IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 13-51114

RICHARD RYNEARSON, 

Plaintiff - Appellant

v.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA; AGENT LANDS, Border Patrol Agent, 

Individually; RAUL PEREZ, Border Patrol Agent, Individually, 

Defendants - Appellees

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of Texas

USDC No. 2:12-CV-24

Before REAVLEY, ELROD, and SOUTHWICK, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

Richard Rynearson brought this Bivens action against two border patrol 

agents in their individual capacities. He alleged they violated his Fourth 

Amendment rights by unlawfully detaining him. The district court granted 

summary judgment for the agents after concluding that they were entitled to 

qualified immunity. We AFFIRM.

* Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not 

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH 

CIR. R. 47.5.4.

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

February 26, 2015

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

 

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FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Rynearson, a major in the United States Air Force, was stopped at a fixed 

interior immigration checkpoint in Uvalde County, Texas approximately 67 

miles from the United States-Mexico border in March 2010. He alleges that he 

has had several unpleasant experiences in prior stops at the checkpoint. 

Consequently, he was prepared with numerous cameras in his vehicle to record 

this stop. The following facts come from the pleadings and a video Rynearson 

recorded during the stop and posted on at least two websites. The defendants 

included the video as an exhibit in their Motion to Dismiss.

When Rynearson entered the checkpoint he was asked if he owned his 

vehicle. Upon saying he did, he was asked to move to the secondary inspection 

area. He was not asked about his citizenship at any point during the initial 

stop. Rynearson kept his window almost completely closed throughout all 

communications with the officers despite being repeatedly asked to open it 

further or step out of the vehicle. Rynearson was held in his vehicle in the 

secondary inspection area for a little over a minute before he was asked to 

display his identification. Inside the car, he stuck his driver’s license and 

military identification between the window glass and the door’s weather 

stripping, where they could be read from the outside of the vehicle.

Upon seeing Rynearson’s military identification, Agent Lands asked him 

where he was stationed. The agent then asked him to step out of the car. 

Rynearson refused and demanded to be told why he was being detained. Agent 

Lands explained that he needed to determine Rynearson’s citizenship and that 

he would be free to go afterwards, but Rynearson still refused to step out of the 

car or roll down his window. Rynearson insisted that he would not get out 

unless Lands explained his reasonable suspicions for detaining him. This 

discussion continued for about eight minutes before Agent Lands said he was 

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going to find a supervisor. Rynearson then added his passports to the display 

of documents on his window.

After Rynearson had waited 18 minutes at the checkpoint, Supervisory 

Border Patrol Agent Perez arrived. Rynearson explained to Agent Perez that 

the agents had not allowed him to leave despite the fact that he had offered his 

identification and told them that he was a citizen. Rynearson still refused to 

roll down his window or exit the vehicle. Agent Perez asked for Rynearson’s 

passports and for the name of Rynearson’s commanding officer. Rynearson 

refused to give the name and complained that Agent Perez was trying to 

interfere with his employment. Agent Perez then took Rynearson’s passports

into the checkpoint station and returned 13 minutes later to inform Rynearson 

that he was free to go. He explained that if Rynearson would be more 

cooperative in the future by rolling down his window to help agents hear over 

the traffic and by physically producing immigration documents for validation, 

the checkpoint procedure would be quicker. Rynearson’s total time at the 

checkpoint was approximately 34 minutes. 

Rynearson submitted an administrative claim to United States Customs 

and Border Protection pursuant to the Federal Tort Claims Act (“FTCA”), 28 

U.S.C. § 2671 et seq., seeking $500,000 in damages as a result of the stop. His 

claim was denied. He then filed this suit in the United States District Court

for the Western District of Texas. His FTCA claims were based on negligence, 

false arrest and imprisonment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and 

violation of rights under the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth 

Amendments. His complaint also included Bivens claims against Agents 

Lands and Perez for violation of his Fourth Amendment rights. See Bivens v. 

Six Unknown Named Agents of Fed. Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971).

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Only the Bivens Fourth Amendment claims are before this court. All others 

were dismissed and no appeal was taken. 

The district court concluded that Agents Lands and Perez were entitled 

to qualified immunity because Rynearson failed to demonstrate a violation of 

his Fourth Amendment rights in either the manner of conduct at the stop or 

the duration of the stop. The court also found that the agents had reasonable 

suspicion to detain Rynearson. Finally, the district court denied Rynearson’s 

motion to stay summary judgment pending discovery. 

DISCUSSION

We review de novo a district court’s grant of summary judgment on the 

basis of qualified immunity. Freeman v. Gore, 483 F.3d 404, 410 (5th Cir. 

