Diamonte Taylor was convicted by a Superior Court jury for gang-related murder and violent felonies. On appeal, he contended that the evidence obtained from his smartphones was gathered under an unconstitutional search warrant, which lacked specificity in time and scope, thus violating his rights under the Fourth Amendment, the Delaware Constitution, and state law. The court found that this error was not harmless, leading to a reversal of his convictions and a remand for a new trial without the improperly seized evidence. Taylor was identified as a member of the Wilmington gang "Shoot to Kill" (STK), involved in violent incidents following the murder of an STK affiliate in 2015. Key testimony in the trial included that of Kevon Harris-Dickerson, an STK member who implicated Taylor and another associate in a May 2016 crime spree. Specific incidents included a robbery where Taylor and an accomplice used a gun to threaten victims and steal items, with evidence linking Taylor to the crime through fingerprints and witness identifications.
On May 16, 2016, Shango Miller was shot outside his grandmother's house in Wilmington while playing with family. After the incident, Miller informed a forensic nurse that he was outside smoking when he heard a shot and ran inside. He identified the shooter as "D-Nice" and recognized Taylor in a photo line-up. Surveillance footage showed two individuals, later identified as Smith and Taylor, fleeing the scene shortly after the shooting, with one wearing a distinctive hat. Police recovered a 9mm shell casing from the location.
On May 18, 2016, Temijiun Overby was shot during an attempted robbery on Thatcher Street. Video footage captured Smith approaching Overby and his friends while Harris-Dickerson remained nearby. After Overby refused to surrender his belongings, Smith shot him. Latasha Pierce, Harris-Dickerson's girlfriend, testified that Harris-Dickerson possessed a 9mm Canik pistol, which Smith requested before they followed Overby. Investigators found a 9mm shell casing at the shooting scene.
The following day, May 19, 2016, high school freshman Brandon Wingo was shot while walking home. Witnesses noted a suspicious figure in a black jacket who fired shots at Wingo and his classmates, resulting in Wingo's death. Treasure Evans, who saw the incident, recalled seeing Taylor drive by shortly before the shooting, noting he was in a light blue car and wearing a black hoodie. The shooter was described as wearing all black but was not clearly identified.
Evans identified Taylor as the shooter based on recognizing him in a vehicle and during a photo line-up. Evans’s mother, Nadana Sullivan, witnessed the shooter flee with a gun but did not see his face; however, she was informed by children that the shooter was named Diamonte. Sullivan had previously seen Taylor handling a gun days before the murder. Harris-Dickerson, who was with Taylor and Smith on the day of the murder, testified that they had planned to retaliate against Wingo for disrespectful comments made online about a deceased gang member. On the day of the shooting, after dropping off Pierce at work, Harris-Dickerson drove with Taylor to Clifford Brown Walk, where Taylor expressed a desire to shoot Wingo from the car. Harris-Dickerson refused, and Taylor exited the vehicle with a gun. Shortly after, Harris-Dickerson heard gunfire and returned to the scene, where he saw Taylor running toward a nearby house. Inside, Taylor confessed to shooting Wingo, and they later drove past Wingo's body, with Taylor reportedly laughing. The group traveled to North Carolina afterward, with Harris-Dickerson stating that Taylor and Smith shared possession of a 9mm firearm used in multiple shootings, including that of Wingo. On May 30, 2016, Brandon Wingo's cousin, Shawn Garrett, noted a suspicious vehicle, prompting him and his friend Tiheed Roane to flee. Roane observed an individual, later identified as Grimey, brandishing a gun, while another, named D-Nice, mimicked shooting gestures. On the same day, police responded to a report of a man with a gun, leading to the arrest of Smith, who matched the description of the suspect. During the arrest, a firearm was recovered from Smith's waistband.
