KELLY K.E. MAHONEY, Magistrate Judge.
Defendant Jose Luis Bautista-Ramos moves to suppress fingerprint evidence and statements he made after he was stopped and arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deportation officers. Doc. 7. He primarily argues that ICE officers lacked reason to believe he posed an escape risk and therefore violated 8 U.S.C. § 1357(a) by arresting him without a warrant. He also argues that ICE violated his rights by conducting a traffic stop of his vehicle. The United States (the Government) resists. Doc. 10. I recommend, with some reservation,
On June 26, 2018, ICE officers arrested Bautista-Ramos. He remained in ICE custody for three weeks until I signed a criminal complaint on July 18, 2018, finding probable cause that Bautista-Ramos had unlawfully reentered the United States after previously being removed, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a), and issued a warrant for his arrest. MJ Docs. 1, 3.
Bautista-Ramos filed a motion to suppress (Doc. 7), and I held a hearing on the motion on September 12, 2018 (Doc. 13). Deportation Officer Corey McMahon testified at the hearing. I also admitted three exhibits submitted by Bautista-Ramos, and seven exhibits submitted by the Government:
In January 2018, deportation officers at the local ICE office in Sioux City, Iowa, received "leads" regarding Bautista-Ramos's presence in northwest Iowa from the National Criminal Analysis and Targeting Center. These leads indicated that Bautista-Ramos's "possible daughter[]" and "possible spouse" (both United States citizens) had activated utilities at an address in Orange City, Iowa, in October and November 2017; that Bautista-Ramos's "possible spouse" owned a restaurant located at an address in Sheldon, Iowa, with an active phone number; and that Osceola County, Iowa, property tax records from 2017/2018 indicated Bautista-Ramos's "possible spouse" owned property in Ashton, Iowa. Doc. 10-3 at 4-6. The leads also indicated that Iowa Secretary of State records revealed Bautista-Ramos was the "co-signer/debtor" for his "possible spouse's" restaurant in Sheldon, Iowa, since the initial filing in 2006 through the most recent filing on December 3, 2017. Doc. 10-3 at 5. There was also an Iowa address for another of Bautista-Ramos's "possible daughters" (also a United States citizen) and the address of a "possible relative." Doc. 10-3 at 6. Through the leads and his own research, Deportation Officer McMahon learned that Bautista-Ramos had previously been removed from the United States in 1985 and again in 1993 (the latter removal as a result of an aggravated felony conviction) and that he had never obtained permission to return to the United States. See also Doc. 10-2.
On June 26, 2018, Deportation Officer McMahon and other ICE officers went searching for individuals that they had received leads about, ultimately arresting eleven to fifteen people that day (none pursuant to a warrant). While looking for another individual in Sioux Center, Iowa, an ICE officer received information from a fusion center
Deportation Officer McMahon and the other ICE officers knew what Bautista-Ramos looked like through documents from his prior removal proceedings in 1993, which included a picture of Bautista-Ramos (which appears to be from 2001) and a description of his appearance, including height, weight, that he wears glasses, and that he has tattoos on his arms. See Doc. 10-3 at 1, 4. Within ten minutes of their arrival at JTV Manufacturing, ICE officers saw an individual, whose appearance matched the picture of Bautista-Ramos, leave the building and walk toward a dark SUV in the parking lot. The ICE officers stopped Bautista-Ramos, "identified who he was verbally by his name," and asked whether he was in the country illegally, to which he responded, yes. ICE officers arrested Bautista-Ramos and took him into ICE custody, where his fingerprints were taken and he made incriminating statements. Later, the United States Marshals took Bautista-Ramos's fingerprints when they took him into custody on the criminal complaint. Doc. 10-5.
