FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

No. 04-10076 Plaintiff-Appellee,

D.C. No.

v.  CR-02-00381-EJG

ERIC ALAN MAYO,

OPINION Defendant-Appellant. 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of California

Edward J. Garcia, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted

November 4, 2004—San Francisco, California

Filed January 14, 2005

Before: William C. Canby, Jr., Pamela Ann Rymer, and

Michael Daly Hawkins, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Canby

731
COUNSEL

Tim Warriner, Sacramento, California, for the appellant. 

Norman Y. Wong, Assistant United States Attorney, Sacramento, California, for the appellee. 

OPINION

CANBY, Circuit Judge. 

Eric Mayo appeals the district court’s denial of his motion

to suppress evidence found in a search of his vehicle. While

UNITED STATES v. MAYO 733
responding to a call about suspicious narcotics activity, officers arrested Mayo for a felony violation of California’s vehicle code. The officers searched Mayo’s car incident to this

arrest, finding bags of stolen mail. Mayo seeks to suppress

this evidence on the grounds that officers: (1) lacked reasonable suspicion to detain him, (2) unreasonably broadened the

length and scope of their investigation during his detention,

(3) lacked probable cause to arrest him on the vehicle code

violation, and (4) expanded the scope of the search incident

to arrest beyond constitutional limits when they searched the

hatchback area of his car. We reject all four claims, and

affirm the judgment of the district court. In doing so, we join

other circuits in ruling that, for purposes of an automobile

search incident to arrest, officers may search the cargo area

behind the rear seat of a hatchback vehicle. 

Facts

On July 16, 2002, Officer Fritts of the Stockton Police

Department Narcotics Unit received a call from the manager

of a Super-8 Motel.1 The manager reported suspicious activity

in the motel’s parking lot. Four cars—a brown Chevrolet

truck, red Pontiac Firebird, silver Dodge Caravan, and a silver

Honda Civic (Mayo’s car)—pulled up next to each other. The

occupants got out of their cars and began talking. One of the

occupants handed another a package of some sort. The driver

of the truck wiped down the steering wheel and door handle

of the truck with a rag or shirt, and then he walked away from

the group, carrying a maroon backpack. The manager gave

Officer Fritts the make and license plate number of each of

the four vehicles. 

1Officer Fritts knew the manager because the motel was located in an

area with high narcotics activity. Officer Fritts had given the manager his

phone number so that she could report any suspicious activity to him.

From the record, it appears that she had called Officer Fritts at least twice

before to report suspicious activity at her motel. [Id.] 

734 UNITED STATES v. MAYO
After Officer Fritts received the call, he radioed the police

dispatcher to send a patrol car to the motel to investigate

suspicious activity, possibly involving narcotics. He also gave

the dispatcher the descriptions of the four cars involved.2 He

told the dispatcher nothing else. 

Responding to the dispatcher, Officer Golden arrived at the

motel within a few minutes. By the time of his arrival, however, three of the cars had left the motel. Officer Golden spotted the fourth car, Mayo’s Honda Civic, parked by the

manager’s office. Officer Golden pulled in behind the Civic

and, as part of standard safety procedure, entered Mayo’s

license plate information into his computer. 

Officer Golden then approached Mayo, who was standing

next to his Civic. Officer Golden informed Mayo that he was

investigating possible narcotics activity, and he asked Mayo

for identification. Mayo handed Officer Golden his driver’s

license and California vehicle sales license.3 The two then

chatted informally for a minute, and Officer Golden asked

Mayo whether he owned the Civic, to which Mayo responded

that he was in the process of buying it from a third party. Officer Golden then took Mayo’s licenses back to his patrol car

to enter the information into his computer. 

After returning to his patrol car, Officer Golden noticed for

the first time that the Civic’s registration expired in 1999, but

the sticker on the plate read 2003, indicating that the sticker

probably was stolen. Officer Golden walked back to Mayo

and asked him about the registration. Mayo denied any

knowledge of the stolen sticker on the license plate.4

2

It is unclear from the record whether Officer Fritts relayed the license

plate numbers to the dispatcher. At the least, he relayed the make and

color of the vehicles. 

3Apparently, this second license allows Mayo to resell cars in the State

of California (although its precise use is unclear from the record). 

4

It is a felony to place, with intent to defraud, a false registration sticker

on a California license plate. CAL. VEH. CODE § 4463. 

