United States of America v. Quintin A. Bell

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
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No. 00-4154
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
v.
QUINTIN A. BELL,
Appellant
___________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Pennsylvania
District Court Judge: The Honorable D. Brooks Smith, Chief Judge
(D.C. Criminal No. 00-cr-00006)
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Submitted Under Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)
January 17, 2002
Before: RENDELL, FUENTES, and MAGILL, Circuit Judges
(Opinion Filed: January 29, 2002)
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MEMORANDUM OPINION
________________________ FUENTES, Circuit Judge:
Tried before a jury, inmate, Quintin A. Bell, was convicted of unlawful possession
of marijuana by an inmate in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1791 (a) (2). Bell was sentenced to a
term of fifteen months and a three year term of supervised release. Bell’s conviction was
the result of an investigation of drug smuggling into the prison facility. On February 2,
2000, prison officials believed that Bell had ingested or secreted a quantity of marijuana
during a visit with his wife, Monique Bell. After an initial search yielded no contraband,
he was placed into a dry cell where his activities were videotaped and his feces and urine
were examined for drugs. Eventually, while in the dry cell, Bell’s feces was found to
contain Latex, a material commonly used in connection with drug smuggling. Based on a
belief that, at one point, Bell had ingested the contents of the Latex material found in his
feces, officials obtained three urine samples from Bell. All three tested positive for THC,
a metabolite of marijuana.
On appeal, Bell contends that prison officials did not have reasonable suspicion to
place him in a dry cell and to search his urine and feces and to videotape his activities
while in the cell. Specifically, Bell alleges that since the strip, visual, and body cavity
searches conducted on him revealed no contraband, prison officials never possessed the
requisite reasonable suspicion to confine and detain him in a dry cell while placing his
exercise of bodily functions under surveillance. He maintains, then, that the ensuing
search of his feces and urine was unconstitutional, and that the results of those searches
should have been suppressed by the District Court.
We conclude that prison officials had a reasonable basis to place Bell in the dry

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cell and that, because Bell had no reasonable expectation of privacy in his cell, no
constitutional rights were violated by the search of his urine and feces. We note that by
Bell’s own concession, the constitutionality of placing inmates in dry cells has been
repeatedly upheld. See, e.g., United States v. Holloway, 128 F.3d 1254, 1256 (8th Cir.
1997). Moreover, we find that under the circumstances leading up to and surrounding
Bell’s detention, there existed a reasonable suspicion on the part of prison officials, that
both warranted and justified the use of the dry cell facility.
We further agree with the District Court’s conclusion that "the search of urine and
feces removed from Inmate Bell’s dry cell did not violate his rights under the Fourth
Amendment because he possessed no legitimate expectation of privacy therein". As noted
by the District Court:
Here, the search at issue concerned items removed from Bell’s ce
No efforts were taken by prison officials to physically extract from
...Bell’s person urine, feces, tissue or any other bodily fluid. Instead
prison officials if I may be forgiven this lapse into cliche simply
waited for nature to take its course. Accordingly, under Hudson v.
Palmer, 468 U.S. at 526, the search of the urine and feces removed
from...Bell’s dry cell did not violate his rights under the Fourth
Amendment because he possessed no legitimate expectation of
privacy therein.
In these circumstances, we discern no error on the part of the District Court.
Accordingly, we will affirm Bell’s judgment of conviction and the sentenced imposed.
_____________________________
TO THE CLERK OF THE COURT:
Kindly file the foregoing Opinion.
/s/Julio M. Fuentes
Circuit Judg

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