Defendant Alonzo Shipp ("Shipp" or "Defendant") moves to suppress evidence obtained from his Facebook account. (See Mots. to Suppress (Dkt. 20); Mem. in Support of Mots. to Suppress ("Mem.") (Dkt. 20-1).)
*303I. BACKGROUND
A. Facts
1. Alleged Shooting
On or about July 20, 2018, an unnamed individual, referred to herein as John Doe, was shot in the vicinity of 117-26 147th Street in Queens, New York. (Compl. (Dkt. 1) ¶ 2.) Doe then ran south down 147th Street and east on 119th Street to the corner of 119th Avenue and Sutphin Boulevard, where he collapsed. (Id. )
Video of the incident shows an individual wearing a white t-shirt pointing an object at another individual. (Id. ¶ 3.) A muzzle flash is visible. (Id. ) The video then shows Doe running south on 147th Street. (Id. )
Doe then called 911 and stated in part: "I've been shot ... My shooter's coming to me right now ... My shooter is on me ... My shooter is right here, my shooter is right here" and "I don't want to die Pump, please. Please [inaudible] Pump. Pump. Pump. I don't want to die Pump. Pump I don't want to die, Pump." (Id. ¶¶ 4, 6.)
Video cameras captured footage of Doe on Sutphin Boulevard. (Id. ¶ 7.) The footage shows an individual approach Doe, take an item out of his pants or waistband, stand over Doe, point an object at him, and then walk away. (Id. ) As he walked away, his face was visible on a surveillance camera. (Id. ) Surveillance video of the incident also appears to show the alleged shooter wearing a bandage or similar object on his lower left arm. (Aff. in Supp. of an Appl. for a Search Warrant ("Aff.") (Dkt. 25-1) ¶ 7.)
On January 2, 2019, Shipp was arrested and charged with possession of the firearm alleged to have been used in the July 20, 2018 incident. (See Mem. at 6; Indictment (Dkt. 7) ¶ 1.)
2. Facebook Warrant
On February 8, 2019, Magistrate Judge Vera M. Scanlon signed a search and seizure warrant authorizing disclosure of information associated with Facebook user ID 100002075016114 (the "Facebook Warrant"). (See Facebook Warrant (Dkt. 25-1) at ECF p. 17-22.) The warrant application was based on the affidavit of Special Agent Joanna Beck of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (the "Affidavit"). (See Aff. at ECF p. 2-16.) The Affidavit set forth the basis for probable cause, which included the following:
• During a 911 call placed during the alleged shooting, the victim can be heard calling the shooter "Pump." (Id. )
• Surveillance video of the incident on July 20, 2018 appear to show the shooter wearing a bandage or similar object on his lower left arm. (Id. ¶ 7.)
• Shipp has admitted that he uses the nickname "Pump." (Id. )
• Publicly accessible photos, including a profile picture, on a Facebook account belonging to a user calling himself "Sts Pistol Tony" appear to be photos of Shipp, indicating that the account may belong to Shipp. (Id. ¶ 9.)
• Individuals wish the account holder "Happy Birthday" on October 31, the date of Shipp's birthday. (Id. )
• Publicly available photos from May 25, 2018 from this account show Shipp with what appears to be an ACE bandage on his lower left arm *304fewer than two months before the date of the shooting. (Id. ¶ 10.)3
• Publicly available posts from 2018 on the account appear to show Shipp referring to himself as "Pump" and other individuals referring to him as "Pump." (Id. ¶ 11.)
The Facebook Warrant required Facebook to disclose to the Government a substantial amount of information pertaining to the user ID identified:
(a) All contact and personal identifying information, including full name, user identification number, birth date, gender, contact e-mail addresses, Facebook passwords, Facebook security questions and answers, physical address (including city, state, and zip code), telephone numbers, screen names, websites, and other personal identifiers.
(b) All activity logs for the account and all other documents showing the user's posts and other Facebook activities;
(c) All photos and videos uploaded by that user ID and all photos and videos uploaded by any user that have that user tagged in them;
(d) All profile information; News Feed information; status updates; links to videos, photographs, articles, and other items; Notes; Wall postings; friend lists, including the friends' Facebook user identification numbers; groups and networks of which the user is a member, including the groups' Facebook group identification numbers; future and past event postings; rejected "Friend" requests; comments; gifts; pokes; tags; and information about the user's access and use of Facebook applications;
(e) All other records of communications and messages made or received by the user, including all private messages, chat history, video calling history, and pending "Friend" requests;
(f) All "check ins" and other location information;
(g) All IP logs, including all records of the IP addresses that logged into the account;
(h) All records of the account's usage of the "Like" feature, including all Facebook posts and all non-Facebook webpages and content that the user has "liked";
(i) All information about the Facebook pages that the account is or was a "fan" of;
(j) All past and present lists of friends created by the account;
(k) All records of Facebook searches performed by the account;
(l) All information about the user's access and use of Facebook Marketplace;
(m) The types of service utilized by the user;
(n) The length of service (including start date) and the means and source of any payments associated with the service (including any credit card or bank account number);
(o) All privacy settings and other account settings, including privacy settings for individual Facebook posts and activities, and all records *305showing which Facebook users have been blocked by the account;
(p) All records pertaining to communications between Facebook and any person regarding the user or the user's Facebook account, including contacts with support services and records of actions taken.
