Reply to Donnie Dumptruck says Mar-A-Lago's been searched by the FBI

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Judge just ordered a redacted version released.  yay![/quote]

That's not really true.  He ordered DOJ to give him a proposed redacted version with justifications for the redactions.   We won't see anything anytime this month, and I think there's at least a 50/50 chance DOJ prevails on him to keep it all sealed.[/quote]

It's a good theoretical stance, but in practice I hope much of it is redacted to protect all the people who are cooperating with the investigation.[/quote]

It will be very heavily redacted and I am sure all witness names and identifying information will be redacted out.  Anything that identifies the actual documents at issue will be redacted. There will probably be some procedural stuff, background on the statutes at issue, maybe a little background section about Trump and Mar-a-Lago, that won't be redacted, but it won't be anything new.  The only thing of interest that might not be redacted is the back-and-forth that happened before the search, but I'm not sure that would even be in there in the first place since it was not relevant to the legal issue.[/quote]

It is the ONLY thing of interest.  Garland said they did it because they had no other choice and the “back and forth” better back that up orherwise all the people saying this is a witch-hunt or politically motivated will be right. [/quote]

No they won’t.  Decent chance the affidavit says nothing about this because it is irrelevant as a legal matter.[/quote]

A warrant is a court ordered breach of someone’s 4th Amendment rights.  I this context, with Trump lawyers already involved and some amount of cooperation having gone, some description of how the cooperation ended or broke down and reached stalemate is part of the legal analysis.  And yes, for this if you think this was just ok to do, it is an authorized breach of a constitutional protection.[/quote]

There is no constitutional impediment to a reasonable search and siezure under the Fourth Amendment as authorized by a warrant issued pursuant to a showing of probable cause. It’s right there in the text of the Amendment, which proscribes only an “unreasonable” search. To frame the issue as you have done demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of the Constitution. [/quote]

The question is was it reasonable?  This judge concluded it was and people want to see the basis for his decision.  It is reasonable if trumps team wasn’t cooperating.  But if they were cooperating and then DOJ went silent for 2 months and then got the warrant, I think there is a fair argument that it was unreasonable.  If law enforcement is working with a person about obtaining things, and the person is cooperating and awaiting the next steps, then this was an unreasonable warrant.  The judge’s decision could be overturned.  The warrant CAN be found invalid on appeal.  [/quote]

No, the one and only question is, was there probable cause.  Go read Rule 41(d)(1) of the Federal Rules: "After receiving an affidavit or other information, a magistrate judge—or if authorized by Rule 41(b), a judge of a state court of record—must issue the warrant if there is probable cause to search for and seize a person or property or to install and use a tracking device."  Also read Illinois vs. Gates: "The task of the issuing magistrate is simply to make a practical, common sense decision whether, given all the circumstances set forth in the affidavit before him, including the "veracity" and "basis of knowledge" of persons supplying hearsay information, there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place."  You may want the law to be whether it was reasonable to conduct a search, but that is not what the law actually is.

Yes, a search warrant can be challenged, but you have to show the finding of probable cause was "clearly erroneous" or point out another procedural error.  If you do that, which is really hard to do because district and appellate courts are very very deferential to magistrates, there are a bunch of exceptions to actually getting the evidence suppressed.  One of those exceptions is the "good faith" exception, where if a law enforcement officer relies in good faith on a warrant that appears valid on its face, then the evidence is not excluded even if it turns out the warrant was not based on probable cause.  As you might expect, the good faith exception makes it almost impossible to actually get evidence excluded because of an illegal warrant.  You can thank the Republicans on the Supreme Court for that one.

Another one of the exceptions is the "inevitable discovery" exception.  Under that exception, the evidence is not suppressed if law enforcement would have found it anyway through lawful means.  Ironically, the argument you are making is basically an admission that the inevitable discovery exception would apply since, according to you, Trump would have definitely handed the documents over if the Government had just asked a few more times.[/quote]

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