Opinion ID: 6534115
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Creation of Entry Point

Text: [¶67] The district court found that Mr. Pier, not the officers, created the entry point into his truck. 42. ... Trooper Kirlin did not facilitate Frosty's sniff of the interior of Mr. Pier's vehicle by opening the door. The door to Mr. Pier's vehicle was open because Mr. Pier failed to shut it when Deputy Colling asked him to exit the vehicle. [¶68] Mr. Pier claims the district court erred in this finding. First, he likens this case to Winningham , where the Tenth Circuit held that law enforcement's act of leaving a vehicle's door open until the drug dog arrived evidenced their intent to facilitate an interior dog sniff and therefore violated the Fourth Amendment. Winningham , 140 F.3d at 1331 . Additionally, he contends that because Deputy Colling would not permit him to return to his vehicle to secure it and Deputy Colling refused to close the vehicle door himself, it was Deputy Colling who was responsible for creating the entry point. I disagree. 9 [¶69] First, Winningham is factually different from this case. In Winningham , New Mexico border agents stopped a van on suspicion of carrying undocumented aliens. Winningham , 140 F.3d at 1329 . One of the agents requested and was given consent to search the van for illegal passengers and opened the van's sliding door to conduct that search. Id . The search revealed no other passengers, and the agent then requested and was given consent to run a drug dog around the van's exterior. Id . When the canine unit arrived five or six minutes later, the handler began the exterior sniff with the dog leashed. Id . As they approached the rear of the van, however, the handler detected a just noticeable change in the dog's behavior and unleashed the dog. Id . at 1329-30. The dog then jumped into the van, methodically sniffed its interior, and eventually alerted on a rear vent where the agents found fifty kilograms of marijuana. Id . at 1330.  [¶70] In holding the interior sniff violated the Fourth Amendment, the court observed: In Mr. Winningham's case, the officers themselves opened the door, allowing the van to sit on the side of the highway with the sliding door wide open for a period of at least six minutes until the drug dog could arrive. The dog handler then unleashed the dog as the dog neared the open door. A desire to facilitate a dog sniff of the van's interior, absent in Stone, seems readily apparent here. Winningham , 140 F.3d at 1331 (footnote omitted). [¶71] In contrast to Winningham , in this case it was Mr. Pier who opened his vehicle door and left it open, not Deputy Colling. See Guidry , 817 F.3d at 1006 (distinguishing Winningham where defendant, not officers, opened door); United States v. Nance , 2010 WL 4004782 , -21 (E.D. Tenn. 2010) (same); United States v. Woods , 2008 WL 11396770 ,  (D. Kan. 2008) (upholding search where defendant left door open and rejecting argument that officers created entry point by requiring defendant to exit vehicle). Additionally, Deputy Colling's refusal to allow Mr. Pier to return to his vehicle was a decision made for safety reasons, not to facilitate an interior search. Deputy Colling cited his concern with Mr. Pier's aggressive behavior and the presence of knives in the vehicle, and testified that [b]ased on his actions, and the fact that there were knives in the vehicle, I wasn't going to let him touch his vehicle nor shut his door. That makes this case less like Winningham and more like Mostowicz , an Eleventh Circuit case where the court concluded: Mostowicz contends that the officers facilitated [K-9] Cody's search when they handcuffed him before he had an opportunity to close his door. But nothing evidences that the officers instructed Mostowicz to leave open his door. And, as we have discussed, the officers handcuffed Mostowicz based on their reasonable belief that he was armed and dangerous, not to facilitate the dog sniff. Mostowicz , 471 Fed. Appx. at 891 . [¶72] Finally, I reject Mr. Pier's argument that Deputy Colling was responsible for creating the entry point because he refused to close the door himself. An officer has no affirmative duty to close vehicle entry points in preparation for an exterior sniff. Sharp , 689 F.3d at 619 ; Lyons , 486 F.3d at 373 . As the Eighth Circuit explained: Appellants do not cite to any authority that holds that the officers had the affirmative duty to close the windows in preparation for the dog sniff, and we find none. Instead, appellants rely on United States v. Winningham , 140 F.3d 1328 , 1329-30 (10th Cir. 1998) [.] .... Winningham does not help appellants here, as both Trooper Brehm and Sgt. Duis, in the words of the district court, took the situation as [they] found it. Lyons , 486 F.3d at 373 . [¶73] For these reasons, I would find no clear error in the district court's conclusion that Mr. Pier, not the officers, created the entry point through which Frosty accessed the interior of Mr. Pier's vehicle.