United States of America v. Dustin Michael Schirf

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
DUSTIN MICHAEL SCHIRF,
Defendant - Appellee.
No. 15-30284
D.C. No. 3:15-cr-00012-RRB-
KFM-1
MEMORANDUM*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Alaska
Ralph R. Beistline, Senior District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted June 6, 2016
Seattle, Washington
Before: PAEZ and BYBEE, Circuit Judges and TIGAR,** District Judge.
The United States appeals the district court’s order suppressing evidence
obtained during a warrantless search of Dustin Schirf’s home. We affirm.
FILED
JUN 21 2016
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
** The Honorable Jon S. Tigar, District Judge for the U.S. District Court
for the Northern District of California, sitting by designation.

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The district court correctly determined that the emergency aid exception did
not excuse the troopers’ warrantless entry into Schirf’s home. See Brigham City v.
Stuart, 547 U.S. 398, 403 (2006). A warrantless entry is justified under the
emergency aid exception when, based on the totality of the circumstances: (1) the
officers had an objectively reasonable basis for believing that there “was an
immediate need to protect others or themselves from serious harm,” and (2) the
manner and scope of the search were reasonable. United States v. Snipe, 515 F.3d
947, 952 (9th Cir. 2008).
Here, it was objectively unreasonable for the troopers to believe that entry
into Schirf’s trailer was necessary to protect themselves or others from imminent
harm. Upon arriving at the scene, officers saw no signs of a disturbance: no angry
voices, no broken glass, no blood, no door ajar, and nobody visibly hurt or upset.
Compare id. at 949; United States v. Martinez, 406 F.3d 1160, 1162-63 (9th Cir.
2005); United States v. Brooks, 367 F.3d 1128, 1130 (9th Cir. 2004). All they
heard was loud music playing at what appeared to be a Halloween party.
Moreover, the woman who answered the door denied that any domestic violence
incident had occurred or that any shots had been fired. Although the troopers later
discovered that Schirf was armed, that fact does not excuse the warrantless
entrance by Trooper Fowler because he did not know Schirf had a weapon at the
2

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time he entered. Under these circumstances, the troopers could not rely solely on
the content of the 911 call, which did not identify Schirf’s trailer specifically, to
justify their warrantless search.1
AFFIRMED.
1 Because we agree with the district court on prong one of the emergency aid
exception analysis, there is no need to address whether the manner and scope of the
search were reasonable.
3

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United States v. Schirf, No. 15-30284
BYBEE, Circuit Judge, dissenting:
I would find that the officers did have a reasonable basis for the warrantless
entry into Schirf’s trailer, and would reverse the decision of the district court. The
officers received a report of gunshots fired from a high-powered rifle, and a
woman screaming “Stop, help, stop, stop.” Schirf’s trailer was the only residence
in the area fitting the 911 caller’s description of the location of the gunshots.
When the officers made contact with the residents of the trailer, Melody Miller, the
woman who answered the door, admitted that she was the person who had
screamed, but then insisted, bizarrely, that it was in fact a goat on the property who
had screamed for help. The officers were not required to take Miller at her word
that everyone in the house was fine in light of the other circumstances, i.e., a report
of gunshots and screams for help coming from the residence, and Miller’s strange
response to the officers’ questions.
Moreover, one of the individuals the officers pulled out of the house was
indeed armed with a handgun, and attempted to conceal this from the officers:
Schirf. The fact that Schirf was armed, and had initially attempted to conceal this
fact, added another element of concern for safety—both the safety of the officers as
they attempted to investigate the situation and the safety of everyone else, as
FILED
JUN 21 2016
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
1

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Trooper Vik testified. See United States v. Snipe, 515 F.3d 947, 951–52 (9th Cir.
2008) (“Considering the totality of the circumstances, law enforcement must have
an objectively reasonable basis for concluding that there is an immediate need to
protect others or themselves from serious harm.”) (emphasis added). Most
importantly, perhaps, the officers knew there were multiple people in the
house—they could hear them—and the officers still had not located the rifle that
had fired the shots. The circumstances the officers confronted when they arrived at
the scene were not sufficient to negate the reasonableness of the officers’ belief,
based on the serious nature of the 911 call, that they were confronting an
emergency and that someone in Schirf’s trailer could be in need of emergency aid.
I respectfully dissent.
2

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