## Facts

- Microsoft investigators contacted Edward Cunnius through Craigslist ads and made an undercover test purchase of software at his home in Everett, Washington.
- Based on the investigation, the United States sought a warrant to search Cunnius’s residence, seize computers and other digital devices, and search all electronically stored information (ESI) for evidence of copyright infringement and trafficking in counterfeit goods.
- The application requested authority to search all ESI on the devices “related to the use of the devices,” without segregating materials through a filter/taint team.
- The application also declined to limit reliance on the plain-view doctrine during the ESI review and contemplated seeking a second warrant if evidence of other crimes was found.
- The court advised the government it would not approve the warrant as submitted due to lack of limiting procedures; the government declined to revise the request and sought a written ruling.

## Issues

1. Whether a warrant authorizing seizure of all digital devices and a comprehensive search of all ESI, without filter/taint procedures and without limiting plain-view reliance, satisfies the Fourth Amendment’s particularity requirement.
2. Whether, in this digital-search context, the requested terms would function as a prohibited general warrant by leaving excessive discretion to investigators.

## Decision

- The court denied the warrant application.
- The court concluded the requested authority amounted to an overbroad general warrant under the Fourth Amendment and controlling circuit law.
- The denial rested on the government’s refusal to employ a filter/taint process and its insistence on unrestricted use of plain view while reviewing all ESI.

## Legal Principles

- The Fourth Amendment requires warrants to particularly describe the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized, and it forbids general exploratory searches.
- Particularity requires meaningful limits on officer discretion; a warrant that effectively permits a broad rummaging through all information on a digital device risks becoming a general warrant.
- Because digital devices contain large volumes of varied personal information, additional ex ante safeguards may be necessary to confine the search to evidence supported by probable cause.
- Filter/taint procedures can serve as structural limits by screening out privileged or irrelevant data before the investigative team reviews it.
- Unrestricted plain-view use, when combined with authority to open and examine broad categories of digital files, can expand a targeted warrant into a de facto search for evidence of any crime.

## Conclusion

The court denied the requested digital-device warrant because its terms authorized a sweeping review of all stored data without protective procedures and without limiting plain-view use, failing the Fourth Amendment’s particularity requirement and resembling a prohibited general warrant.


In re United States's Application for a Search Warrant to Seize and Search Electronic Devices from Cunnius, 770 F. Supp. 2d 1138 (W.D. Wash. 2011)