On June 1, 2016, United States Marshals arrested Taylor, who was a passenger in a car driven by Corliss Pierce, sister of Latasha Pierce. During the arrest, Marshals discovered two smartphones in Taylor's pockets: a white Samsung and a white Motorola. A subsequent search of the car, authorized by a warrant, uncovered two additional smartphones—a black ZTE and another white Samsung with a pink cover, which Latasha Pierce identified as hers. A search of Taylor's residence at 508 Shearman Street yielded two black coats, a black gun case, and a box of 9mm ammunition.
Wilmington Police Detective MacKenzie Kirlin sought a warrant to search Taylor's smartphones, citing connections to gang-related shootings and the belief that smartphones are used for criminal communications. On June 16, 2016, a Justice of the Peace Court issued a warrant to search for a wide array of data on the devices. Using Cellebrite software, police extracted extensive data from the white Motorola smartphone, totaling 4,645 pages of information from January 2005 to June 2016, including 17,672 data files, of which 98 percent were included in the final report.
Subsequently, a grand jury indicted Taylor and others on multiple charges, including Robbery First Degree and Murder First Degree. Taylor moved to suppress evidence from his smartphones, arguing the search warrant lacked probable cause and specificity. The Superior Court denied this motion, finding sufficient probable cause based on communications related to gang activity and concluding that the warrant was not a general warrant lacking particularity.
The court found that the warrant for searching Taylor's smartphones was specifically limited to certain data types relevant to ongoing criminal investigations, which included references to specific incidents and a narrow time frame. The search yielded incriminating evidence, including text messages and images linked to a murder. Taylor pled guilty to charges and testified against others, while his case was severed for trial. At trial, a 95-page excerpt from a 4,645-page extraction report of his smartphone was introduced, leading to his conviction on multiple charges, including First Degree Murder. The court sentenced him to a mandatory life sentence plus additional years for other charges. On appeal, Taylor contended that the warrant constituted a general warrant in violation of constitutional protections, claiming it lacked specificity and time limits. The State countered that the warrant was not general due to the context provided in the application and argued that any error was harmless given other strong evidence against Taylor. The appellate court stated it would review the constitutional issues and the Superior Court's legal conclusions de novo, while assessing factual findings for support and errors.
The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and Article I, Section 6 of the Delaware Constitution both protect individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures, requiring warrants to be issued based on probable cause and to describe with particularity the place to be searched and items to be seized. Delaware law mandates that search warrants specify the person or place to be searched and the items sought in detail. A judge or magistrate must find probable cause based on the affidavit's facts for a warrant to be issued, ensuring a connection between the crime and the location to be searched.
In the case of Buckham v. State, the court emphasized that a search warrant must demonstrate more than probable cause; it must provide sufficient facts for a judicial officer to reasonably believe that the sought property will be found at the specified location. This legal framework applies particularly to searches of smartphones, which contain extensive personal information that reveals intimate aspects of individuals' lives. The U.S. Supreme Court in Riley v. California recognized that smartphone searches pose significant privacy concerns and deserve heightened scrutiny to prevent the risk of general warrants that might lead to unjustified invasions of privacy. Thus, judicial officers must exercise heightened vigilance when issuing warrants for digital devices.
In the case of Buckham, the police secured a search warrant for smartphone data to trace the defendant's movements over the six weeks preceding his arrest. However, the warrant was overly broad, permitting a comprehensive search of all data on the smartphone, including call logs, images, and text messages, rather than limiting it to GPS data relevant to the alleged Attempted Murder 1st Degree. At trial, incriminating Facebook messages were introduced, but it was determined that the vague allegations in the warrant application failed to establish a clear connection between the phone data and the shooting, undermining the trial court's probable cause finding.
The court emphasized that search warrants must specify the items to be searched with sufficient detail and must not exceed the probable cause on which they are based. The Buckham warrant inadequately defined a time frame for the search and allowed access to irrelevant data categories. This ruling drew on prior case law, particularly Wheeler v. State, which also criticized warrants lacking particularity and time limitations. In Wheeler, the warrants were deemed general and unconstitutional due to their failure to restrict searches to relevant dates and the specific nature of the evidence sought.