There is a factual dispute over the timing of when the ICE officers stopped Bautista-Ramos. The only officer to testify, Deportation Officer McMahon, did not witness officers stopping Bautista-Ramos, although he listened to the encounter via cell phone. He testified that "to [his] knowledge," Bautista-Ramos had opened the door to his vehicle and was standing near it when ICE officers began talking to him. Deportation Officer McMahon's report of the arrest, however, indicates:
Doc. 7-2 at 2. On cross-examination, he explained that the description in his report is "the information that was provided to [him] at the time of the arrest" by the ICE officers involved in the arrest. Although I fully credit Deportation Officer McMahon's testimony that he now believes Bautista-Ramos was stopped before he entered his vehicle, no testimony was elicited about how he came to that belief—e.g., did he hear differently from the officers involved in the arrest or from another source? and did he learn this new information prior to or after Bautista-Ramos filed his motion to suppress?
Bautista-Ramos moves to suppress the incriminating statements he made after his arrest, as well as the fingerprint evidence obtained by ICE and the United States Marshals. He argues that ICE officers lacked statutory authority to conduct a traffic stop of his vehicle and to arrest him without a warrant.
At the hearing, Bautista-Ramos conceded that prior to stopping his vehicle, the ICE officers had probable cause that he had unlawfully reentered the United States after being removed.
Bautista-Ramos relies on 8 U.S.C. § 1357(a)(3), which provides that ICE officers "have power without warrant . . . within a reasonable distance from any external boundary of the United States, to board and search for aliens any . . . vehicle." "Reasonable distance" is defined by regulation as no more than "100 air miles from any external boundary of the United States." 8 C.F.R. § 287.1(a)(2). Thus, Bautista-Ramos argues that because the ICE officers were more than one hundred miles away from a border, they could not stop his vehicle, despite having probable cause that he had committed a felony immigration offense.
The Government responds that § 1357(a)(3) is inapplicable here and that ICE officers may conduct warrantless traffic stops under 8 U.S.C. § 1357(a)(1), which provides that ICE officers "have power without warrant . . . to interrogate any alien or person believed to be an alien as to his right to be or remain in the United States." In United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873, 876-77 (1975), the Supreme Court interpreted both § 1357(a)(1) and § 1357(a)(3), which the Government argued permitted ICE officers to conduct traffic stops without meeting the requirements of the Fourth Amendment. The Supreme Court rejected this argument, holding that "[t]he effect of [its] decision is to limit exercise of the authority granted by both [§ 1357(a)(1) and § 1357(a)(3)]," such that "[e]xcept at the border and its functional equivalents, officers on roving patrol may stop vehicles only if they are aware of specific articulable facts, together with rational inferences from those facts, that reasonably warrant suspicion that the vehicles contain aliens who may be illegally in the country." Id. at 882, 884. Thus, as I read Brignoni-Ponce, the Supreme Court recognized that § 1357(a)(1) permits ICE officers to conduct warrantless traffic stops based on reasonable suspicion and that "[t]here is no geographical limitation on th[e] authority" in § 1357(a)(1). Id. at 877, 884; see also United States v. Tamayo-Baez, 820 F.3d 308, 311-13 (8th Cir. 2016) (holding that ICE officer had "reasonable suspicion to conduct a traffic stop" of defendant based on information he had illegally reentered the United States and that "therefore the traffic stop was lawful").
Bautista-Ramos's cited authority does not support a different conclusion. In United States v. Venzor-Castillo, 991 F.2d 634, 635-36 (10th Cir. 1993), a border patrol agent conducted a traffic stop of a vehicle 235 miles north of the Mexican border based on (1) a recent increase in alien smugglers in the area seeking to avoid a permanent checkpoint located elsewhere; (2) the vehicle being an older model Cadillac, which the agent "often found to be favored by alien smugglers"; (3) the passengers in the back seat sliding down out of view as the vehicle approached the agent's marked patrol car; (4) the passengers in the front seat staring straight ahead as they passed the marked patrol car; and (5) the vehicle appearing to be heavily loaded and having a temporary license plate. The Tenth Circuit suggested that the border patrol agents lacked reasonable suspicion to stop the car because of its distance from the border, noting that "the distance from the border becomes critical when the circumstances will not permit a reasonable presumption the traveler came from beyond the international border" and that in this case, the vehicle could have "entered the highway from any one of the thirteen towns and cities between" the border and the place of the stop, or it could have traveled from a neighboring state. Id. at 638-40. The court did not address § 1357(a)(1) or reasonable suspicion based on information obtained from leads. Moreover, even if Venzor-Castillo can be read as support for the proposition that ICE officers cannot conduct stops based on reasonable suspicion unless they are within one hundred miles of a border, it distinguishes stops based on probable cause (which Bautista-Ramos concedes existed here). See id. at 638.
