Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 414.0

529US2

Unit: $U44

[09-26-01 10:00:50] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 334 (2000)

339

Breyer, J., dissenting

as a matter of course, feel the bag in an exploratory manner.
But this is exactly what the agent did here. We therefore
hold that the agent’s physical manipulation of petitioner’s
bag violated the Fourth Amendment.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is

Reversed.

Justice Breyer, with whom Justice Scalia joins,

dissenting.

Does a traveler who places a soft-sided bag in the shared
overhead storage compartment of a bus have a “reasonable
expectation” that strangers will not push, pull, prod,
squeeze, or otherwise manipulate his luggage? Unlike the
majority, I believe that he does not.

Petitioner argues—and the majority points out—that,
even if bags in overhead bins are subject to general “touch-
ing” and “handling,” this case is special because “Agent
Cantu’s physical manipulation of [petitioner’s] luggage ‘far
exceeded the casual contact [he] could have expected from
other passengers.’ ” Ante, at 338. But the record shows
the contrary. Agent Cantu testiﬁed that border patrol ofﬁ-
cers (who routinely enter buses at designated checkpoints to
run immigration checks) “conduct an inspection of the over-
head luggage by squeezing the bags as we’re going out.”
App. 9. On the occasion at issue here, Agent Cantu “felt a
green bag” which had “a brick-like object in it.”
Id., at 10.
He explained that he felt “the edges of the brick in the bag,”
id., at 12, and that it was a “[b]rick-like object . . . that,
when squeezed, you could feel an outline of something of [a]
different mass inside of it,” id., at 11. Although the agent
acknowledged that his practice was to “squeeze [bags] very
hard,” he testiﬁed that his touch ordinarily was not “[h]ard
enough to break something inside that might be fragile.”
Id., at 15. Petitioner also testiﬁed that Agent Cantu
“reached for my bag, and he shook it a little, and squeezed
it.”

Id., at 18.