Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/422/873/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 16:44:59+00:00

Document:
The Fourth Amendment held not to allow a roving patrol of the Border Patrol to stop a vehicle near the Mexican border and question its occupants about their citizenship and immigration status, when the only ground for suspicion is that the occupants appear to be of Mexican ancestry. Except at the border and its functional equivalents, patrolling officers may stop vehicles only if they are aware of specific articulable facts, together with rational inferences therefrom, reasonably warranting suspicion that the vehicles contain aliens who may be illegally in the country. Pp. 422 U. S. 878-887.
(a) Because of the important governmental interest in preventing the illegal entry of aliens at the border, the minimal intrusion of a brief stop, and the absence of practical alternatives for policing the border, an officer whose observations lead him reasonably to suspect that a particular vehicle may contain aliens who are illegally in the country may stop the car briefly, question the driver and passengers about their citizenship and immigration status, and ask them to explain suspicious circumstances; but any further detention or search must be based on consent or probable cause. Pp. 422 U. S. 878-882.
(b) To allow roving patrols the broad and unlimited discretion urged by the Government to stop all vehicles in the border area without any reason to suspect that they have violated any law, would not be "reasonable" under the Fourth Amendment. Pp. 422 U. S. 882-883.
(c) Assuming that Congress has the power to admit aliens on condition that they submit to reasonable questioning about their right to be in the country, such power cannot diminish the Fourth Amendment rights of citizens who may be mistaken for aliens. The Fourth Amendment therefore forbids stopping persons for questioning about their citizenship on less than a reasonable suspicion that they may be aliens. Pp. 422 U. S. 883-884.
POWELL, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which BRENNAN, STEWART, MARSHALL, and REHNQUIST, JJ., joined. REHNQUIST, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 422 U. S. 887. BURGER, C.J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which BLACKMUN, J., joined, post, p. 422 U. S. 899. DOUGLAS, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, post, p. 422 U. S. 888. WHITE, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which BLACKMUN, J., joined, post, p. 422 U. S. 914.
This case raises questions as to the United States Border Patrol's authority to stop automobiles in areas near the Mexican border. It differs from our decision in Almeida-Sanchez v. United States, 413 U. S. 266 (1973), in that the Border Patrol does not claim authority to search cars, but only to question the occupants about their citizenship and immigration status.
car parked at the side of the highway. The road was dark, and they were using the patrol car's headlights to illuminate passing cars. They pursued respondent's car and stopped it, saying later that their only reason for doing so was that its three occupants appeared to be of Mexican descent. The officers questioned respondent and his two passengers about their citizenship and learned that the passengers were aliens who had entered the country illegally. All three were then arrested, and respondent was charged with two counts of knowingly transporting illegal immigrants, a violation of § 274(a)(2) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 66 Stat. 228, 8 U.S.C. § 1324(a)(2). At trial, respondent moved to suppress the testimony of and about the two passengers, claiming that this evidence was the fruit of an illegal seizure. The trial court denied the motion, the aliens testified at trial, and respondent was convicted on both counts.
The court held that the Fourth Amendment, as interpreted in Almeida-Sanchez, forbids stopping a vehicle, even for the limited purpose of questioning its occupants, unless the officers have a "founded suspicion" that the occupants are aliens illegally in the country. The court refused to find that Mexican ancestry alone supported such a "founded suspicion," and held that respondent's motion to suppress should have been granted. [Footnote 2] 499 F.2d 1109 (1974). We granted certiorari and set the case for oral argument with No. 73-2050, United States v. Ortiz, post, p. 422 U. S. 891, and No. 73-6848, Bowen v. United States, post, p. 422 U. S. 916. 419 U.S. 824 (1974).
The Government does not challenge the Court of Appeals' factual conclusion that the stop of respondent's car was a roving patrol stop, rather than a checkpoint stop. Brief for United States 8. Nor does it challenge the retroactive application of Almeida-Sanchez, supra, Brief for United States 9, or contend that the San Clemente checkpoint is the functional equivalent of the border. The only issue presented for decision is whether a roving patrol may stop a vehicle in an area near the border and question its occupants when the only ground for suspicion is that the occupants appear to be of Mexican ancestry. For the reasons that follow, we affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.
