In re the Search Warrant for: [Redacted]@Hotmail.com

*1185 ORDER DENYING MOTION PURSUANT TO 18 U.S.C. § 2705 (b)

A typical federal magistrate judge’s courtroom calendar on criminal duty in 2014 looks much like it did in 1986, when Congress passed the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. Defendants make their initial appearances in the courtroom. Rights are read and detention decisions made. Perhaps an out-of-district ease will require an identification and removal hearing. Every week or so, a grand jury foreperson or deputy appears bearing indictments in hand. A handful of agents, family members and others might look on, but no more than that. A 1986 magistrate, as we were simply called back then, would feel right at home.

Not so in chambers, where the bulk of criminal duty is still performed. There, my historical colleague might wonder, where are all the search warrant applications? Not the applications for email warrants, or warrant applications for location data or cell phone records, but the old-fashioned kind. The kind where a house hid drugs. Or guns. The kind where the property owner or occupant was the target. At least in the federal courthouse of Silicon Valley, we still see such warrant applications, but they are a…