UNITED STATES v. MAYO 735
During this time, Officer Fritts arrived to investigate narcotics activity. The motel manager told him that Mayo

attempted to rent a room with a credit card in the name of

Bennie Bindi. Officer Fritts approached Mayo, and Fritts,

along with another narcotics officer, smelled a chemical odor

commonly found in methamphetamine labs. Officer Fritts

asked Mayo about the smell, and Mayo denied any knowledge

of it. 

Officer Fritts then asked Mayo about the credit card that he

tried to use to rent the motel room. Mayo explained that Bennie Bindi authorized the use of the card because Mayo did not

have enough cash to rent a room. Mayo then consented to a

pat-down search. The search produced nothing suspicious,

except $160.00 in twenty-dollar bills. Officer Fritts asked

Mayo why he did not rent the room with this money, and

Mayo responded that he wanted to rent the room for two

nights. 

Shortly thereafter, Bennie Bindi approached the group.

Officer Fritts searched Bindi’s car—the silver Dodge Caravan

that the manager had seen earlier—because Bindi was on

searchable probation. The search produced glass pipes for

smoking methamphetamine and an altered driver’s license,

among other things. 

Officer Fritts returned to Mayo and asked him several times

to consent to a search of his vehicle. Mayo refused each time.

Finally, Officer Fritts instructed Mayo that, if Mayo did not

consent to the search, he would arrest Mayo for the felony

vehicle registration violation. When Mayo again refused,

Officer Fritts arrested him and searched his Civic incident to

arrest. Officer Fritts found the stolen mail—the subject of the

indictment—in bags located in both the passenger compartment and hatchback area behind the rear seat. From the slim

record, it appears that Mayo could access the hatchback area

from the passenger compartment. The entire event lasted

736 UNITED STATES v. MAYO
between twenty and forty minutes, from the first arrival of the

police to the search of Mayo’s vehicle. 

Procedural History

Mayo filed a motion in the district court to suppress the

evidence from the search of his vehicle. After a hearing, the

district judge denied the motion. Mayo then entered a conditional guilty plea, reserving the right to appeal the denial of

his motion to suppress. The district court sentenced Mayo to

six months in prison followed by three years of supervised

release. Mayo appealed.5

Discussion

I. REASONABLE SUSPICION TO DETAIN AND

QUESTION

[1] The parties assume, as we do, that Mayo was detained

at least by the time that Officer Golden took Mayo’s driver’s

license and walked back to his patrol car with it. We conclude

that this detention and its limited extension was supported by

reasonable suspicion, based on specific, articulable facts, that

Mayo was engaging in criminal activity. See, e.g., United

States v. Michael R., 90 F.3d 340, 346 (9th Cir. 1996) (stating

standard for reasonable suspicion).6 Before detaining and

questioning Mayo, officers knew the following: four vehicles,

including Mayo’s, arrived in the motel parking lot in tandem;

the occupants of the vehicles gathered around the silver

Dodge Caravan; the driver of the Caravan handed a package

to the driver of the Firebird; the driver of the Chevrolet truck

then wiped down the steering wheel and driver’s side door

handle with a shirt or rag, and then he walked away carrying

5The district court did not stay Mayo’s sentence, so he presumably has

now served the incarceration portion. 

6We review de novo the question whether the officers had reasonable

suspicion for the detention. Michael R., 90 F.3d at 345-46. 

UNITED STATES v. MAYO 737
a maroon backpack; and after this “transaction,” the occupants (save Mayo) left the area.7

 Moreover, this meeting took

place in a high-crime area and in front of a motel that hosted

previous narcotics activity. See, e.g., United States v. DiazJuarez, 299 F.3d 1138, 1142 (9th Cir. 2002) (noting that presence in a high—crime area is relevant to a reasonable suspicion analysis). 

[2] We reject Mayo’s contention that his detention was

based on mere presence in the vicinity of suspicious activity.

Mayo relies on Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U.S. 85 (1980), which

held that officers lacked reasonable suspicion to detain and

search a defendant solely because of his presence in a tavern

in which the officers suspected the bartender dealt heroin.

Unlike Ybarra, however, Mayo clearly interacted with the

other participants during the suspicious activity. The officers

therefore had reasonable suspicion to detain and question

Mayo when they arrived on the scene.

