⚖ Oral Arguments, with Context

The Ninth Circuit hears Herbert Redholtz’s challenge to searches of his email. He pleaded guilty to distributing, receiving and possessing child sexual abuse material. He admitted using his personal email account to store and exchange the material. The appeal concerns whether the government obtained and kept that evidence lawfully. His lawyer seeks suppression, meaning exclusion of evidence from the criminal case. The discussion turns on two warrants, issued five years apart. James Flynn, for Redholtz, will argue that investigators kept a copy of the email account without completing the first warrant’s required separation of relevant and unrelated records, or obtaining an extension. Amanda Elbogen, for the United States, will argue that the investigation paused and a new warrant lawfully authorized the later search. These are contested accounts of what the warrants allowed. There is also a dispute about the original basis for searching. A hash is a digital signature used to compare images. A match can link an image to a reference image; the parties disagree about what the judge was told about how the reference material had been classified. Probable cause requires a fair probability that evidence of a crime will be found, not proof beyond a reasonable doubt. It must rest on information presented to the judge, not facts learned later. The Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable searches and seizures. The panel will ask whether limits in an email warrant constrain how long the government may hold data, and whether a later warrant resolves any earlier violation. The judges will also ask whether any violation calls for excluding the evidence. A prosecution’s deadline, or statute of limitations, is different from the constitutional limits on the search itself.

United States v. Herbert Redholtz (No. 25-1959) — U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, argued October 21, 2026.