"within a reasonable distance from any external boundary of the United States, to board and search for aliens any vessel within the territorial waters of the United States and any railway car, aircraft, conveyance, or vehicle. . . ."
and we must decide whether the Fourth Amendment allows such random vehicle stops in the border areas.
The Fourth Amendment applies to all seizures of the person, including seizures that involve only a brief detention short of traditional arrest. Davis v. Mississippi, 394 U. S. 721 (1969); Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1, 392 U. S. 16-19 (1968). "[W]henever a police officer accosts an individual and restrains his freedom to walk away, he has seized' that person," id. at 392 U. S. 16, and the Fourth Amendment requires that the seizure be "reasonable." As with other categories of police action subject to Fourth Amendment constraints, the reasonableness of such seizures depends on a balance between the public interest and the individual's right to personal security free from arbitrary interference by law officers. Id. at 392 U. S. 20-21; Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U. S. 523, 387 U. S. 536-537 (1967).
aliens for jobs, and generating extra demand for social services. The aliens themselves are vulnerable to exploitation because they cannot complain of substandard working conditions without risking deportation. See generally Hearings on Illegal Aliens before Subcommittee No. 1 of the House Committee on the Judiciary, 92d Cong., 1st and 2d Sess., ser. 13, pts. 1-5 (1971-1972).
The Government has estimated that 85% of the aliens illegally in the country are from Mexico. United States v. Baca, 368 F.Supp. 398, 402 (SD Cal 1973). [Footnote 5] The Mexican border is almost 2,000 miles long, and even a vastly reinforced Border Patrol would find it impossible to prevent illegal border crossings. Many aliens cross the Mexican border on foot, miles away from patrolled areas, and then purchase transportation from the border area to inland cities, where they find jobs and elude the immigration authorities. Others gain entry on valid temporary border-crossing permits, but then violate the conditions of their entry. Most of these aliens leave the border area in private vehicles, often assisted by professional "alien smugglers." The Border Patrol's traffic-checking operations are designed to prevent this inland movement. They succeed in apprehending some illegal entrants and smugglers, and they deter the movement of others by threatening apprehension and increasing the cost of illegal transportation.
Against this valid public interest we must weigh the interference with individual liberty that results when an officer stops an automobile and questions its occupants.
"[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."
"the police officer . . . be able to point to specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant"
a belief that his safety or that of others is in danger. Id. at 392 U. S. 21; see id. at 392 U. S. 27.
in approaching the respondent to investigate a tip that he was carrying narcotics and a gun.
"The Fourth Amendment does not require a policeman who lacks the precise level of information necessary for probable cause to arrest to simply shrug his shoulders and allow a crime to occur or a criminal to escape. On the contrary, Terry recognizes that it may be the essence of good police work to adopt an intermediate response. . . . A brief stop of a suspicious individual, in order to determine his identity or to maintain the status quo momentarily while obtaining more information, may be most reasonable in light of the facts known to the officer at the time."
Id. at 407 U. S. 145-146.
immigration status, and he may ask them to explain suspicious circumstances, but any further detention or search must be based on consent or probable cause.
air miles from the border. 8 CFR § 287.1(a) (1975). Thus, if we approved the Government's position in this case, Border Patrol officers could stop motorists at random for questioning, day or night, anywhere within 100 air miles of the 2,000-mile border, on a city street, a busy highway, or a desert road, without any reason to suspect that they have violated any law.
may assume for purposes of this case that the broad congressional power over immigration, see Klendienst v. Mandel, 408 U. S. 753, 408 U. S. 765-767 (1972), authorizes Congress to admit aliens on condition that they will submit to reasonable questioning about their right to be and remain in the country, this power cannot diminish the Fourth Amendment rights of citizens who may be mistaken for aliens. For the same reasons that the Fourth Amendment forbids stopping vehicles at random to inquire if they are carrying aliens who are illegally in the country, it also forbids stopping or detaining persons for questioning about their citizenship on less than a reasonable suspicion that they may be aliens.