II. LENGTH AND SCOPE OF THE INVESTIGATION 

Mayo further contends that his detention exceeded Fourth

Amendment limitations in both duration and scope. We conclude to the contrary.8

 From the record, the maximum estimated time of the detention was forty minutes. Although the

7Officer Golden, who arrived on the scene first, did not know all of

these facts. The dispatcher told him to investigate suspicious narcotics

activity and gave him a description of the cars involved, including

Mayo’s. Collectively, however, officers knew all of these facts before

Officer Golden detained Mayo and asked for his identification. See United

States v. Sutton, 794 F.2d 1415, 1426 (9th Cir. 1986) (“We look to the collective knowledge of all the officers involved in the criminal investigation

although all of the information known to the law enforcement officers

involved in the investigation is not communicated to the officer who actually makes the stop.”). 

8We review de novo the question whether the initial detention exceeded

its proper scope or duration. See United States v. Garcia-Rivera, 353 F.3d

788, 791 (9th Cir. 2003). 

738 UNITED STATES v. MAYO
duration of detention bears on whether a Terry stop is justified, there is no strict time requirement. United States v.

Sharpe, 470 U.S. 675, 687 (1985) (holding that, under the circumstances, a twenty-minute detention was not too long);

Haynie v. County of Los Angeles, 339 F.3d 1071, 1076 (9th

Cir. 2003) (noting that a Terry stop does not have rigid time

constraints so long as the officer conducts the investigation in

a diligent and reasonable fashion). 

[3] Here, the officers conducted the investigation in a constitutional manner. The period of detention was permissibly

extended because new grounds for suspicion of criminal

activity continued to unfold. The officers pursued their multiple inquiries promptly as they arose: they questioned Mayo

regarding their suspicion of narcotics activity; investigated the

vehicle code violation; investigated Mayo’s attempted use of

another’s credit card; investigated the connection between

Mayo and Bindi, who returned to the scene while officers

were questioning Mayo; searched Bindi’s Dodge Caravan;

and questioned Mayo about the chemical odor associated with

methamphetamine. A maximum of forty minutes to pursue all

of these inquiries was not unreasonable. Therefore, the Terry

detention did not exceed constitutional limits.

III. PROBABLE CAUSE TO ARREST 

[4] We also conclude that there was probable cause to support Mayo’s arrest for the felony violation of California’s

vehicle code.9 There is no dispute that placing a stolen registration sticker on a license plate, with intent to defraud, is a

felony violation of California law. CAL. VEH. CODE § 4463.

There also is no dispute that Mayo admitted that he was driving the car that day, was in the process of buying it, and had

been in possession of it for the last month. These facts were

9We review de novo the district court’s ruling that there was probable

cause for Mayo’s warrantless arrest. See, e.g., United States v. Juvenile

(RRA-A), 229 F.3d 737, 742 (9th Cir. 2000) (stating standard). 

UNITED STATES v. MAYO 739
sufficient to establish probable cause to believe that Mayo

committed or participated in the crime. 

[5] Although Mayo told the officers that he was buying the

car and did not realize that the sticker was on the license

plate, the officers did not have to accept Mayo’s version of

the facts. The standard for probable cause is not so demanding. See, e.g., United States v. Hernandez, 322 F.3d 592, 596

(9th Cir. 2003) (stating the standard for probable cause:

whether, under the totality of the circumstances, a prudent

officer would have believed that there was a fair probability

that the suspect committed the crime). It was just as likely (if

not more so) that Mayo, rather than the prior owner, placed

the sticker on the plate to avoid the time and expense of registration. The arrest was not unconstitutional.10

IV. SEARCH INCIDENT TO ARREST; THE

HATCHBACK AREA

[6] Mayo finally contends that officers were not entitled to

search the hatchback area of his vehicle, where some of the

stolen mail was found, as part of a search incident to his

arrest. Our approach to this issue is informed by New York v.

Belton, 453 U.S. 454, 460 (1981), which held that officers

may conduct a search of the entire passenger compartment of

a vehicle, as well as any containers within it, as an incident

to the arrest of one of the vehicle’s occupants. Of particular

importance for our purposes is the emphasis the Court placed

10Mayo contends that he was arrested for refusing to consent to the

search of his automobile. He relies on Gasho v. United States, 39 F.3d

1420, 1431-32 (9th Cir. 1994), which held that refusal of consent to search

did not support probable cause to arrest. Here, however, the probable

cause was supplied by the felonious attachment of a stolen sticker to an

expired license plate. Where an arrest is supported by probable cause, a

subjective intent of the officers to conduct a search is irrelevant, so long

as the search is not conducted in an extraordinary manner. See United

States v. Hudson, 100 F.3d 1409, 1416 (9th Cir. 1996). There was nothing

extraordinary about the search of Mayo’s vehicle. 