2007). “The doctrine of qualified immunity protects governmental officials 

‘from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly 

established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person 

would have known.’” Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 231 (2009) (quoting 

Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982)). The plaintiff has the burden 

of refuting a properly raised qualified immunity defense “by establishing that 

the official’s allegedly wrongful conduct violated clearly established law.” 

Brumfield v. Hollins, 551 F.3d 322, 326 (5th Cir. 2008) (quotations and citation 

omitted). “Qualified immunity gives government officials breathing room to 

make reasonable but mistaken judgments and protects all but the plainly 

incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.” Stanton v. Sims, 134 S. 

Ct. 3, 5 (2013) (quotations and citations omitted).

We conduct a two-step analysis to determine whether an agent is entitled 

to qualified immunity. See Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194 (2001). The usual 

approach is to determine, first, “whether, viewing the summary judgment 

evidence in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, the defendant violated the 

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plaintiff's constitutional rights.” Freeman, 438 F.3d at 410. If such a violation 

occurred, we then “consider whether the defendant’s actions were objectively 

unreasonable in light of clearly established law at the time of the conduct in 

question.” Id. at 411. For a right to be clearly established, “existing precedent 

must have placed the statutory or constitutional question beyond debate.” 

Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 131 S. Ct. 2074, 2083 (2011). Although the existence of the 

right is often considered first, it is permissible to begin with the determination 

of whether the claimed right was clearly established: “the judges of the district 

courts and the courts of appeals are in the best position to determine the order 

of decisionmaking that will best facilitate the fair and efficient disposition of 

each case.” Pearson, 555 U.S. at 242.

A routine interior immigration checkpoint stop conducted without 

reasonable suspicion does not violate the Fourth Amendment. United States 

v. Martinez-Fuerte, 428 U.S. 543, 561-62 (1976). Border patrol agents at 

interior checkpoints may stop a vehicle, refer it to a secondary inspection area, 

request production of documents from the vehicle’s occupants, and question the 

occupants about their citizenship. Id. at 562-63. The purpose of the stop is 

limited to ascertaining the occupants’ citizenship status. United States v. 

Machuca-Barrera, 261 F.3d 425, 433 (5th Cir. 2001). “The permissible 

duration of an immigrant checkpoint stop is therefore the time reasonably 

necessary to determine the citizenship status of the persons stopped.” Id.

“Conversely, when officers detain travelers after the legitimate justification for 

a stop has ended, the continued detention is unreasonable.” United States v. 

Portillo-Aguirre, 311 F.3d 647, 654 (5th Cir. 2002).

Rynearson argues the agents violated his Fourth Amendment rights by 

being “intentionally dilatory” in waiting too long to ask about his citizenship, 

intentionally extending the duration of his detainment, and calling his military 

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base to inquire into his military status. He argues that he had a right to refuse 

to cooperate because the Fourth Amendment “does not impose obligations on 

the citizen” to cooperate. See Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial Dist. Ct. of Nev., 542 U.S. 

177, 187 (2004).

Rynearson relies on precedent discussing the Supreme Court’s analysis 

in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968). Terry allows a law enforcement officer to 

detain a person for a brief investigation if the officer can identify specific and 

articulable facts leading to a reasonable suspicion that the person is 

committing or about to commit a crime. United States v. Hill, 752 F.3d 1029, 

1033 (5th Cir. 2014). In contrast, the Supreme Court has granted agents at 

immigration checkpoints the right to stop and question a vehicle’s occupants 

regarding their citizenship without reasonable suspicion of any wrongdoing. 

Machuca-Barrera, 261 F.3d at 433. That grant of authority is readily 

distinguishable from the authority granted by Terry. 

There is no dispute that the initial stop was constitutional. Neither 

Rynearson nor his car was searched. Because the Supreme Court has granted 

agents the authority to stop, question, and inspect documents at interior 

checkpoints, the government argues there must also be a requirement that the 

individual cooperate with the agents. The Supreme Court has concluded that 

“all that is required of the vehicle’s occupants is a response to a brief question 

or two and possibly the production of a document evidencing a right to be in 

the United States.” United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873, 880 (1975) 

(quotations and citation omitted). 

The facts indicate that Rynearson generally asserted his right against 

unlawful searches and seizures while the agents had difficulty determining 

how to respond to his unorthodox tactics. We have not discovered nor been 

shown any authority supporting Rynearson’s claim that the constitutional 

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rights he chose to stand on were clearly established. Accordingly, we conclude 

that these governmental officials, at worst, made reasonable but mistaken 

judgments when presented with an unusually uncooperative person, unusual 

at least in the facts described in any of the caselaw.