Bautista-Ramos also relies on the dissenting opinion in United States v. Orozco, 191 F.3d 578, 584 (5th Cir. 1999) (Dennis, J., dissenting), which interpreted Brignoni-Ponce as limiting "stops on the basis of reasonable suspicion . . . to such stops within the 100 mile border zone." Outside the 100 mile border zone, the dissent suggested, the stop must be based on probable cause. Id. at 584-85. Here, probable cause existed, so the Orozco dissent does not support that the ICE officers exceeded their statutory authority. Neither does the majority opinion in Orozco, which upheld a traffic stop by a border patrol agent that occurred two hundred to three hundred miles from the border based on reasonable suspicion of "illegal alien smugglers" in the vehicle. Id. at 579, 581-84
I recommend rejecting Bautista-Ramos's argument that ICE officers lack statutory authority to conduct a traffic stop more than one hundred miles from an international border.
Bautista-Ramos argues that since ICE officers had no information suggesting he posed an escape risk, they lacked statutory authority to arrest him without a warrant. Under 8 U.S.C. § 1357(a), an ICE officer "ha[s] power without warrant":
Contrary to the Government's argument otherwise, each of these subsections (including subsection (5)) require belief of a likelihood of escape for an ICE officer to arrest a person without a warrant. See also 8 C.F.R. § 287.8(c)(2)(ii) ("A warrant of arrest shall be obtained except when the designated immigration officer has reason to believe that the person is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained."). And consistent with the Fourth Amendment, to arrest a person, an ICE officer must have probable cause that the person is in the United States illegally or has committed an offense. See United States v. Chavez, 705 F.3d 381, 384 (8th Cir. 2013).
The Government argues that the arrest was not warrantless due to the prior removal order and warrant of deportation; that ICE officers had reason to believe that Bautista-Ramos would escape; and that even if not, suppression is not an appropriate remedy for a statutory violation. The first of the Government's arguments can be disposed of in short order. The Government argues that the prior removal order and warrant of deportation from Bautista-Ramos's 1993 removal constitutes a warrant for his arrest. See Doc. 10-2. The Government points to 8 U.S.C. § 1231(a)(3), which provides:
The regulations implementing this provision provide that to "establish[] whether an alien is subject to" reinstatement of a prior removal order, the immigration officer must (1) obtain the prior removal order, (2) determine "whether the alien is in fact an alien who was previously removed . . .," and (3) determine whether the alien unlawfully reentered the United States; then, once the immigration officer has so found, "he or she shall provide the alien with written notice of his or her determination." 8 C.F.R. § 241.8(a), (b). Thus, certain requirements must be met before the prior removal order is reinstated; the prior removal order is not "`automatically reinstated by operation of law' upon the [alien's] illegal reentry into the United States." Lin v. Gonzales, 473 F.3d 979, 982 (9th Cir. 2007); see also Lara-Aguilar v. Sessions, 889 F.3d 134, 144 (4th Cir. 2018) ("The reinstatement of a prior removal order is neither automatic nor obligatory. . . ."); Cazun v. Attorney Gen. United States, 856 F.3d 249, 261 (3d Cir. 2017) ("[R]einstatement of a removal order is not automatic."). Here, the prior removal order and warrant of deportation had not been reinstated at the time of Bautista-Ramos's arrest. Bautista-Ramos's arrest was not pursuant to a warrant. See Araujo v. United States, 301 F.Supp.2d 1095, 1101-02 (N.D. Cal. 2004) (holding that the plaintiff was subject to a warrantless arrest that required a finding he was "likely to escape before a warrant c[ould] be obtained" when ICE could have "file[d] a Notice of Intent/Decision to Reinstate Prior [Deportation] Order," but did not).
