Bailey’s Spatial Constraint Does Not Bar a Probation Officer from Directing a Supervised-Releasee Home During Execution of a Residential Warrant

Introduction

In United States v. Matthew Scott Rocco, No. 24-4609 (4th Cir. Sept. 9, 2025) (unpublished), the Fourth Circuit affirmed the denial of a motion to suppress evidence—a cellular telephone—seized from a residence during execution of a valid search warrant. The dispute centered on whether a probation officer (overseeing a defendant on federal supervised release) violated the Fourth Amendment, and the “spatial constraint” recognized in Bailey v. United States, by directing the defendant to return home so that he would be present when agents executed the warrant.

Rocco, a recidivist supervised-releasee, had been convicted of receiving and possessing child pornography. He challenged only the suppression ruling, arguing that his return-home directive, coordinated with law enforcement, impermissibly expanded the authority recognized in Bailey, which limits detentions incident to the execution of a search warrant to the immediate vicinity of the premises. The Fourth Circuit rejected that argument and held the directive was a reasonable, minimally intrusive measure in light of the diminished privacy interests of supervisees and the government’s substantial interests in supervision, public protection, and reducing recidivism.

Summary of the Opinion

Standard of review: The court reviewed the district court’s factual findings for clear error and legal conclusions de novo, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the government after the suppression motion was denied.
Fourth Amendment framework: Applying the reasonableness balancing test from United States v. Knights—assessing the supervisee’s diminished privacy expectations against the government’s supervision and public-safety interests—the court held the directive to return home was a minimal intrusion and reasonable under the totality of the circumstances.
Bailey’s spatial constraint: Bailey’s limitation on detentions incident to the execution of a search warrant did not prevent a probation officer from instructing a supervised-releasee to return home where the supervisee was already subject to at-home visits as a release condition and the government’s interests were compelling.
Alternative ground: The panel also deferred to the district court’s alternative finding that the inevitable discovery doctrine would have applied to the phone, given the ongoing investigation and the probation officer’s full knowledge of it.
Disposition: The convictions were affirmed.

Detailed Analysis

1. Precedents and Authorities Cited

The opinion proceeds from a settled line of Fourth Amendment cases governing searches and seizures involving persons under court supervision—probationers, parolees, and supervised-releasees—and the standard of review applicable to suppression decisions.

United States v. Knights, 534 U.S. 112 (2001): The Supreme Court articulated that the “touchstone of the Fourth Amendment is reasonableness,” determined by balancing an individual’s privacy interests against the government’s legitimate needs. Knights upheld a warrantless search of a probationer subject to a search condition on reasonable suspicion, emphasizing the probationer’s diminished expectations of privacy and the government’s substantial interests in supervision and preventing recidivism. The Rocco panel relies on Knights both for the balancing framework and for the proposition that a supervisee’s status informs both sides of the balance.
Samson v. California, 547 U.S. 843 (2006): Samson held that parolees have even fewer expectations of privacy than probationers, validating suspicionless searches of parolees under a state statute. The panel cites Samson to underscore the well-established principle that supervised individuals have diminished privacy interests and that the government’s interests in combating recidivism and ensuring compliance are substantial.
United States v. Reyes, 283 F.3d 446 (2d Cir. 2002): Reyes treated supervised release on par with probation for Fourth Amendment purposes and distinguished between intrusive “probation searches” and relatively less intrusive “home visits,” which need not be supported by reasonable suspicion when authorized by supervision conditions. The panel references Reyes to place supervised release within the same analytical framework.
Bailey v. United States, 568 U.S. 186 (2013): Bailey limited the authority (announced in earlier cases) to detain occupants incident to the execution of a search warrant, imposing a “spatial constraint”: such detentions must occur in the immediate vicinity of the premises to be searched. The panel acknowledges Bailey’s balancing analysis and “spatial constraint,” but distinguishes it in the supervised-release context.
Standards-of-review authorities: United States v. Davis, 94 F.4th 310 (4th Cir. 2024) (standard of review on suppression rulings), United States v. Fall, 955 F.3d 363 (4th Cir. 2020) (viewing evidence favorably to government after denial), United States v. Cox, 744 F.3d 305 (4th Cir. 2014), Anderson v. Bessemer City, 470 U.S. 564 (1985), and United States v. Stevenson, 396 F.3d 538 (4th Cir. 2005) (clear-error deference). These frame the appellate lens through which the record was evaluated.
United States v. Hamilton, 986 F.3d 413 (4th Cir. 2021): The panel cites Hamilton for the core purposes of supervised release—public protection and rehabilitation—thereby strengthening the government-interest side of the Knights balancing.
Inevitable discovery doctrine: United States v. Alston, 941 F.3d 132 (4th Cir. 2019) (standard—preponderance that discovery would have occurred lawfully), and United States v. Bullette, 854 F.3d 261 (4th Cir. 2017) (clear-error deference to district court on the factual inevitability finding).

