Opinion ID: 1452969
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Evidence Seized from the Suburban[3]

Text: The officers seized Garcia's luggage tag and bundles of money pursuant to a properly executed search warrant for the Suburban. Therefore, in order to suppress this evidence, Garcia must show that the warrant was obtained as a result of a prior illegality. See Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 485, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963) (noting that the exclusionary rule bars evidence obtained either during or as a direct result of an unlawful invasion). Garcia contends that his arrest during the stop of the Suburban is the prior illegality that tainted the subsequent search warrant for the Suburban. According to Garcia's argument, because the illegal arrest allowed the officers to execute a canine narcotics sniff and because the results of the canine sniff were included in the supporting affidavit, the search warrant is a fruit of his illegal arrest and is thus invalid. Garcia's argument erroneously equates the investigatory stop of the Suburban with his allegedly illegal arrest. Even assuming he was illegally arrested at the time the Suburban was stopped, it was the investigatory stop  and not the illegal arrest  that produced the canine narcotics sniff and the resulting search warrant. So long as the officers acted properly in stopping the vehicle and executing the canine sniff, the resulting search warrant was not tainted by a prior illegality. The Supreme Court has recently recognized that a passenger of a stopped vehicle, like Garcia, is seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment and so may challenge the constitutionality of the stop. Brendlin v. California, ___ U.S. ___, 127 S.Ct. 2400, 2403, 168 L.Ed.2d 132 (2007). We conclude that the stop of the Suburban was lawful. An officer may conduct an investigatory stop if it is supported by a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. Smoak v. Hall, 460 F.3d 768, 778 (6th Cir.2006) (citing United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 273, 122 S.Ct. 744, 151 L.Ed.2d 740 (2002)). Reasonable suspicion requires the officer to have `a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the particular person . . . of criminal activity' based on `specific and articulable facts[.]' Id. at 778-79 (quoting Houston v. Clark County Sheriff Deputy John Does 1-5, 174 F.3d 809, 813-14 (6th Cir.1999)). Garcia does not challenge the stop of the Suburban for investigatory purposes, and we find that the officers indeed had reasonable suspicion to support the stop. The officers had been monitoring, following, and listening to Ovalle  the driver of the Suburban  for at least two days. During this time they had heard Ovalle and his companions discuss guns, kilos, and large sums of money. They also knew that Ovalle had left the Sheraton after complaining of too many people asking too many questions and that he had later returned to transport two individuals who claimed to work for him. These specific and articulable facts provided reasonable suspicion for an investigatory stop of the Suburban. We turn next to whether the canine narcotics sniff exceeded the permissible scope or duration of the investigatory stop. [A]n investigative detention must be temporary and last no longer than is necessary to effectuate the purpose of the stop. United States v. Davis, 430 F.3d 345, 354 (6th Cir.2005) (quoting Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 500, 103 S.Ct. 1319, 75 L.Ed.2d 229 (1983)). The scope of activities conducted during an investigatory stop must reasonably be related to the circumstances that initially justified the stop. United States v. Richardson, 949 F.2d 851, 856 (6th Cir.1991). The officers reasonably suspected the Suburban's occupants of illegal drug trafficking, and the canine narcotics sniff is directly related to investigating this suspicion. Moreover, the duration of the stop was reasonable; the canine sniff was performed within a half hour of the stop, and we have previously upheld an investigatory stop that included a thirty-five minute wait for the canine unit. See United States v. Orsolini, 300 F.3d 724, 730 (6th Cir.2002) (finding a Terry detention reasonable where the entire investigation lasted less than one hour with approximately thirty-five minutes spent waiting for the canine unit to arrive). Thus the canine narcotics sniff was lawfully conducted as part of the investigatory stop. Garcia provides no evidence that his allegedly illegal arrest contributed to or in any way tainted the search warrant for the Suburban. Consequently, we need not determine the precise timing of Garcia's arrest or whether it was supported by probable cause. Because we find that the officers did not act unlawfully in stopping the Suburban or executing a canine narcotics sniff, and because Garcia has failed to show that the search warrant was the fruit of a prior illegality, we affirm the district court's refusal to suppress the evidence seized from the Suburban.