The following excerpt is from U.S. v. Young, 993 F.2d 887 (9th Cir. 1993):
Young argues that the district court erred in not suppressing the evidence gathered from the wiretap. A district court's judgment that an officer did not intentionally or recklessly omit information from a wiretap affidavit is reviewed for clear error. United States v. Tham, 960 F.2d 1391, 1395 (9th Cir.1991). The district court's judgment that the omitted information was not material to the question of the necessity of the wiretap is reviewed de novo. United States v. Ippolito, 774 F.2d 1482, 1484 (9th Cir.1985).
A federal wiretap may be authorized when the issuing judge determines, on the basis of a submitted affidavit, that "normal investigative procedures have been tried and have failed or reasonably appear to be unlikely to succeed if tried or [appear] to be too dangerous." 18 U.S.C. 2518(3)(c). In other words, the wiretap must be necessary to the success of the investigation. The question of whether an affidavit has demonstrated that the wiretap is necessary is to be answered in a "practical and common sense fashion." United States v. Brown, 761 F.2d 1272, 1275 (9th Cir.1979), cert. denied, 445 U.S. 934 (1980).
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