(Facebook Warrant, Attach. B-I.)
The Facebook Warrant also authorized law enforcement officers to seize "[a]ll information described above in Section I that constitutes evidence of a violation of
(a) Evidence of the possession of firearms by Shipp;
(b) Evidence indicating how Shipp went by the nickname "Pump" and/or that other individuals knew him by the name "Pump";
(c) Evidence demonstrating that Shipp had a bandage on his left arm in or about the time of the shooting;
(d) Evidence indicating how and when the Facebook account was accessed or used to determine the chronological and geographic context of account access, use, and events relating to the crime under investigation and to the Facebook account owner (including, but not limited to, whether Shipp was in or around Queens, New York at the time of the shooting in July 2018);
(e) Evidence indicating the Facebook account owner's state of mind as it relates to the crime under investigation;
(f) The identity of the person(s) who created or used the user ID, including records that help reveal the whereabouts of such person(s).
(Id. Attach. B-II.)
Pursuant to the Facebook Warrant, Facebook disclosed 21,471 pages. (Opp'n to Facebook Mot. ("Opp'n") (Dkt. 25) at 4.) On April 25, 2019, the Government produced to Shipp the entire return from Facebook. (Id. ) The Government states that law enforcement agents are continuing to review this return to determine which parts may be seized pursuant to Attachment B-II. (Id. ) To date, the Government has seized several pieces of evidence pursuant to Attachment B-II, including:
• Evidence demonstrating that the account belongs to Shipp.
• A status update posted by the account user six days before the shooting, in which he referred to himself as "Pump," and a message in November 2018 in which the account user told another individual to call him and stated: "my name is pump";
• Messages sent by the account user six days after the shooting, in which he stated that he needed money and was on the run. When asked why he was on the run, the account user responded, "I know u seen the news a shooting." When the individual said she had not seen the news and asked where the shooting has happened, the account user stated, "119 sutphin." When the other individual asked if anyone was hurt, the account user wrote, "of course they got my pics." He later added that he had already left town.
• Messages sent by Defendant in November 2018, in which he forwarded a post by the NYPD from September 10, 2018 that included a photograph of Shipp and an appeal for the public to help locate him "in regards to a *306nonfatal shooting." The person to whom the account user sent the post responded, "O, my goshhh. sigh." and the account user responded, "I know." Later in the conversation, when the individual told the account user that this information hurts them, the account user wrote, "Im hurt to cuz I was chilling into this incident."
(Id. at 4-6.)
B. Procedural History
On January 2, 2019, Shipp was arrested and charged with possession of the firearm alleged to have been used in the July 20, 2018 incident. (See Mem. at 6; Indictment (Dkt. 7) ¶ 1.) He was denied bail on January 10, 2019. (See Jan. 10, 2019 Min. Entry (Dkt. 4); Order of Detention (Dkt. 5).) Shipp was arraigned on February 1, 2019 before Magistrate Judge Scanlon, at which point he entered a plea of not guilty. (Feb. 1, 2019 Min. Entry (Dkt. 11).)
Shipp now seeks to suppress evidence uncovered from the Facebook account because, he contends, the warrant was overbroad and not sufficiently particular. (See Mots.; Mem.) The Government opposes the motion, arguing that the Facebook Warrant met the particularity requirement and was not overbroad, and that in any case, the good-faith exception would apply. (Id. at 12-13.)
II. LEGAL STANDARD
The Fourth Amendment explicitly commands that warrants must be based on probable cause and must "particularly describ[e] the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." U.S. Const. amend. IV. The warrant requirement is intended to ensure that "those searches deemed necessary should be as limited as possible." Coolidge v. New Hampshire,
The appropriate scope of a search "is defined by the object of the search and the places in which there is probable cause to believe that it may be found." United States v. Ross,
To be sufficiently particular under the Fourth Amendment, a warrant must satisfy three requirements. Ulbricht,
Despite their frequent conflation, "[over]breadth and particularity are related but distinct concepts. A warrant may be broad, in that it authorizes the government to search an identified location or object for a wide range of potentially relevant material, without violating the particularity requirement." Ulbricht,
"Even if a warrant lacks particularity, '[t]he fact that a Fourth Amendment violation occurred ... does not necessarily mean that the exclusionary rule applies.' " United States v. Lin, No. 15-CR-601 (DLI),
III. DISCUSSION
A. Overbreadth and Particularity
The court has serious concerns regarding the breadth of Facebook warrants like the one at issue here.
