In 2004, Donald Leonard Sturgis was convicted of federal crack-cocaine distribution offenses.
See United States v. Roberson,
The Supreme Court granted Sturgis’s pеtition for writ of certiorari, vacated our judgment, and remanded for reconsideration of the legаlity of the search of the car in light of yet another intervening Supreme Court
decision
— Arizona
v. Gant,
I.
By now the parties are well-acquainted with the facts, and we will recite only briefly those necessary to our disposition. In late 2003, Minneapolis police recеived a tip that Robert Roberson was dealing narcotics out of the residence at 1526 Oliver Avenue North. After surveillance of the address revealed activity consistent with narcotics sales, policе applied for and obtained a search warrant. The application for that warrant noted that both “Robert Roberson and another tenant Don Strugis live[d] at this address.”
When police arrived at 1526 Oliver Avenue North to execute the warrant they found Sturgis sitting in his car, which was parked in the street in front of the house. Officers pulled Sturgis from the car, handcuffed him, and searched the car’s center console. In it they found “approximately $1,000 in cash.”
Roberson,
Sturgis moved to suppress the evidence found in his car, arguing that the searches violated the Fourth Amendment. The district court denied his motion, and we affirmed. We wrote:
Officers may lawfully detain thе occupant of a house near that house while the premises are being searched pursuant to a valid search warrant. A preliminary search of the car’s interior was valid as a search incident to Sturgis’s arrest. While executing the search warrant, officers found contraband in Sturgis’s residence, giving them probable cause to believe that additional evidence would be found in the automobile in which Sturgis hаd been sitting. This probable cause justified the warrantless search of the automobile under the automobile exception. The district court thus did not err in denying Sturgis’s motion to suppress.
Id. at 940 (citations omitted).
Gant
calls into question our holding that the preliminary search of Sturgis’s vehicle was valid as a search incident to arrest.
See Gant,
II.
The search warrant covered: “1526 Oliver Ave No., and Vehiclе (MN JA5631), any occupants within, any vehicles belonging to the occupants, and any unattached garagеs and/or storage sheds....”
1
When considering whether a search “exceeded the scope of [а] warrant,” we “look[] to the fair meaning of the warrant’s terms.”
United States v. Johnson,
Sturgis acknowledges that the police “considered [Sturgis] a resident of 1526 Oliver Avenue North,” аnd that Sturgis “was acting consistently with someone who lived at the house.” Appellant’s Br. at 6. Accordingly, he was an “occupant,” even though he was not within the house “when the search started.”
Johnson,
Sturgis resists this conclusion, pointing out that the warrant extended only to “occupants within,” (emphasis added), and “any vehicles belonging to the occupants.” Therefore, 1 Sturgis says, “the warrant’s reference to ‘occupants’ did not mean residents or tenants,” but instead meant “people within the house at the time of the search.” Appellant’s Br. at 19-20. And because Sturgis was not within the house when the search started, the argument goes, the warrant did not authorize a search of his vehicle. We disagree.
The warrant’s qualification of the word “occupants” with the word “within” suggests that “occupаnts,” by itself, extends beyond “people within the house at the time of the search,” Appellant’s Br. at 20. Sturgis’s narrоw reading of the word “occupants” to include only those within the residence renders nugatory the word “within” in thе phrase “occupants within.” The better definition of the term “occupants” is the one we adopted in Johnson— a definition that includes Sturgis. Because the warrant authorized the search of “any vehicles belonging to the occupants,” whether or not those occupants were within the residence at the time of the search, the search of Sturgis’s vehicle was authorized.
The order denying Sturgis’s motion to suppress is affirmed.
Notes
. Sturgis’s car was not "Vehicle (MN JA5631)."