Because we hold that no constitutional right of which all reasonable 

officers would have known was violated, we need not consider whether 

Rynearson actually had some limited Fourth Amendment right to refuse to 

cooperate. See Pearson, 555 U.S. at 242. 

We close by examining Rynearson’s argument that the district court 

erred by denying his motion to stay summary judgment pending limited 

discovery. “We review a decision to stay discovery pending resolution of a 

dispositive motion for an abuse of discretion.” Brazos Valley Coal. for Life, Inc. 

v. City of Bryan, Tex., 421 F.3d 314, 327 (5th Cir. 2005). We find no basis to 

disturb the district court’s exercise of discretion. Qualified immunity “is 

intended to give government officials a right not merely to avoid standing trial, 

but also to avoid the burdens of such pretrial matters as discovery . . . .” 

McClendon v. City of Columbia, 305 F.3d 314, 323 (5th Cir. 2002) (citation and 

internal quotations omitted). To stay summary judgment in order to allow 

discovery, the court must determine “that the plaintiff’s pleadings assert facts 

which, if true, would overcome the defense of qualified immunity.” Wicks v. 

Miss. State Emp’t Servs., 41 F.3d 991, 994 (5th Cir. 1995). Then, if the court 

remains “unable to rule on the immunity defense without further clarification 

of the facts,” it may issue a discovery order “narrowly tailored to uncover only 

those facts needed to rule on the immunity claim . . . .” Lion Boulos v. Wilson, 

834 F.2d 504, 507-08 (5th Cir. 1987). We have already discussed why the 

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officers were entitled to qualified immunity in the absence of any clearly 

established constitutional right. Discovery was unnecessary. 

AFFIRMED.

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JENNIFER WALKER ELROD, Circuit Judge, dissenting:

At a fixed interior immigration checkpoint approximately sixty-seven 

miles from the United States–Mexico border, United States Air Force officer 

Richard Rynearson presented four forms of government-issued identification—

including official and personal U.S. passports—to show that he is a United 

States citizen. Yet Agent Lands refused to examine the passports and Agent 

Perez, rather than simply scrutinizing the passports, asked Rynearson to 

identify his commanding officer and then made Rynearson wait while he placed 

phone calls to Rynearson’s employer. Because the law is clearly established 

that immigration officials violate the Fourth Amendment when they continue 

to detain a traveler beyond the time reasonably necessary to investigate his 

citizenship status, I respectfully dissent.

I.

The majority opinion accurately recites many of the facts that gave rise 

to this controversy, but I write to emphasize a couple of points. First, for the 

duration of the stop, Rynearson asserted his rights while also providing the 

documentation needed to prove his citizenship status. The majority opinion 

labels these actions “tactics” and calls them “unorthodox” and “unusually 

uncooperative.” However, as the majority opinion recognizes—and a review of 

the record and the video confirms1—Rynearson began cooperating as early as 

1 As the majority opinion observes, Rynearson posted a video of the incident on the 

internet, and the defendants attached it as an exhibit to their motion to dismiss. The video, 

which is divided into four parts and entitled “Full Video – Border Patrol Incident,” appears 

at the following links: 

Part One: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BId1f8WG2s

Part Two: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqU9M9RyeZA

Part Three: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8GDNFleCI8

Part Four: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZbCCBH7YM4

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two minutes into the stop by producing identification documents.2 Moreover, 

while he provided the information needed to prove his citizenship, Rynearson 

explained several times that he would not indulge the officers’ commands when 

he thought that they exceeded the limited scope of the immigration checkpoint 

inquiry. Standing on one’s rights is not an “unorthodox tactic[].” It is a 

venerable American tradition. 

Second, the record also shows that Agents Lands and Perez did not 

expeditiously investigate Rynearson’s citizenship status. Approximately two 

minutes into the stop, Rynearson displayed his military identification and 

driver’s license for Agent Lands, but Agent Lands waited until approximately 

eleven minutes into the detention to inform Rynearson that those 

identification cards “don’t mean anything.” At that point, Rynearson 

immediately offered to show Agent Lands his official and personal U.S. 

passports. Agent Lands ignored the offer and, for the first time, finally asked 

Rynearson whether he was a United States citizen. Rynearson responded 

affirmatively, but he was not then permitted to leave, and Agent Lands never 

asked to see Rynearson’s passports. 

Almost eighteen minutes into the detention, Agent Perez arrived and 

asked for Rynearson’s passports. Rynearson instantly surrendered them. 