The Second Circuit has cautioned that "[b]ecause of the nature of digital storage, it is not always feasible to 'extract and segregate responsive data from non-responsive data.' " Ulbricht,
The means of hiding evidence on a hard drive-obscure folders, misnamed files, encrypted data-are not currently possible in the context of a Facebook account. Hard drive searches require time-consuming electronic forensic investigation with special equipment, and conducting that kind of search in the defendant's home would be impractical, if not impossible. By contrast, when it comes to Facebook account searches, the government need only send a request with the specific data sought and Facebook will respond with precisely that data. That procedure does not appear to be impractical for Facebook or for the government. Facebook produced data in response to over 9500 search warrants in the six-month period between July and December 2015.
United States v. Blake,
Like many Facebook search warrants, the warrant at issue here authorized a very broad search, but permitted the actual "seizure" only of certain information constituting evidence of the crime of being a felon in possession after January 1, 2018. (See Facebook Warrant.) The Facebook Warrant required the disclosure to the government of sixteen categories of information associated with the Facebook account, a seemingly boilerplate list apparently designed to capture all information associated with the account. Accordingly, Facebook provided 21,000 pages of information to the government, which included all contact and personal identifying information, all private messages and chat histories, all video history, all activity logs (including logs of activity in associated Facebook applications), all friend requests, all rejected friend requests, all photoprints, all Neoprints, and all past and present lists of friends. The Facebook Warrant even required the disclosure of information generated in connection with services that appear entirely unrelated to the facts in the Affidavit and the crime charged-for example, there was no fact in the Affidavit suggesting that the account holder used Facebook Marketplace, a service that can be used to buy and sell items and services online, let alone that Facebook Marketplace would contain evidence of the charged crime of being a felon in possession or even additional evidence that the account belonged to Shipp.
Moreover, although the Facebook Warrant only permitted the government to seize "evidence of a violation of
Finally, the court notes that the warrant did not set any limits on what the Government was required to do with the information that they collected and searched, but did not "seize." This is concerning in light of the breadth of information that Facebook was required to provide to the Government pursuant to the Facebook Warrant. See In Matter of Search of Info. Associated with Facebook Account Identified by Username Aaron.Alexis that is Stored at Premises Controlled by Facebook, Inc.,
In sum, the court is concerned that Facebook warrants of the kind at issue here unnecessarily "authorize precisely the type of 'exploratory rummaging' the Fourth Amendment protects against." See United States v. Bradbury, No. 14-CR-71,
B. Good Faith Exception
That said, the court need not decide whether the Facebook Warrant violated the Fourth Amendment because, even if it did, the Facebook Warrant falls into the "good faith exception" to the exclusionary rule established by United States v. Leon,
"The burden is on the government to demonstrate the objective reasonableness of the officers' good faith reliance on an invalidated warrant." Clark,
(1) where the issuing magistrate has been knowingly misled; (2) where the issuing magistrate wholly abandoned his or her judicial role; (3) where the application is so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render reliance upon it unreasonable; and (4) where the warrant is so facially deficient that reliance upon it is unreasonable.
Neither the first nor the second parameter have any applicability here. With respect to the other two parameters, the court finds that the Facebook Warrant was not "based on an affidavit so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render official belief in its existence entirely unreasonable," Leon,
IV. CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, Defendant's (Dkt. 20) motion to suppress evidence obtained *313pursuant to the Facebook Warrant is DENIED.
SO ORDERED.
Notes
Shipp also moved to suppress post-arrest statements and identification evidence, or in the alternative for an evidentiary hearing as to whether law enforcement engaged in a deliberate two-step interrogation of Shipp, and a Wade hearing. (See Mem. at 5.) Only the motion to suppress the Facebook warrant (the "Facebook Motion") is before the court at this time. (See May 23, 2019 Order (granting Government's request to address only the Facebook Motion at this time in light of the Government's representation that it would not seek to introduce post-arrest statements or an identification of Shipp if the court denied his motion to suppress the Facebook warrant).)
The court assumes the parties' familiarity with the factual background and sets forth here only those facts relevant to the Facebook Motion.
This fact is relevant because, as noted above, the alleged shooter in the surveillance video of the incident appeared to be wearing bandage or similar object on his lower left arm at the time of the alleged shooting. (See Aff. ¶ 7.)
Courts have recognized a Fourth Amendment interest in the data contained in an individual's Facebook account. See United States v. Meregildo,
Modern cell phones may provide the closest analogy to a Facebook account because, as the Supreme Court explained in Riley v. California,
Given that Facebook controls the storage and cataloging of associated data, and that digital data is generally sortable by date stamps, temporal limitation of Facebook searches appears feasible.