Under § 1357(a), a deportation officer has the power to arrest an alien without a warrant only if the deportation officer has reason to believe that the alien is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained. Bautista-Ramos argues that before the ICE officers stopped Bautista-Ramos in the parking lot, they had no reason to believe that he was likely to escape. The Government does not disagree (indeed, it would be hard for the Government to argue otherwise in the face of a January 2018 form in which an ICE officer indicated that Bautista-Ramos was not a "flight/escape risk" (Doc. 10-3 at 2) and Deportation Officer McMahon's testimony that the circumstances did not change between January 2018 and before the investigatory stop in June 2018). Instead, the Government argues that ICE officers lacked probable cause to arrest Bautista-Ramos until they stopped him and confirmed his identity and status in the United States and that once ICE officers alerted Bautista-Ramos to their investigation by questioning him, Bautista-Ramos posed an escape risk.
The Government relies on Contreras v. United States, 672 F.2d 307 (2d Cir. 1982) (per curiam), and United States v. Ravelo-Rodriguez, No. 3:11-CR-70, 2012 WL 1597390 (E.D. Tenn. Mar. 12, 2012), report and recommendation adopted, 2012 WL 1598074 (E.D. Tenn. May 7, 2012). In Contreras, ICE officers received an anonymous tip that people living at a certain apartment were in the country illegally. 672 F.2d at 308. They went to investigate, and a woman answered the door in a housecoat and admitted she had entered the country illegally. Id. ICE officers arrested her. Id. She brought suit under the Federal Tort Claims Act, arguing that ICE officers did not have reason to believe she was likely to escape before a warrant could be obtained for her arrest. Id. at 307-09. The Second Circuit held that "when the alien's deportability is clear and undisputed, that circumstance alone may provide a sufficient basis for an [ICE] officer to believe that escape is likely before a warrant can be obtained." Id. at 309. Thus, the Second Circuit held that the warrantless arrest was not unlawful, as the alien "acknowledged to the arresting officers that she had entered this country illegally." Id. at 309.
Ravelo-Rodriguez called the broad language of Contreras into question, reasoning (in reliance on an unpublished Fourth Circuit case) that "`a holding that in every case in which an alien is deportable an arrest can be made without a warrant' . . . . would be contrary to the statute itself, which requires a reasonable belief that the alien is likely to escape," in addition to a reasonable belief that the alien is deportable. 2012 WL 1597390, at *16 (quoting United States v. Harrison, No. 97-4178, 1999 WL 26921, at *4 (4th Cir. Jan. 25, 1999) (per curiam)).
Here, I do not find that ICE officers had reason to believe that Bautista-Ramos posed a risk of flight at the time of his warrantless arrest.
"Th[e] flight-risk determination is not mere verbiage." Pacheco-Alvarez, 227 F. Supp. 3d at 889 (relying, inter alia, on Arizona v. United States, 567 U.S. 387, 408 (2012), which invalidated a state statute authorizing warrantless arrests of removable aliens that did not require a finding of a likelihood of escape); see also Davila, 247 F. Supp. 3d at 668 ("The likelihood-of-escape limitation is `seriously applied.'" (quoting United States v. Cantu, 519 F.2d 494, 497 (7th Cir. 1975)). When ICE officers arrested Bautista-Ramos without a warrant and without reason to believe he was likely to escape before a warrant could be obtained, they exceeded their statutory authority and violated § 1357(a). To hold otherwise would be to render the "likelihood of the person escaping" clause of the statute meaningless, satisfied any time ICE officers alert an undocumented alien to their investigation (which could occur in every case, even those in which ICE officers already had probable cause, as here, and allow ICE officers to circumvent the statutory warrant requirement simply by confronting the alien about his immigration status before arresting him).
I am troubled by what appears to be a practice of effecting warrantless arrests without regard to the requirements of § 1357(a).
