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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
QUINCINO WAIDE,
Defendant-Appellant.
   No. 21-5827
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky at Lexington.
No. 5:18-cr-00116-1—Karen K. Caldwell, District Judge.
Argued: December 6, 2022
Decided and Filed: February 13, 2023
Before: SILER, GILMAN, and NALBANDIAN, Circuit Judges.


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OPINION
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RONALD LEE GILMAN, Circuit Judge. Quincino Waide first encountered the Lexington police after a shed fire occurred on the property next to his. Although no one suspected Waide of having anything to do with the fire, the fire investigator noticed surveillance cameras attached to Waide’s duplex residence and asked Waide to turn over his digital video recorder (DVR) to see what it might reveal about the shed fire. When Waide declined, the investigator sought a warrant (the DVR warrant) to enter Waide’s apartment and retrieve the DVR.

The affidavit in support of the DVR warrant, however, lacked reliable evidence to establish probable cause to believe that the shed fire was due to arson or any other criminal activity. A state magistrate nevertheless issued the warrant. When the fire investigator and five other officials with the Lexington Police and Fire Departments arrived at Waide’s duplex to execute the DVR warrant, their threatened entry and a pointed inquiry about whether Waide had drugs on the premises caused Waide to admit that his apartment contained a small amount of marijuana. This confession led to the issuance of two subsequent warrants (the narcotics warrants) to search both units of Waide’s duplex for narcotics. The searches yielded a firearm plus large quantities of drugs and money.

After the district court denied Waide’s multiple motions to suppress evidence, he entered into a conditional guilty plea to the offense of possessing cocaine and heroin with the intent to distribute the drugs, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), and to the offense of possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1).

Waide now appeals. For the reasons set forth below, we REVERSE the judgment of the district court and REMAND with instructions to suppress the unlawfully collected evidence.