But to the extent that the district court's order was based on its factual conclusions, we review under a "clearly erroneous" standard. United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1136 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 958, 113 S.Ct. 421, 121 L.Ed.2d 344 (1992) (citations omitted). The district court must perform a two-part analysis to determine whether the independent source doctrine applies: (1) does the warrant affidavit, when purged of tainted information gained through the initial illegal entry, contain sufficient remaining facts to constitute probable cause ("probable cause"); and (2) did the illegal search affect or motivate the officers' decision to procure the search warrant ("effect of the illegal entry").

Under the independent source doctrine as stated in Murray, if during the untainted legal search police discover not only item z but also rediscover items x and y, x and y as well as z are admissible. Id. at 538, 108 S.Ct. at 2533; see also United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1140 (3d Cir. 1992). Applied to this case, that means that if the police legally searched Markling's motel room and that search was untainted by Gehl's prior illegal search of the briefcase, all evidence found in the motel room — including that found in the briefcase — is admissible against Markling.

The Fourth Amendment requires the government to obtain a warrant prior to searching areas in which an individual possesses a reasonable expectation of privacy. Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 360 (1967); United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1136-37 (3d Cir. 1992). For evidence obtained during a warrantless search to be admissible at trial, the government must establish that the search and seizure was permissible under an exception to the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement.

The independent source and inevitable discovery doctrines thus differ in that the former focuses on what actually happened and the latter considers what would have happened in the absence of the initial search. 962 F.2d 1131, 1140 (3d Cir. 1992). Here, pursuant to the state search warrant, Vanadia lawfully discovered evidence of child pornography (lurid file names and the first video file) while searching for evidence of financial crimes.

Under this doctrine, "evidence that was in fact discovered lawfully, and not as a direct or indirect result of illegal activity, is admissible. . . . " United States v. Herrold 962 F.2d 1131, 1140 (3d Cir. 1992). If a lawful warrant is obtained subsequent to the initial illegal search or entry, then the evidence is admissible if the warrant is based upon probable cause other than facts tainted by the initial illegal act and the "officers were not prompted to obtain the warrant by what they observed during the initial entry."

By the rule's formulation, it can be seen that evidence first obtained from a truly independent source is not excluded by the rule. See Murray v. United States, 487 U.S. 533, 537, 108 S.Ct. 2529, 2533, 101 L.Ed.2d 472 (1988); United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1139 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 113 S.Ct. 421, 121 L.Ed.2d 344 (1992). Likewise, information learned first from an illegal source is not forever shielded from view, if it was in fact later obtained from a truly independent source.

“[T]he independent source doctrine serves as an exception to the exclusionary rule and permits the introduction of evidence initially discovered during, or as a consequence of, an unlawful search, but later obtained independently from activities untainted by the initial illegality.” United States v. Stabile, 633 F.3d 219, 243 (3d Cir. 2011) (quoting United States v. Price, 558 F.3d 270, 281 (3d Cir. 2009)) (internal quotation marks omitted). Under the independent source doctrine, the Third Circuit has found that “even assuming that some factual averments in the affidavit are tainted, they do not vitiate a warrant which is otherwise validly issued upon probable cause reflected in the affidavit.” United States v. Johnson, 690 F.2d 60, 63 (3d Cir. 1982); see also United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1138-43 (3d Cir. 1992) (following Johnson); United States v. Deaner, 1 F.3d 192, 197 (3d Cir. 1993) (“Because the affidavit establishes probable cause without the evidence obtained by such device, we express no opinion on whether the use of a FLIR [forward-looking infra-red] device in aerial surveillance of a residence is a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.”)

United States v. Longmire, 761 F.2d 411, 417 (7th Cir. 1985) ("Where the police have acted pursuant to a warrant, the independent determination of probable cause by a magistrate gives rise to a presumption that the arrest or search was legal.") The government has the burden of demonstrating that an exception to the warrant requirement applies. United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1137 (3d Cir. 1992). 30.

Defendant believes reconsideration is warranted here to correct a clear error of law committed by the Court when it applied the wrong exclusionary rule exception, and thus reached the wrong result, to analyze the admissibility of the child pornography evidence discovered in searches violating the Fourth Amendment. Stabile argues that the inevitable discovery doctrine does not apply because, as the Court noted in the Suppression Opinion, the case involved no prediction or speculation as to what law enforcement would do; rather law enforcement in fact sought and obtained a search warrant based on the incriminating file names appearing in plain view during Detective Vanadia's search of the 120 GB hard drive. Defendant relies on the Third Circuit's opinion in United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131 (3d Cir. 1992). There, the appeals court found that an inevitable discovery analysis, which had been applied by the district court in denying the defendant's motion to suppress, was inappropriate in light of the actual discovery and seizure of the challenged contraband evidence in a second, separate search.

Under the latter, evidence that is discovered through unlawful conduct, but would inevitably be discovered by other means, is rendered admissible. Indeed, the "inevitable discovery doctrine . . . is in reality an extrapolation from the independent source doctrine." Murray, 487 U.S. at 539, 108 S.Ct. at 2534; see also United States v. Herrold, 962 F.2d 1131, 1138-40 (3d Cir.) (contrasting independent source and inevitable discovery doctrines), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 958, 113 S.Ct. 421, 121 L.Ed.2d 344 (1992). In Murray, government officers obtained a search warrant for a warehouse after they already had entered it and therein observed bales of what they suspected was marijuana.