Rather than simply examine the passports, however, Agent Perez asked 

Rynearson to identify his commanding officer and attempted to call the Provost 

Marshal3 and CID.4 Agent Perez spent ten to fifteen minutes on these phone 

calls, and Agent Lands did not inform Rynearson that he was free to leave until 

2 Because the parties agree that Rynearson’s video is accurate, we must “view[] the 

facts in the light depicted by the videotape.” Scott v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372, 380–81 (2007).

3 The Provost Marshal is the officer in charge of the military police.

4 “CID” refers to the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command.

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more than fifteen minutes after Agent Perez took his passports.5 In total, 

approximately twenty-three minutes transpired between the time that 

Rynearson offered his passports to Agent Lands and the time that the 

detention ended, for a total detention time of approximately thirty-four 

minutes. Although Agent Perez did scrutinize Rynearson’s passports at some 

point during the final portion of the detention, Agent Lands stated in a 

declaration that such records checks generally take a “couple of minutes.”

II.

Agents Lands and Perez argue that, on summary judgment, they can 

invoke qualified immunity to defeat Rynearson’s Bivens action against them. 

The test for qualified immunity is a familiar one. “First, a court must decide 

whether the facts . . . alleged . . . make out a violation of a constitutional right. 

Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 232 (2009). “Second, if the plaintiff has 

satisfied this first step, the court must decide whether the right at issue was 

‘clearly established’ at the time of [the] alleged misconduct.” Id. This second 

prong of the qualified immunity analysis asks whether “[t]he contours of the 

right [are] sufficiently clear that a reasonable official would understand that 

what he is doing violates [the] right.” Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 640 

(1987). Stated another way, “in the light of pre-existing law the unlawfulness 

must be apparent.” Id. Qualified immunity applies unless both prongs are 

satisfied. Pearson, 555 U.S. at 232.

5 The majority opinion incorrectly asserts that Agent Perez was the one who returned 

the passports to Rynearson and informed him that he was free to leave. In fact, Agent Lands 

(not Agent Perez) was the officer who returned the passports; in his declaration, Agent Perez 

averred that he “informed [Agent Lands] to release Mr. Rynearson and to return Rynearson’s 

passports and send him on his way.” ROA. 266. In addition, the agents’ voices are clearly 

distinguishable on the videotape, and Agent Lands is the one speaking when Rynearson 

receives his passports and is informed that he may leave.

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The Supreme Court has made clear that while the Fourth Amendment 

permits routine, suspicionless stops at fixed checkpoints near the border, the 

scope of such stops is “quite limited.” United States v. Martinez–Fuerte, 428 

U.S. 543, 557, 562 (1976). “[A]ll that is required of the vehicle’s occupants is a 

response to a brief question or two and possibly the production of a document 

evidencing a right to be in the United States.” Id. at 558 (internal quotation 

marks omitted). Moreover, this court has held that “[t]he scope of an 

immigration checkpoint stop is limited to the justifying, programmatic purpose 

of the stop: determining the citizenship status of persons passing through the 

checkpoint.” United States v. Machuca–Barrera, 261 F.3d 425, 433 (5th Cir. 

2001). “It follows that the permissible duration of an immigration stop is the 

‘time reasonably necessary to determine the citizenship status of the persons 

stopped.’” United States v. Portillo–Aguirre, 311 F.3d 647, 653 (5th Cir. 2002) 

(quoting Machuca–Barrera, 261 F.3d at 433). 

“An officer may ask questions outside the scope of the stop, but only so 

long as such questions do not extend the duration of the stop.” Machuca–

Barrera, 261 F.3d at 432. “Conversely, when officers detain travelers after the 

legitimate justification for a stop has ended, the continued detention is 

unreasonable.” Portillo–Aguirre, 311 F.3d at 654. “[A]ny further detention 

beyond a brief question or two or a request for documents evidencing a right to 

be in the United States must be based on consent or probable cause,” Portillo–

Aguirre, 311 F.3d at 652, or upon reasonable suspicion, Machuca–Barrera, 261 

F.3d at 434. Even a three-minute extension beyond a detention’s permissible 

duration is cognizable as a Fourth Amendment violation. See Portillo–Aguirre, 

311 F.3d at 654.

By making Rynearson wait for thirty-four minutes, ignoring a verbal 

affirmation of U.S. citizenship, and rejecting multiple forms of identification, 

Agents Lands and Perez far exceeded the scope of the immigration-checkpoint 

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inquiry as the Supreme Court defined it in Martinez–Fuerte. Putting aside the 

dilatory nature of the stop as a whole, at a bare minimum, once Rynearson 

offered his passports to Agent Lands, any further detention other than the 

couple of minutes required to authenticate the passports was unnecessary. 

