Pagan-Gonzalez v. Moreno

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The First Circuit vacated in part the district court's grant of Defendants' motion to dismiss Plaintiff's complaint, holding that the warrantless search in this case violated the Fourth Amendment because the circumstances, including deception by law enforcement officers, vitiated the consent given by Plaintiff.Plaintiff alleged that he consented to FBI agents' entry into his home and search of his computers only because the officers lied about the true reason of why there were there and what they were looking for. The district court granted Defendants' motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim. The First Circuit vacated in part and affirmed in part, holding (1) because the totality of the circumstances pointed to a situation involving beguilement, the government did not meet its burden to prove voluntariness, and therefore, the warrantless entry into Plaintiff's home and the search and seizure of his computer violated the Fourth Amendment; (2) Defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity on Plaintiff's search-based Fourth Amendment claim because any reasonable officer would have recognized that the circumstances were impermissibly coercive; and (3) even if Plaintiffs' malicious prosecution claim had merit, Defendants would be entitled to qualified immunity. View "Pagan-Gonzalez v. Moreno" on Justia Law