who reported being “watched.”
Issues
| Issue | Plaintiff's Argument | Defendant's Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sufficiency of evidence of § 2119 mens rea (intent to cause death or serious bodily harm) | Government: evidence (masked assailant pointing a gun at Rowe, physical pat-down, coordinated communications and phone/location data linking Small and coconspirator) permitted a reasonable juror to find conditional intent. | Small: no verbal threats, no proof gun was loaded, no physical injury — insufficient to prove intent to cause death/serious harm. | Affirmed: viewing evidence in government’s favor, a rational juror could infer conditional intent from pointing a gun at close range and physical contact. |
| Fourth Amendment: warrantless searches of cell phone; abandonment exception | Government: phone abandoned at crash scene amid flight; officers reasonably concluded phone belonged to fleeing suspect and could be searched without warrant. | Small: phone was not abandoned; even if physical phone abandoned, Riley protects digital contents absent a warrant. | Affirmed: objective facts (flight, discarded bloody clothes nearby, phone found in secured/crime-scene area, no effort to retrieve phone) supported abandonment; Riley does not foreclose other case-specific exceptions. |
| Sixth Amendment: alleged extrajudicial contact with jurors (jurors reported being “watched”) | Government: the reports were vague, occurred in a public courthouse area, and the court implemented additional security — no presumptive prejudice. | Small: jurors 5 and 11 were watched, which could have influenced impartiality; court should have voir dired or excused them. | Affirmed: Remmer presumption not triggered because contact was vague and not shown to be communication or tampering; court’s precautionary security measures and invitation to report further concerns sufficed. |
Key Cases Cited
- Holloway v. United States, 526 U.S. 1 (1999) (§ 2119 allows conditional intent: intent to harm if necessary to steal the car)
- Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (1979) (standard for reviewing sufficiency of the evidence: whether any rational trier of fact could find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt)
- Remmer v. United States, 347 U.S. 227 (1954) (establishes presumption of prejudice for unauthorized juror contact and entitlement to hearing)
- Riley v. California, 573 U.S. 373 (2014) (cell‑phone searches require special Fourth Amendment consideration; search‑incident‑to‑arrest exception inapplicable to digital data)
- United States v. Foster, 507 F.3d 233 (4th Cir. 2007) (elements of federal carjacking under § 2119)
- United States v. Fekete, 535 F.3d 471 (6th Cir. 2008) (analysis of brandishing and when additional facts are required to infer § 2119 intent)
- Abel v. United States, 362 U.S. 217 (1960) (abandonment doctrine: abandoned property may be appropriated by government)
- United States v. Leshuk, 65 F.3d 1105 (4th Cir. 1995) (defendant who abandons property cannot seek suppression of evidence seized from it)
- United States v. Cheek, 94 F.3d 136 (4th Cir. 1996) (applying Remmer factors to determine whether extrajudicial contact requires evidentiary hearing)