United States v. Earl Harvey

MEMORANDUM

We review de novo the denial of a motion to suppress, and may affirm on any ground fairly supported by the record. United States v. Mayer, 560 F.3d 948, 956 (9th Cir.2009).

Harvey’s probation officer saw a computer and broadband card in Harvey’s bedroom; Harvey admitted to using the computer, accessing the Internet, and communicating with another convicted felon, all in violation of his terms of supervised release; and a forensic review of the computer indicated that Harvey had replaced the hard drive before turning it over to the Probation Office: there was a non-factory hard drive and all the files on it had been loaded after the probation officer saw the computer. These facts established probable cause to believe that Harvey was in violation of his terms of supervised release, and, therefore, probable cause to search his residence for further evidence related to these violations, including the original hard drive. In light of the facts of the case, the information supporting the search was not stale when the search was conducted, about two months after the initial sighting of the laptop and one month after the forensic review. See United States v. Lacy, 119 F.3d…