Despite my concerns, Bautista-Ramos cites no cases (and I have found none) holding that suppression is an appropriate remedy here. Bautista-Ramos does not dispute that the ICE officers had probable cause that he had committed the felony offense of reentry after prior removal. As a general rule, the Fourth Amendment requires that a warrantless arrest be based on probable cause but does not require the arresting officer believe the person is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained. See United States v. Watson, 423 U.S. 411, 423-24 (1976); Cantu, 519 F.2d at 496 & n.3. Rather, the likelihood of escape "is a statutory limitation." Cantu, 519 F.2d at 496.
United States v. Abdi, 463 F.3d 547, 556 (6th Cir. 2006). Although it could perhaps be argued that ICE officers that exceed their statutory authority and make an arrest outside their jurisdiction have effected an unreasonable seizure in violation of the Fourth Amendment (even if they have probable cause to make an arrest), every court to address this issue (that I have found) has rejected this argument, or at least, held suppression is not warranted. See United States v. De La Cruz, 835 F.3d 1, 5-7, 6 n.4 (1st Cir. 2016) (holding that when ICE officers "exceeded their federal statutory mandate" by arresting the defendant without a warrant—and without reason to believe he was likely to escape— only a statutory violation occurred, not a constitutional violation, as ICE officers had probable cause the defendant had committed aggravated identity theft and related offenses, and the "statutory violation `untethered to the abridgment of constitutional rights' [wa]s insufficient to justify suppression" (quoting United States v. Adams, 740 F.3d 40, 43 (1st Cir. 2014))); Abdi, 463 F.3d at 554, 558, 560 (holding that when ICE officers violated § 1357(a) by effecting a warrantless arrest without a belief the defendant would escape, the exclusionary rule did not apply because "no violation of the Fourth Amendment resulted from the warrantless arrest," as ICE officers had probable cause the defendant had committed a terrorism-related felony); Harrison, 1999 WL 26921, at *4-5 (holding that when ICE officers arrested the defendant with probable cause of unlawful reentry but no belief related to a likelihood of escape, they violated § 1357(a), but not the Fourth Amendment; and declining to address as a general matter whether "the exclusionary rule applies to evidence obtained after an arrest that is illegal but not unconstitutional," and holding that "inherently reliable" identity evidence such as fingerprints should not be suppressed to remedy a violation of the § 1357(a) escape requirement); see also United States v. Ryan, 731 F.3d 66, 66-71 (1st Cir. 2013) (holding that although federal park ranger lacked statutory authority to arrest the defendant outside the park system, the arrest was "constitutionally reasonable" and suppression was not an appropriate remedy); United States v. Perkins, 166 F.Supp.2d 1116, 1132-33 (W.D. Tex. 2001) (holding that when border patrol agents exceeded their statutory authority by stopping a vehicle based on reasonable suspicion of drug trafficking, suppression was not an appropriate remedy, even though "the limitations on the arrest powers of . . . any. . . specialized federal law enforcement agency[] implicate constitutional rights"), on reconsideration, 177 F.Supp.2d 570 (W.D. Tex. 2001) (holding no statutory violation occurred and thus not addressing remedy), aff'd, 352 F.3d 198 (5th Cir. 2003). Accordingly, I recommend denying Bautista-Ramos's motion to suppress.
I RESPECTFULLY RECOMMEND that Bautista-Ramos's motion to suppress (Doc. 7) be
Objections to this Report and Recommendation, in accordance with 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1), Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 59(b), and Local Criminal Rule 59, must be filed within fourteen days of the service of a copy of this Report and Recommendation; any response to the objections must be filed within seven days after service of the objections. A party asserting such objections must arrange promptly for the transcription of all portions of the record that the district court judge will need to rule on the objections. LCrR 59. Objections must specify the parts of the Report and Recommendation to which objections are made, as well as the parts of the record forming the basis for the objections. See Fed. R. Crim. P. 59. Failure to object to the Report and Recommendation waives the right to de novo review by the district court of any portion of the Report and Recommendation, as well as the right to appeal from the findings of fact contained therein. United States v. Wise, 588 F.3d 531, 537 n.5 (8th Cir. 2009).
MJ Doc. 1 at 3.