United States v. Rochelle

*Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion
should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited
circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
F I L E D
November 14, 2006
Charles R. Fulbruge III
Clerk
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
No. 06-40588
Summary Calendar
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
RANDY CRAIG ROCHELLE,
Defendant-Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
For the Eastern District of Texas
(USDC No. 1:05-CR-68-ALL)
Before KING, HIGGINBOTHAM, and GARZA, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
Defendant Randy Craig Rochelle pleaded guilty to possession of
child pornography in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(2)(B). His
plea agreement preserved his right to appeal the district court’s
suppression ruling, which we affirm.
A FBI search of Rochelle’s home in Beaumont revealed an
extensive collection of child pornography. Rochelle contends that
the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule does not apply
because the search warrant was based on an affidavit so lacking in

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1United States v. Cherma, 184 F.3d 403, 407 (5th Cir. 1999).
2United States v. Cisneros, 112 F.3d 1272, 1278 (5th Cir. 1997).
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indicia of probable cause as to render belief in its existence
entirely unreasonable.1 We disagree.
In general, “[a]n officer may rely in good faith on the
validity of a warrant so long as the warrant is supported by more
than a bare bones affidavit.”2 The search warrant affidavit here
was not bare bones.
The affidavit reported that for a thirty day period the FBI
monitored the “Shangri_la” website receiving emails just as members
of the eGroup would and received 77 emails, which contained 22
images of child pornography and 10 images of child erotica. The
FBI obtained the subscriber list to Shangri_la which included the
appellant, who was a member for 7 days until the site was shut down
by Yahoo. During that seven day period, the appellant would have
received 24 emails. The affiant reported that one of those 24
emails contained three photographs of a pre-pubescent female
wearing only white underwear. Another email had four pictures
containing a nude, pre-pubescent female. The affiant classified
all of these pictures, conservatively, as child erotica.
Appellant now urges that these pictures of a nude child were
mere erotica and, as such, did not suggest a fair probability that
he was also in possession of child pornography. This argument
surely would have held the interest of a jury had he gone to trial,

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3United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 923 (1984) (internal quotation marks
omitted).
3
but it does not convince us that the lack of probable cause was so
obvious as to “render official belief in its existence entirely
unreasonable.”3 The district court’s suppression ruling is
AFFIRMED.

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