of traffic on the particular road, and previous experience with alien traffic are all relevant. See Carroll v. United States, 267 U. S. 132, 267 U. S. 159-161 (1925); United States v. Jaime-Barrios, 494 F.2d 455 (CA9), cert. denied, 417 U.S. 972 (1974). [Footnote 10] They also may consider information about recent illegal border crossings in the area. The driver's behavior may be relevant, as erratic driving or obvious attempts to evade officers can support a reasonable suspicion. See United States v. Larios Montes, 500 F.2d 941 (CA9 1974); Duprez v. United States, 435 F.2d 1276 (CA9 1970). Aspects of the vehicle itself may justify suspicion. For instance, officers say that certain station wagons, with large compartments for fold-down seats or spare tires, are frequently used for transporting concealed aliens. See United States v. Bugarin-Casas, 484 F.2d 853 (CA9 1973), cert. denied, 414 U.S. 1136 (1974); United States v. Wright, 476 F.2d 1027 (CA5 1973). The vehicle may appear to be heavily loaded, it may have an extraordinary number of passengers, or the officers may observe persons trying to hide. See United States v. Larios-Montes, supra. The Government also points out that trained officers can recognize the characteristic appearance of persons who live in Mexico, relying on such factors as the mode of dress and haircut. Reply Brief for United States 12-13, in United States v. Ortiz, post, p. 422 U. S. 891. In all situations, the officer is entitled to assess the facts in light of his experience in detecting illegal entry and smuggling. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. at 392 U. S. 27.
person of Mexican ancestry is an alien is high enough to make Mexican appearance a relevant factor, but, standing alone, it does not justify stopping all Mexican-Americans to ask if they are aliens.
For the Court of Appeals' purposes, the distinction between a roving patrol and a fixed checkpoint was controlling. The court previously had held that the principles of Almeida-Sanchez v. United States applied retrospectively to the activities of roving patrols, but not to those of fixed checkpoints. See United States v. Peltier, 500 F.2d 985 (CA9 1974), rev'd, ante, p. 422 U. S. 531; United States v. Bowen, 500 F.2d 960 (CA9 1974), aff'd, post, p. 422 U. S. 916.
There may be room to question whether voluntary testimony of a witness at trial, as opposed to a Government agent's testimony about objects seized or statements overheard, is subject to suppression as the fruit of an illegal search or seizure. See United States v. Guana-Sanchez, 484 F.2d 590 (CA7 1973), cert. dismissed as improvidently granted, 420 U. S. 513 (1975). But since the question was not raised in the petition for certiorari, we do not address it.
We cannot accept respondent's contention that, even though 287(a)(3) does not mention probable cause, its legislative history establishes that Congress meant to condition immigration officers' authority to board and search vehicles on probable cause to believe that they contained aliens. The legislative history simply does not support this contention.
The estimate of one million was produced by the Commissioner of the INS for the Immigration and Nationality Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee. Hearings on Illegal Aliens before Subcommittee No. 1 of the House Committee on the Judiciary, 92d Cong., 2d Sess., ser. 13, pt. 5, pp. 1323-1325 (1972). The higher estimate appears in the INS Ann.Rep. iii (1974).
This estimate tends to be confirmed by the consistently high proportion of Mexican nationals in the number of deportable aliens arrested each year. In 1970, for example, 80% of the deportable aliens arrested were from Mexico. See INS Ann.Rep. 95 (1970). In 1974, the figure was 92%. INS Ann.Rep. 94 (1974).
In this case, the officers did search respondent's car, but because they found no other incriminating evidence, the validity of the search is not in issue. Almeida-Sanchez changed the Border Patrol's practice of searching cars on routine stops, and the Government informs us that roving patrols now search vehicles only when they have probable cause to believe they will find illegally present aliens or contraband. Brief for United States 25.
Because the stop in this case was made without a warrant and the officers made no effort to obtain one, we have no occasion to decide whether a warrant could be issued to stop cars in a designated area on the basis of conditions in the area as a whole and in the absence of reason to suspect that any particular car is carrying aliens. See Almeida-Sanchez, 413 U.S. at 413 U. S. 275 (POWELL, J., concurring); Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U. S. 523 (1967).
As noted above, we reserve the question whether Border Patrol officers also may stop persons reasonably believed to be aliens when there is no reason to believe they are illegally in the country. See Cheung Tin Wong v. INS, 152 U.S.App.D.C. 66, 468 F.2d 1123 (1972); Au Yi Lau v. INS, 144 U.S.App.D.C. 147, 445 F.2d 217, cert. denied, 404 U.S. 864 (1971). The facts of this case do not require decision on the point.
