United States of America v. Darnell Keith Jones

United States Court of Appeals
For the Eighth Circuit
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No. 24-2922
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United States of America
Plaintiff - Appellee
v.
Darnell Keith Jones
Defendant - Appellant
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Appeal from United States District Court
for the Southern District of Iowa - Central
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Submitted: December 15, 2025
Filed: April 3, 2026
[Unpublished]
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Before LOKEN, SMITH, and KOBES, Circuit Judges.
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PER CURIAM.
Ottumwa, Iowa Police officers responded to a disturbance call from a local
apartment building. Officers entered the apartment and found Darnell Keith Jones.
Jones’s presence violated a court order forbidding his contact with the resident. The
officers also saw evidence of marijuana use by Jones, including ash on his shirt and
some of the drug in the refrigerator. The officers arrested Jones and seized his
cellphone. Several days later, an investigator applied for a search warrant from a

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state court judge to examine Jones’s cellphone for evidence of drug trafficking. The
investigator’s affidavit detailed Jones’s presence in the apartment and the marijuana
found there. The investigator noted that Jones’s criminal history included a
marijuana offense. The investigator also noted that the quantity observed was
consistent with distribution. The affidavit noted that drug dealers and drug users use
cell phones in connection with their crimes. The judge issued the warrant.
The government downloaded the contents of the phone pursuant to the warrant
and returned the phone to Jones. Later, officers applied for and obtained additional
search warrants to further search the downloaded contents of the phone, Jones’s
Meta account, and his Snapchat account for evidence of human trafficking.
The phone search revealed incriminating evidence beyond drug use and drug
trafficking. Based on the new evidence, the government charged Jones with multiple
sex offenses, including sex trafficking and enticement of a minor. Jones filed a
motion to suppress, which the district court1 denied. Jones later conditionally
pleaded guilty. In his plea, Jones reserved his right to appeal the court’s denial of his
motion to suppress. He now pursues this issue on appeal.
Jones contends that the investigator’s affidavit supporting the initial search
warrant failed to establish probable cause that officers would find evidence of drug
trafficking on his phone. He further argues that the Leon2 good-faith exception to
the exclusionary rule ought not to apply. He avers that the affidavit was so deficient
that no reasonable officer would have believed it sufficient. Relatedly, he argues that
the district court should have excluded all the evidence found in the cell phone as
fruit of the poisonous tree.
1 The Honorable Rebecca Goodgame Ebinger, United States District Judge for
the Southern District of Iowa.
2United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897 (1984).

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“Probable cause exists when the totality of the circumstances shows a fair
probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular
place.” United States v. Ivey, 91 F.4th 915, 917 (8th Cir. 2024) (citation modified).
We must “determine whether the issuing magistrate judge had a substantial basis for
concluding that probable cause existed.” Id. “Though the issue of probable cause is
reviewed de novo,” United States v. Keele, 589 F.3d 940, 943 (8th Cir. 2009), we
“pay great deference to the probable cause determinations of the issuing judge or
magistrate, and limit our inquiry to discerning whether the issuing judge had a
substantial basis for concluding that probable cause existed,” United States v. Butler,
594 F.3d 955, 962 (8th Cir. 2010) (citation modified).
“A supporting affidavit establishes probable cause to issue a search warrant if
it sets forth sufficient facts to establish that there is a fair probability that contraband
or evidence of criminal activity will be found in the particular place to be searched.”
United States v. Mazzulla, 932 F.3d 1091, 1098 (8th Cir. 2019) (citation modified).
“Not only may an issuing judge ‘draw reasonable inferences from the totality of the
circumstances in determining whether probable cause exists to issue a warrant, we
have also recognized that law enforcement officers may make reasonable inferences
in preparing affidavits in support of a warrant.’” United States v. Brackett, 846 F.3d
987, 992 (8th Cir. 2017) (quoting United States v. Thompson, 210 F.3d 855, 860 (8th
Cir. 2000)).
When the issuing judge relies solely on the affidavit presented, “only that
information which is found within the four corners of the affidavit may be considered
in determining the existence of probable cause.” United States v. Gladney, 48 F.3d
309, 312 (8th Cir. 1995) (quoting United States v. Leichtling, 684 F.2d 553, 555 (8th
Cir. 1982)). Whether probable cause supports the issuance of the warrant is “based
upon a common-sense reading of the entire affidavit.” United States v. Seidel, 677
F.3d 334, 338 (8th Cir. 2012) (quoting United States v. Sumpter, 669 F.2d 1215,
1218 (8th Cir. 1982)).

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Upon review, we affirm the district court’s conclusion that the search warrant
for Jones’s cell phone was supported by probable cause. The affidavit described the
officer’s experience, the officers’ interactions with Jones upon entry, the quantities
of marijuana found in the apartment, and the connection between cellphone usage
and illegal drug distribution.
Jones attacks the warrant as relying on an unsupported inference that he used
his phone to distribute drugs. His attack fails. We have held it “reasonable to infer
that cell phones found at a location associated with drug trafficking and on the person
of an individual associated with drug trafficking had a fair probability of containing
evidence of the crime.” United States v. Eggerson, 999 F.3d 1121, 1127 (8th Cir.
2021) (citation modified).
He also argues that the affidavit failed to sufficiently draw a nexus between
the phone and any criminal activity. The contents of the affidavit show otherwise.
The affidavit noted his drug-related criminal history and mentioned that drug users
and dealers commonly use their cell phones to further those activities. See id. at 1125
(“If firearms are tools of the drug trade . . . there is little reason to believe that cell
phones are not.” (citation modified)); see also United States v. Smith, 581 F.3d 692,
694 (8th Cir. 2009) (discussing defendant’s prior drug conviction in probable cause
analysis). As we have previously noted, “[i]t would be unreasonable and impractical
to demand that judges evaluating probable cause must turn a blind eye to the virtual
certainty that drug dealers use cell phones.” Eggerson, 999 F.3d at 1127. Jones
argues that the affidavit used only boilerplate language, but “[w]e will not disturb a
court’s finding of probable cause ‘unless there was no substantial basis for that
finding.’” Brackett, 846 F.3d at 992 (quoting United States v. Montgomery, 527 F.3d
682, 686 (8th Cir. 2008)); see Kaley v. United States, 571 U.S. 320, 338 (2014)
(noting that probable cause “is not a high bar”).
On this record, we hold “that the magistrate had a substantial basis for
concluding that probable cause existed.” Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 238–39
(1983) (citation modified).

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For the reasons discussed above, we affirm the district court denial of Jones’s
motion to suppress.3
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3 Because the warrant issued here was valid, the Leon good-faith exception and
the fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine are not implicated. Cf. Leon, 468 U.S. at 897;
United States v. Ortiz-Cervantes, 868 F.3d 695, 702 (8th Cir. 2017) (“Under the
good-faith exception, evidence seized pursuant to a search warrant issued by a
magistrate that is later determined to be invalid, will not be suppressed if the
executing officer’s reliance upon the warrant was objectively reasonable.” (quoting
United States v. Proell, 485 F.3d 427, 430 (8th Cir. 2007)).

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