TitleUnited States of America v. Lawrence D. Adkinson

No. 17-3381

United States Court of Appeals: Seventh Circuit

Decided on February 14^th, 2019

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ISSUE:

Whether a company, as a private party, acted as an agent of the police in violation of the Fourth Amendment by providing data to the government that was collected from tower dumps without a search warrant. 

HOLDING:

The Court held that a company, as the private party, was not transformed into an agent of state by furnishing data to government that had been collected from tower dumps without search warrant.  Where the company acted in its own interest to prevent future robberies of its stores and recovery of its property, there is no evidence that it expected benefits from the government.

“A search or seizure by a private party does not implicate the Fourth Amendment

unless the private party is acting as an instrument or agent of the government.”

FACTS OF THE CASE:

Defendant Lawrence Adkinson robbed T-Mobile phone stores in Indiana and Kentucky.  As part of its investigation, T-Mobile conducted tower dumps: it pulled data from cell sites near the stores to identify which phones had connected to them—and thus were close to the crimes.  T-Mobile’s privacy policy allowed T-Mobile to disclose information about its phones’ users to satisfy any applicable legal process or enforceable governmental request or to protect its rights or interests, property or safety or that of others. Law enforcement used the information from T-Mobile to obtain a court order under the Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2703, granting the FBI access to additional cell-site data.

COURT’S ANALYSIS:

The Court held that a company, as the private party, was not transformed into an agent of state by furnishing data to government that had been collected from tower dumps without search warrant.  The Court makes a distinguishes between this case and Carpenter.  In Carpenter, the Supreme Court held that the government may not, without a warrant supported by probable cause, compel a cellular service company to search for and supply the data that its cell sites reveal about a user’s past movements in violation of the Fourth Amendment.  In this case, the record does not show that the government compelled T-Mobile to provide its data. 

The Court agrees that the Fourth Amendment was not violated for three primary reasons:

(1) T-Mobile is a private party and Adkinson has not shown that it was the government’s agent.  In order to show agency, defendant must establish that T-Mobile agreed to act on the government’s behalf and to be subject to its control or that the government ratified T-Mobile’s conduct as its own. T-Mobile acted in its own interest to prevent future robberies of its stores and recovery of its property, there is no evidence that it expected benefits from the government.

(2) Adkinson consented to T-Mobile collecting and sharing his cell-site information.  As a condition of using a phone serviced by T-Mobile, Adkinson agreed to T-Mobile’s policy that T-Mobile could disclose information when reasonably necessary to protect its rights, interests, property, or safety, or that of others. And in accordance with its policy, T-Mobile shared information with law enforcement after one of its stores was robbed at gunpoint.

(3) Carpenter did not invalidate warrantless tower dumps, which identified phones near one location, at one time because the Supreme Court declined to rule that these dumps were searches requiring warrants.