Trash Runs 1-22-23 Discussion Board

I made this post on a discussion board for a Court Systems and Practices class on 1-22-23. Students were asking about trash and privacy and using evidence found in trash.

Class,

You guys are doing an excellent job on this discussion board so far and you are asking the right questions. When I say "asking the right questions", that is very important in the law and science. It means you guys grasp the general facts and relevant points which are important to the legal questions with this subject. Most people get distracted with non-relevant, emotional issues. Good work!

If you guys have other questions, please ask me. Comment, reply, or ask in this post. I want you guys to learn and understand how this happens in real investigations.

Now, lets answer some of the questions. One of the benefits of having worked in organized crime for years is that I learned how to put legal to the test in deploy the correct procedures when necessary. I had a Masters Degree in Criminal Justice while working in Organized Cime. However, having field experience and an academic background together, means that I can tell you how this stuff actually work. Most of the procedures you read about in the book, I have actually done.

One thing I want you all to take away from this. Terms like Probable Cause are important and have very specific meaning. The 4th Amendment protects YOU! It means that before I can search your house or your phone, I have to show a lot of evidence that shows a crime is being committed and the evidence of that crime is located in a very specific location.

Is Trash Private?

Answer: Yes and No.

The general rule is that trash inside your house or next to your house in a trash can is private. Next to your house means your house is still within the "curtilage" of the home. Curtilage has various definitions but for search and seizure issues it typically mean the area surrounding a home that is deemed more private.

Lets consider normal trash handling in most cites and probably at your house. I will describe my house. I live in Killeen in a house I own with a driveway and a garage. During the week my city-issued trash can sits next to my house (against the wall) right by my garage door. There, my trash still has privacy and I have not "abandoned" it yet. Trash pickup day is Thursday for me. On Wednesday night, I push my trash can to the street so the trash trick can pick it up. At that point I have abandoned the contents of the can, as the city truck will collect it. At that point any person, including a police officer, can take that trash, search it, sell things found in, keep things for your own use, etc. I have abandoned that.

Once a person discards an item, there is no privacy in that item. Thus it can be seized, sold, tested, etc.

The leading Supreme Court case on this issue is Greenwood v. California, 486 US 35 (1988) https://www.oyez.org/cases/1987/86-684

Do police really take people's trash?

Answer: Absolutely! It is an excellent tool for obtaining probable cause to search some other person, place, or thing (like a house) later. You will find that this tool is used and has been used on suspected killers (including serial killers). Likely in current cases in the news right now.

Have I ever taken and dug through people's trash?

Answer: Absolutely! So many times I can't count on all kinds of investigations, including murder.

What kind of evidence have I found?

Answer: I will give you one example here.

I received information people were manufacturing methamphetamine in the middle of a very large ranch in Central Texas. After some interviews and discussion with people who reported it to me, I conducted some "trash runs" on the trash belonging to the suspects. I went into my old evidence photos this morning and pulled out a few from that case. I will attach them here. Let me just say that what I found in the trash made it obvious that these people were manufacturing meth. By clear, I mean that after I took their trash numerous times over a period of months and used other investigative techniques, I had probable cause to believe they were manufacturing meth.

What is probable cause to search?

Answer: It means that I have facts and circumstances that would cause a reasonable person to believe a crime has been committed and that evidence of that crime is likely located in a particular place or on a particular person. It means that if I put that information in a search warrant affidavit, present it to a judge, and the judge agrees with me, then the judge will sign a search warrant allowing me to search a specific place I described in my warrant.

I actually have that search warrant for this case. I will include parts of it here. Search warrants are public information the moment they are executed but can be withheld for up to a couple of months with justification. So you may see redactions on what I present to you but it is perfectly legal to see this stuff. You guys can obtain official search warrants and affidavits any time you want as a public record.

Here is my description of "the place to be searched" as required under the 4th amendment.

Pay attention to what the 4th amendment says:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

In my description of this warrant, I provided a detailed description of the place to be searched. Not just the address! I also flew over the location and photographed it from a U.S. Customs helicopter.

Here is a small portion of the affidavit in which I describe the significance of what I found in the trash.

What or Who is an "affiant"?

Answer: An "affiant" is a person who is writing a search warrant affidavit and swearing that its contents are true and correct.

Note that in the passage below, I describe the significance of trash and what types of items are used to make methamphetamine. In a search warrant affidavit, nothing is assumed, and everything is thoroughly described. Probable cause is not emotional social media crap where we just accuse someone of being bad. Affidavits are official documents in which, if I lie in such a document, I will lose my job and go to jail.

The search warrant affidavit is detailed. My affidavit for this case was 10 pages. Myself and Officer Bush conducted numerous trash runs over a period of months, and we also deployed and camped on this ranch for a few days, hiding several hundred yards from the house, and watched the suspects manufacture methamphetamine in the open garage at night.

Here are some of the photos from the trash runs we did.

Notice here numerous boxes of cold and allergy medication. These products contain an ingredient crucial to manufacturing meth, including pseudoephedrine hydrochloride. This photo is from one trash bag. It is impossible for three people to consume this much allergy an cold medication in one week. People who manufacture meth, go through hundreds of boxes of this stuff that they buy, steal, or pay others to obtain. This activity is why today, you must show your identification to purchase allergy or cold medication which contains pseudoephedrine hydrochloride. It is because drug users and makers stole so much of this stuff from Walmart and many other places.

I also found and tested syringes with methamphetamine inside the trash over a period of weeks.