2. The Court’s Legal Reasoning

The court’s analysis proceeds in two interlocking steps: (a) it applies Knights’s totality-of-the-circumstances balancing to the instruction that Rocco return home; and (b) it explains why Bailey’s spatial constraint does not render the instruction unconstitutional.

a. Knights Balancing: Diminished Privacy vs. Substantial Government Interests

The court anchors its analysis in the Knights principle that reasonableness is assessed by balancing the severity of the intrusion against the government’s need, “examining the totality of the circumstances.” Here, several circumstances drive the outcome:

Diminished privacy interest: Rocco was on federal supervised release—a status courts analyze similarly to probation and parole—subject to conditions including at-home visits. The instruction to return home so a probation officer could conduct an at-home visit was viewed as a “minimal impingement” on Rocco’s already diminished expectations of privacy.
Governmental interests: Supervised release’s purposes include protecting the public and rehabilitating the defendant. The court emphasizes that supervisees are more likely to reoffend and that intrusions tolerated in this context can be greater than those applied to the general public. This case involved a recidivist supervisee and a valid residential search warrant supported by probable cause pointing to renewed violations—facts that heightened the government’s supervision and public-safety interests.

Weighing these considerations, the court concludes that directing Rocco to return home for an at-home visit during the warranted search was reasonable. The instruction aligned with his supervision conditions and facilitated the legitimate ends of supervision, including ensuring compliance and preventing further harm.

b. Bailey’s Spatial Constraint: Why It Does Not Control Here

Bailey imposes a “spatial constraint” on detentions incident to a premises search: officers cannot detain an individual far from the search location based solely on the Summers rationale. Rocco argued that leveraging a probation officer’s directive to force him back to the premises for detention effectively evaded Bailey.

The court rejects that view for two reasons:

Nature of the intrusion: The key act was not a Summers-style detention of a non-supervised person away from the premises, but a probation officer’s directive to a supervised-releasee to appear at his residence for an at-home visit—a condition that lawfully and significantly reduces his privacy expectations. The court treats this as a distinct, supervision-based intrusion, analyzed under Knights.
Totality framework applies: Even Bailey itself relies on reasonableness balancing. When that balancing is performed with the salient circumstances here—supervised-release status, home-visit condition, recidivist risk, and ongoing investigation supported by a residential warrant—the instruction to return home falls within constitutional bounds.

In short, Bailey does not create a categorical bar to a supervisee’s return-home directive during a search. The supervisee context—and the supervision condition permitting at-home visits—changes the Fourth Amendment calculus.

c. The Seizure of the Phone During Execution of a Valid Warrant

The phone was seized during the execution of a valid residential search warrant. That seizure was not challenged as beyond the warrant’s scope in this appeal; the challenge was the antecedent instruction to be present. Because the instruction was reasonable and lawful under Knights, the seizure that occurred in the residence pursuant to the warrant remained valid.

d. Alternative Holding: Inevitable Discovery

The panel also endorsed the district court’s alternative ruling that, even assuming a defect, the evidence was admissible under the inevitable discovery doctrine. The relevant standards are:

Burden: The government must prove by a preponderance that the evidence would have been discovered by lawful means (Alston).
Appellate posture: Whether discovery was inevitable is a factual finding entitled to deference (Bullette).

