Opinion ID: 2696081
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Ramp Check and Terry Stop

Text: 7 Case: 12-51063 Document: 00512719470 Page: 8 Date Filed: 08/01/2014 No. 12-51063 Massi does not argue that the regulatory inspection of a ramp check was improper. Such a regulatory inspection is not a detention under the justdescribed Berry formulation of citizen-police contact. Id. Therefore, we consider the issue of suppression to turn solely on what occurred after the ramp check. In so doing, we recognize that no specific occurrence demarks when the activities relating to the ramp check ended and a broader investigation commenced. Instead, as the investigation continued for purposes well beyond the regulatory ones justifying a ramp check, we must apply other relevant legal authority. Massi contends that continuing the stop was not based on articulable, reasonable suspicion as required for an investigatory stop within the second tier of citizen-police contact. The validity of investigatory stops is governed by the standard set forth in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968). Police may detain an individual if the officer has a reasonable suspicion based on specific and particularized facts that the person is involved in criminal activity. Id. at 2122, 27. Our Terry inquiry involves examining whether the initial action was justified and, then, determining whether any subsequent action was reasonably related in scope to either the circumstances that justified the stop or to dispelling a reasonable suspicion that developed during the stop. United States v. Brigham, 382 F.3d 500, 506-07 (5th Cir. 2004) (en banc). “Any analysis of reasonable suspicion is necessarily fact-specific, and factors which by themselves may appear innocent, may in the aggregate rise to the level of reasonable suspicion.” United States v. Ibarra-Sanchez, 199 F.3d 753, 759 (5th Cir. 1999). The facts leading to a finding of reasonable suspicion do not have to be based on a law enforcement officer’s personal observation, but can also arise from the “collective knowledge” of law enforcement entities, so long as that 8 Case: 12-51063 Document: 00512719470 Page: 9 Date Filed: 08/01/2014 No. 12-51063 knowledge gives rise to reasonable suspicion and was communicated between those entities at the time of the stop. See id. at 759-60. There is no clear evidence as to the timeline starting with Massi and Sanchez’s return to the airplane between 6:00 and 6:30 p.m., and the arrival of Agent Howard at about 7:30 p.m. The reasonable suspicion arose from AMOC’s information and was that the airplane was being used to transport drugs. In evaluating what happened at the scene, our caselaw requires “both the scope and length of the officer’s investigation to be reasonable in light of the facts articulated as having created the reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.” United States v. Pack, 612 F.3d 341, 357 (5th Cir. 2010). We conclude that sufficient reasonable suspicion existed to justify an investigatory stop under Terry, which augmented the right to investigate that arose from the ramp check. AMOC’s suspicions arising from the flight pattern were augmented by information concerning Massi’s recent travel to Tijuana, Mexico, a known hub of the illegal drug trade. A third factor was the prior drug trafficking conviction of the airplane’s registered owner. It is true that these facts were passed along by AMOC and were not learned as a result of direct law enforcement contact. Nonetheless, the obligation to submit to a ramp check allowed the airplane and Massi to be held at the airport initially. The law enforcement officers then had a proper basis to continue the encounter beyond the regulatory ramp check under the reasonable suspicion standard in Terry, even if the facts giving rise to suspicion were known prior to law enforcement contact with Massi. 2 The suspicion of a drug crime, either having been committed or still ongoing, was not dispelled and permitted the encounter to continue beyond the temporal confines of the ramp check. 2 No argument is made that the ramp check was invalid as pretextual. This court has already rejected the argument that the motives underlying a ramp check could invalidate what would otherwise have been a proper inspection. Zukas, 843 F.2d at 182 n.1. 9 Case: 12-51063 Document: 00512719470 Page: 10 Date Filed: 08/01/2014 No. 12-51063