The Taylor search warrant was similarly criticized for authorizing a comprehensive search of all digital content on devices without a relevant time frame and employing vague language, echoing the deficiencies noted in both Buckham and Wheeler. Overall, these cases underscore the constitutional requirement for specificity in search warrants to prevent exploratory searches that violate privacy rights.
The Taylor search warrant was deemed unconstitutional because it permitted investigators to conduct an expansive search of all contents on Taylor's smartphones without sufficient specificity, violating the particularity requirement. The Superior Court acknowledged a logical connection between the items sought and the search location, referencing incidents in the Kirlin affidavit and potential communication between Taylor and Harris-Dickerson. However, it concluded that the warrant did not adequately limit the search to data relevant to the probable cause, thus not requiring further examination of probable cause sufficiency.
The court criticized the warrant’s authorization to search "any and all data," which failed to restrict the scope to specific types of information linked to the investigation. Previous cases, Buckham and Wheeler, set a precedent for more stringent standards in warrants for electronic devices, emphasizing the need for limits on time frames and specific data types. The argument that the warrant was not a general warrant because it specified the smartphones and certain data types was rejected; the broad language allowed for an unrestricted search, undermining Fourth Amendment protections meant to require judicial oversight of search parameters.
Investigators extracted nearly all data from Taylor's smartphones over an eleven-year period and searched broadly for evidence of criminal conduct. The Superior Court incorrectly concluded that the investigators operated within the limited scope of the search warrant. The language in the affidavit mirrored that of the warrant, which included broad terms such as "any and all data" and "including but not limited to," failing to restrict the search to specific evidence of witness tampering. Previous case law, specifically Starkey v. State, upheld similar warrants that limited searches to relevant data types. However, the legal context has evolved since then, particularly in light of the United States Supreme Court's rulings, which now require more specificity in warrants for electronic devices. The State argued that any general warrant defects could be mitigated by restricting evidence to the timeframe outlined in the warrant, but the distinction between general and overly broad warrants indicates that evidence obtained under a general warrant cannot be partially suppressed. A general warrant grants excessive discretion to law enforcement, resulting in potential violations of constitutional protections against unreasonable searches.
The legal document addresses the issue of the validity of a warrant, specifically highlighting that a warrant lacking probable cause cannot authorize the seizure of items. While an overly broad warrant can be redacted to remove invalid portions, a general warrant necessitates the suppression of all evidence obtained under it. The Taylor warrant failed to specifically and inclusively describe what was to be seized, granting executing officers excessive discretion to rummage through the defendant's belongings, constituting a constitutional violation that cannot be remedied by limited suppression.
Furthermore, it distinguishes between ordinary evidentiary errors and those of constitutional significance. In cases of constitutional errors, the State must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the error did not influence the verdict. The Taylor warrant is categorized as a general warrant, making the State's reliance on previous cases misplaced. The document concludes that it cannot be determined beyond a reasonable doubt that the jury's verdict would have remained unchanged without the illegally obtained smartphone evidence, which implicated Taylor in serious crimes but not in the armed robbery.
The State presented text messages from Taylor that implied he shot victims Miller and Wingo, and indicated that he and Smith were following Garrett and Roane during the aggravated menacing incident. Additionally, the State introduced photographs of Taylor posing with a gun and wearing a hat that matched one seen in security footage related to the crimes. Consequently, the jury convicted Taylor on all charges supported by evidence from the smartphone extraction report, while acquitting him of charges related to the armed robbery of Rivera and McDonald, which were not included in the report. The smartphone evidence was deemed critical to the State's case, and its admission was determined not to be a harmless error. The court emphasized the importance of the warrant requirement in preserving constitutional values, asserting that the Superior Court should have granted Taylor's motion to suppress the evidence obtained from his smartphones. The judgment was reversed, Taylor's convictions vacated, and the case remanded for a new trial. Justice Vaughn concurred, noting that the warrant did not adequately limit the scope of the seizure.