Given that law enforcement was actively investigating Rocco’s conduct while he was on supervised release and the probation officer was fully apprised of that investigation, the panel deferred to the district court’s finding that the phone would have been inevitably discovered by lawful means.

3. Impact and Practical Implications

Although unpublished and not binding precedent in the Fourth Circuit, Rocco is instructive on a recurring point at the intersection of supervision and search-warrant execution.

Supervisee directives during warrant execution: Rocco signals that, where a supervisee is subject to conditions authorizing at-home visits, a probation officer may direct the supervisee to return home during execution of a valid residential search warrant without transgressing Bailey’s spatial constraint—provided the intrusion is minimal and justified under Knights’s balancing.
Coordination between probation and law enforcement: The opinion implicitly validates coordinated efforts when a probation officer, fully informed of an investigation, acts within the scope of supervision conditions to facilitate oversight and public safety. This reduces the risk that such coordination will be deemed a constitutional end-run around Bailey.
Case-specific factors: The panel repeatedly emphasized context—recidivism, existing supervision conditions, and the presence of a valid residential warrant supported by probable cause. Future cases lacking these factors (for example, no home-visit condition or no ongoing investigation) may come out differently under Knights’s totality test.
Defense considerations: Challenges premised solely on Bailey’s spatial constraint may be insufficient in the supervision context if the government can show a legitimate, condition-authorized supervision purpose and minimal incremental intrusion. Defense counsel should scrutinize whether the directive truly served supervision goals or was pretextual and whether the supervisee’s conditions clearly authorized the particular instruction.
Government strategy: Where supervision conditions permit, framing directives as at-home visits linked to rehabilitation and public-protection goals strengthens the Knights balance. Where evidence would likely be discovered anyway, preserving an inevitable-discovery theory—as here—provides an alternative path to admissibility.

Complex Concepts Simplified

Supervised release: A post-incarceration term during which a federal defendant must comply with conditions and is supervised by a probation officer. It’s akin to probation but follows imprisonment. Violations can result in sanctions, including revocation.
At-home visit condition: A supervision term requiring the supervisee to permit probation officers to visit the home, often “at any time.” Courts view such visits as less intrusive than searches, and they can be conducted without reasonable suspicion when authorized by conditions.
Knights balancing: A Fourth Amendment test that weighs an individual’s privacy expectations (diminished for supervisees) against the government’s interests (high in supervision and public safety) to determine whether a search or seizure is reasonable.
Bailey’s spatial constraint: A limitation on detaining individuals incident to the execution of a search warrant; detentions must occur in the immediate vicinity of the premises being searched. It prevents police from detaining someone far away simply because a residence is being searched.
Clear-error review: An appellate standard that defers to the trial court’s factual findings unless the appellate court is firmly convinced a mistake occurred. It is highly deferential.
Inevitable discovery doctrine: Even if evidence is obtained unlawfully, it remains admissible if the government proves it would ultimately have been discovered by lawful means.

Conclusion

United States v. Rocco clarifies that Bailey’s “spatial constraint” does not prohibit a probation officer from directing a supervised-releasee to return home during the execution of a valid residential search warrant, where the supervisee’s conditions authorize at-home visits and the government’s interests in supervision and public safety are substantial. Applying Knights’s totality-of-the-circumstances balancing, the Fourth Circuit deemed the instruction a minimal privacy intrusion justified by the defendant’s supervision status, recidivist risk, and the existence of probable cause supporting a residential warrant.

The decision underscores two important points: first, the distinct Fourth Amendment framework applicable to supervised individuals, whose diminished privacy expectations often permit intrusions that would be impermissible for the general public; and second, the continued vitality of inevitable discovery as an alternative ground for admitting evidence where lawful discovery was effectively assured. While unpublished, Rocco offers a clear roadmap for courts and practitioners addressing coordinated probation-law-enforcement actions in the course of executing residential warrants in the supervised-release context.