The State Department may issue passports only to United States citizens and 

non-citizen nationals. 22 U.S.C. § 212. As detailed above, Agent Lands refused 

to even look at the passports, and Agent Perez did not simply verify the 

passports’ authenticity—he asked for the identity of Rynearson’s commanding 

officer and wasted ten to fifteen minutes placing unnecessary phone calls to 

military law enforcement.

One cannot escape the impression that Agent Lands’s refusal to look at 

the passports and Agent Perez’s irrelevant phone calls to Rynearson’s 

employer operated as retribution against Rynearson for asserting his rights; 

about three minutes into the stop, a fellow officer even pointed out the cameras 

in Rynearson’s car. But putting that to one side,6 after Rynearson offered his 

passports, Agents Lands and Perez needed only to examine them to determine 

whether Rynearson was a United States citizen. Therefore, Agents Lands and 

Perez detained Rynearson longer than “reasonably necessary to determine the 

citizenship status of the person[] stopped.”7 Machuca–Barrera, 261 F.3d at 

433.

6 Evidence of a defendant’s subjective intentions is not relevant to the qualifiedimmunity defense. See Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 817–19 (1982); Crawford–El v. 

Britton, 523 U.S. 574, 588 (1998).

7 The length of the detention cannot be justified on the alternative basis of reasonable 

suspicion. At oral argument, the government correctly conceded that “this is not a Terry

case.” A drug dog did not alert when agents led it behind the car. Later, Rynearson asked 

Agent Lands several times whether he had reasonable suspicion to detain him; Agent Lands 

insisted that the detention did not require it. When Rynearson asked whether Agent Lands 

believed that Rynearson had violated an immigration law, Agent Lands responded, “I didn’t 

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In addition, I would hold that at the very least, Agents Lands and Perez 

failed to demonstrate entitlement to qualified immunity with respect to the 

twenty-three minutes of detention that followed Rynearson’s offer to show 

Agent Lands his passports. In light of Martinez–Fuerte, Machuca–Barrera, 

and Portillo–Aguirre, and on the record as it currently stands in this case, no 

reasonable officer would believe that he could lawfully detain a traveler for 

twenty-three minutes after the traveler presents a valid U.S. passport—better 

evidence of United States citizenship than the state-issued forms of 

identification that highway travelers most frequently carry on their person. 

Far more than simply ask Rynearson to give the limited information that the 

Supreme Court allows officers to demand at fixed border checkpoints—“a 

response to a brief question or two and possibly the production of a document 

evidencing a right to be in the United States,” Martinez–Fuerte, 428 U.S. at 

558—Agents Lands and Perez were dissatisfied with four forms of governmentissued identification and a verbal affirmation of United States citizenship. All 

that remained after Rynearson’s offer to surrender his passports was to 

authenticate them. On the present record, no reasonable officer—in light of 

Martinez–Fuerte, Machuca–Barrera, and Portillo–Aguirre—would believe that 

he was entitled to take an additional twenty-three minutes while ignoring the 

passports and placing phone calls to Rynearson’s employer.

III.

Firm assertions of one’s rights are far from “unorthodox” in a Republic 

that insists constitutional rights are worth insisting upon and that tasks the 

courts with protecting those rights. See, e.g., Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47, 52–

say you violated an immigration law.” Indeed, Agent Lands insisted that he needed no 

articulable reason at all to detain Rynearson.

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53 (1979) (holding that without reasonable suspicion, police may not require 

citizens to stop and identify themselves); Kolender v. Lawson, 461 U.S. 352, 

353–54 (1983) (invalidating a stop-and-identify statute on vagueness grounds). 

Government officials, like the defendants in this case, often contend that 

“[f]ailure to conform is ‘insubordination,’” W. Va. State Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette, 

319 U.S. 624, 629 (1943), but it is the courts that must draw the line “between 

authority and rights of the individual,” id. at 630. In drawing this line, we do 

not rely upon “whether . . . we would think” complying with an official’s 

commands “to be good, bad or merely innocuous.” Id. at 634. “Nor does our 

duty to apply the Bill of Rights to assertions of official authority depend upon 

our possession of marked competence in the field where the invasion of rights 

occurs.” Id. at 639. Rather, “we act in these matters not by authority of our 

competence” or by our perception of the plaintiff’s actions, “but by force of our 

commissions.” Id. at 640.

Agents Lands and Perez failed to demonstrate their entitlement to 

qualified immunity because the law is clearly established that immigration 

officials may not detain travelers longer than reasonably necessary to 

investigate their citizenship status. For the foregoing reasons, I would reverse 

the judgment of the district court and remand for further proceedings.

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