UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 05-4444
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
versus
RONALD DEAN MULLINS,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western
District of Virginia, at Roanoke. Norman K. Moon, District Judge.
(CR-04-7003)
Submitted: October 12, 2005 Decided: November 8, 2005
Before WILKINSON and LUTTIG, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior
Circuit Judge.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
John S. Edwards, LAW OFFICE OF JOHN S. EDWARDS, Roanoke, Virginia,
for Appellant. John L. Brownlee, United States Attorney, Joseph W.
H. Mott, Assistant United States Attorney, Roanoke, Virginia, for
Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
See Local Rule 36(c).
PER CURIAM:
Ronald Dean Mullins appeals his convictions for
possession of a firearm and ammunition as a previously convicted
felon in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) (2000), and possession
of cocaine in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 844 (2000). Mullins asserts
that the district court erred in denying his motion to suppress
evidence obtained during a police search of his vehicle parked at
his residence because the vehicle was beyond the scope of the
search warrant. Finding no error, we affirm.
We review the district court’s factual findings on a
suppression motion for clear error and its legal conclusions de
novo. United States v. Grossman, 400 F.3d 212, 216 (4th Cir.
2005). When a suppression motion has been denied, we review the
evidence in the light most favorable to the Government. United
States v. Perkins, 363 F.3d 317, 320 (4th Cir. 2004), cert. denied,
125 S. Ct. 867 (2005).
Here, the search warrant at issue authorized law
enforcement officers to search any vehicle located on the curtilage
of the residence. The bounds of the curtilage are determined by
analyzing “[t]he proximity of the area claimed to be curtilage to
the home, whether the area is included with an enclosure
surrounding the home, the nature of the uses to which the area is
put, and the steps taken by the resident to protect the area from
observation by people passing by.” United States v. Dunn, 480 U.S.
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294, 301 (1987). Mullins’s vehicle was parked on the property
between the road and a chain-link fence a short distance from the
residence’s entrance. The residence was located in a rural area,
had no apparent driveway or other parking area, and it appeared
that the space between the road and fence was regularly used as a
parking pad. The fence itself was constructed to contain dogs, not
for purposes of privacy, and included two gates to facilitate
movement between the residence and parking area. We therefore find
no error in the district court’s conclusion that the officers had
an objectively reasonable belief regarding the scope of the warrant
as including Mullins’s vehicle.* See generally Maryland v.
Garrison, 480 U.S. 79, 86-88 (1987) (finding no Fourth Amendment
violation when officers acted reasonably and in good faith when
executing overly broad warrant).
Accordingly, the district court did not err when it
denied Mullins’s motion to suppress. We therefore affirm Mullins’s
convictions and sentence. We dispense with oral argument because
the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the
materials before the court and argument would not aid the
decisional process.
AFFIRMED
*
We do not decide whether the vehicle was parked in the home’s
curtilage because the record adequately establishes the objective
reasonableness of the officers’ belief of the warrant’s scope. See
United States v. Patterson, 278 F.3d 315, 317 (4th Cir. 2002).
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