740 UNITED STATES v. MAYO
on the need for a workable and straightforward rule to identify

the area that may be searched without requiring an individualized factual inquiry into whether the arrestee likely could

access the area for the purpose of grabbing a weapon or

destroying evidence. See id. at 459-60. The Court therefore

relied on the “generalization that articles inside the relatively

narrow compass of the passenger compartment of an automobile are in fact generally, even if not inevitably, within ‘the

area into which an arrestee might reach in order to grab a

weapon or evidentiary ite[m].’ ” Id. at 460 (quoting Chimel v.

California, 395 U.S. 752, 763 (1969)). The Court deemed it

appropriate to rely on this generalization to authorize search

of the entire passenger compartment “[i]n order to establish

the workable rule this category of cases requires.” Id.; see

also Thornton v. United States, 124 S. Ct. 2127, 2132 (2004)

(“The need for a clear rule, readily understood by police officers and not depending on differing estimates of what items

were or were not within reach of an arrestee at any particular

moment, justifies the sort of generalization which Belton

enunciated.”). 

[7] Our task, therefore, is to determine a workable rule,

consistent with the regime of Belton, to govern searches of the

cargo area behind the rear seat of a hatchback vehicle.11 We

conclude that the hatchback area meets the criterion for automobile searches under Belton; it is “generally, even if not

inevitably,” accessible to an arrestee from the passenger area

of the vehicle. 453 U.S. at 460. Contrary to Mayo’s contention, the hatchback area is much more easily viewed as part

of the passenger compartment than as the equivalent of a conventional vehicle trunk.12 Accordingly, an officer conducting

11We recognize that recent occupants, following their arrest and

restraint, are frequently in no position to gain access to any portion of the

passenger compartment of the vehicle, but this fact does not preclude the

application of the Belton rule. See Thornton, 124 S. Ct. at 2132. As one

Justice observed, application of the rule in this context brings to mind “the

mythical arrestee possessed of the skill of Houdini and the strength of Hercules.” Id. at 2134 (Scalia, J., concurring) (internal quotation omitted). 

12As in Belton, our ruling does not extend to the trunk of a vehicle. See

453 U.S. at 460-61 n.4. 

UNITED STATES v. MAYO 741
a search incident to the arrest of an occupant of the vehicle

may search the hatchback area. We adopt that workable rule

for this circuit. Our decision echoes that of other circuits that

have addressed comparable searches. United States v. Caldwell, 97 F.3d 1063, 1067 (8th Cir. 1996); United States v.

Doward, 41 F.3d 789, 794 (1st Cir. 1994); see also United

States v. Olguin-Rivera, 168 F.3d 1203, 1205-07 (10th Cir.

1999) (allowing search of covered cargo area of a sport utility

vehicle); United States v. Pino, 855 F.2d 357, 364 (6th Cir.

1988) (allowing search of cargo area of mid-size station

wagon). 

[8] Mayo urges us to draw a distinction between covered

and uncovered hatchback cargo areas. We see no principled

distinction, however. A covered hatchback area is generally,

if not inevitably, accessible from the passenger compartment,

albeit with some difficulty in some instances. Our ruling that

the hatchback area can be searched should not be clouded by

the interposition of a cover, any more than it would be by the

interposition of a locked container. See Olguin-Rivera, 168

F.3d at 1206 (citing Belton, 453 U.S. at 460). Thus, officers

may search the hatchback cargo area “whether covered or

uncovered.” Id. at 1207. 

[9] We conclude that, under Belton and its progeny, the

officers here properly searched the entire passenger compartment of Mayo’s automobile, including the hatchback cargo

area, as an incident to the arrest of Mayo, a recent occupant

of the vehicle.13

AFFIRMED.

13In his opening brief, Mayo contended that Belton did not apply

because he was outside of his vehicle when the officers arrived. Subsequently, however, the Supreme Court decided Thornton, which held that

the Belton rule also applied to recent occupants of the vehicle. Thornton,

124 S. Ct. at 2132. 

742 UNITED STATES v. MAYO