United States v. Ronald Ray Diaz

CLIFTON, Circuit Judge:

Government agents had a valid warrant to arrest Ronald Ray Diaz. They went to his house to arrest him, thinking he was home one weekday afternoon, as he had been in the past. When he didn’t respond they broke through the door and entered the house on their own, but Diaz wasn’t there and neither was anybody else. Inside the house, the agents discovered incriminating evidence. That evidence became the subject of a motion to suppress, denied by the district court, now before us on appeal.

The question we must consider is whether the agents, who had an arrest warrant but no…