WASHINGTON — A Virginia bank robber’s mobile device led to his downfall, but now his case could reshape how law enforcement uses digital surveillance nationwide.
Okello Chatrie successfully stole $195,000 from a credit union in suburban Richmond and initially escaped capture. However, investigators eventually tracked him down using an advanced digital surveillance method that creates an electronic perimeter to gather location data from mobile devices near crime scenes.
Police obtained a geofence warrant from Google, which revealed that Chatrie’s mobile phone was among several devices present near the financial institution when the theft occurred.
The nation’s highest court will now determine whether these digital tracking warrants breach Fourth Amendment protections against unlawful searches. This represents another instance where justices must interpret an 18th-century constitutional amendment in the context of modern technology that the founding fathers never could have envisioned.
Chatrie’s legal challenge is among two matters scheduled for Monday’s Supreme Court arguments. The second involves pharmaceutical giant Bayer’s attempt to halt thousands of state court cases claiming the company inadequately warned consumers about potential cancer risks linked to its Roundup herbicide.
These location-based warrants fundamentally reverse traditional investigative methods. Standard police procedure involves identifying a suspect first, then securing a warrant to examine their property or devices.
Geofence warrants operate differently — officers begin with only a crime location and no identified suspect. They work backward to determine who was present in that area.
Law enforcement officials praise these warrants for solving previously unsolved cases and crimes where security footage failed to capture clear images of perpetrators or vehicle identification.
Privacy advocates argue that geofence searches constitute broad fishing expeditions that inappropriately scrutinize innocent individuals’ private information simply because their phones were nearby during criminal activity. Legal scholars specializing in digital surveillance warned the court that approving this technique could “unleash a much broader wave of similar reverse searches.”
Federal investigators employed geofence warrants to identify Trump supporters who participated in the January 6, 2021 Capitol attack, and also used them while searching for whoever placed explosive devices outside both major political party headquarters the previous evening.
Law enforcement agencies also attribute these warrants with helping solve homicide cases across multiple states, including California, Georgia and North Carolina.
An academic organization focused on improving police-community relations urged the court to avoid extreme positions in Chatrie’s case.
The previous administration’s stance would permit police to employ geofence warrants and similar technologies “with no judicial supervision or constitutional safeguards,” according to the Policing Project at New York University School of Law. Meanwhile, Chatrie’s legal team wants the court to completely prohibit geofence warrants, which would hinder “legitimate law enforcement activities,” the organization stated.
In Chatrie’s situation, the geofence warrant revitalized a stagnant investigation. After establishing that Chatrie was near the Call Federal Credit Union in Midlothian during the May 2019 robbery, officers secured a home search warrant. They discovered approximately $100,000 in cash, including currency wrapped in bands bearing the bank teller’s signature.
He entered a guilty plea and received nearly 12 years imprisonment. Chatrie’s attorneys argued during appeals that all evidence should have been excluded from his case.
His legal team contested the warrant as a privacy violation because it enabled authorities to collect location information from people near the bank without any evidence connecting them to the crime. Government prosecutors maintained that Chatrie lacked privacy expectations since he voluntarily activated Google’s location tracking feature.
A federal judge determined the search violated Chatrie’s constitutional rights but permitted the evidence because the requesting officer reasonably believed his actions were lawful.
The Richmond federal appeals court confirmed the conviction through a divided decision. Separately, the New Orleans federal appeals court declared that geofence warrants “are general warrants categorically prohibited by the Fourth Amendment.”
During the Supreme Court’s most recent digital privacy case in 2018, justices voted 5-4 supporting a defendant whose movements were monitored by authorities for almost four months without a warrant through cellphone tower records analysis.
That case also examined whether the defendant possessed privacy expectations that would activate Fourth Amendment protections — an issue present in Chatrie’s appeal.
The Supreme Court has previously determined that information shared with outside parties cannot be deemed private.
However, Chief Justice John Roberts emphasized in his majority decision the remarkable computing capabilities of modern cellphones, noting “seismic shifts in digital technology” and “the exhaustive chronicle of location information casually collected by wireless carriers today.”