The Courts of Appeals decisions cited throughout this part are merely illustrative. Our citation of them does not imply a view of the merits of particular decisions. Each case must turn on the totality of the particular circumstances.
The Government also argues that the location of this stop should be considered in deciding whether the officers had adequate reason to stop respondent's car. This appears, however, to be an after-the-fact justification. At trial, the officers gave no reason for the stop except the apparent Mexican ancestry of the car's occupants. It is not even clear that the Government presented the broader justification to the Court of Appeals. We therefore decline at this stage of the case to give any weight to the location of the stop.
The 1970 census and the INS figures for alien registration in 1970 provide the following information about the Mexican-American population in the border States. There were 1,619,064 persons of Mexican origin in Texas, and 200,004 (or 12.4%) of them registered as aliens from Mexico. In New Mexico, there were 119,049 persons of Mexican origin, and 10,171 (or 8.5%) registered as aliens. In Arizona, there were 239,811 persons of Mexican origin, and 34,075 (or 14.2%) registered as aliens. In California there were 1,857,267 persons of Mexican origin, and 379,951 (or 20.4%) registered as aliens. Bureau of the Census, Subject Report PC(2)-1C: Persons of Spanish Origin 2 (1970); INS Ann.Rep. 105 (1970). These figures, of course, do not present the entire picture. The number of registered aliens from Mexico has increased since 1970, INS Ann.Rep. 105 (1974), and we assume that very few illegal immigrants appear in the registration figures. On the other hand, many of the 950,000 other persons of Spanish origin living in these border States, see Bureau of the Census, supra, at 1, may have a physical appearance similar to persons of Mexican origin.
"national self-protection reasonably requiring one entering the country to identify himself as entitled to come in, and his belongings as effects which may be lawfully brought in,"
as agricultural inspections and highway roadblocks to apprehend known fugitives, as not in any way constitutionally suspect by reason of today's decision.
"The infringement on personal liberty of any 'seizure' of a person can only be 'reasonable' under the Fourth Amendment if we require the police to possess 'probable cause' before they seize him. Only that line draws a meaningful distinction between an officer's mere inkling and the presence of facts within the officer's personal knowledge which would convince a reasonable man that the person seized has committed, is committing, or is about to commit a particular crime."
Id. at 392 U. S. 38.
"'Police power exercised without probable cause is arbitrary. To say that the police may accost citizens at their whim and may detain them upon reasonable suspicion is to say, in reality, that the police may both accost and detain citizens at their whim.'"
Amsterdam, Perspectives on the Fourth Amendment, 58 Minn.L.Rev. 349, 395 (1974).
who drive older vehicles that ride low because their suspension systems are old or in disrepair. The suspicion test has indeed brought a state of affairs where the police may stop citizens on the highway on the flimsiest of justifications.
The Court does, to be sure, disclaim approval of the particular decisions it cites applying the suspicion test. But by specifying factors to be considered without attempting to explain what combination is necessary to satisfy the test, the Court may actually induce the police to push its language beyond intended limits and to advance as a justification any of the enumerated factors even where its probative significance is negligible.
Ultimately, the degree to which the suspicion test actually restrains the police will depend more upon what the Court does henceforth than upon what it says today. If my Brethren mean to give the suspicion test a new bite, I applaud the intention. But in view of the developments since the test was launched in Terry, I am not optimistic. This is the first decision to invalidate a stop on the basis of the suspicion standard. In fact, since Terry, we have granted review of a case applying the test only once, in Adams v. Williams, 407 U. S. 143 (1972), where the Court found the standard satisfied by the tip from an informant whose credibility was not established and whose information was not shown to be based upon personal knowledge. If, in the future, the suspicion test is to provide any meaningful restraint of the police, its force must come from vigorous review of its applications, and not alone from the qualifying language of today's opinion. For now, I remain unconvinced that the suspicion test offers significant protection of the "comprehensive right of personal liberty in the face of governmental intrusion," Lopez v. United States, 373 U. S. 427, 373 U. S. 455 (1963) (dissenting opinion), that is embodied in the Fourth Amendment.
* See LaFave, "Street Encounters" and the Constitution, 67 Mich.L.Rev. 39, 666 (1968).

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