This morning, the Supreme Court granted a petition for certiorari in Dahda v. United States, No. 17-43, to decide “[w]hether Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, 18 U.S.C. 2510–2520, requires suppression of evidence obtained pursuant to a wiretap order that is facially insufficient because the order exceeds the judge’s territorial jurisdiction.”
The Act authorizes judges to issue wiretap orders to intercept communications within the territorial jurisdiction of the court in which the judge is sitting (and outside that jurisdiction but within the United States in the case of a mobile interception device. 18 U.S.C. § 2518(3). Evidence may be suppressed if derived from a wiretap order that is “insufficient on its face.” 18 U.S.C. § 2518(10)(a). The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals’ opinion below acknowledged that the wiretap orders in petitioner’s case were extraterritorial and thus facially insufficient. But acknowledging a circuit split, the lower court found the evidence was admissible after concluding the Act's territorial-limitation did not implicate a “core concern” underlying the wiretap statute.
Kannon K. Shanmugam is counsel of record for Mr. Dahda.