Opinion ID: 794457
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Retention of the Mastercases

Text: 46 Intrigue contends that even if probable cause existed for the seizure of the 4,432 mastercases, the Customs Service lacked probable cause to retain them once the Rudalevige test returned inconclusive results on April 9, 2001. Intrigue is correct as a matter of law that when there ceases to be probable cause for continuing a search or seizure, it must end immediately. See Jacobs v. City of Chicago, 215 F.3d 758, 772 (7th Cir.2000). However, because Intrigue mischaracterizes the import of the Rudalevige test, we cannot agree that probable cause evaporated with its failure to reach conclusive results. Probable cause existed at each step in the Customs Service's investigation of the cigarettes. 47 By April 19, 2001, when Phillip Morris definitively established that the cigarettes were not counterfeit, the Customs Service had developed new bases for probable cause, as its inventory of the cigarettes had turned up country-of-origin and re-importation violations. Intrigue does not dispute this fact but instead contends that there was a one-day break in probable cause, between the completion of the inconclusive Rudalevige test on April 9 and the discovery of previously-denied cigarettes on April 10. It contends that once the Rudalevige test failed to establish with certainty that the cigarettes were counterfeit, the inventory should have stopped and the cigarettes should have been returned to Intrigue. 48 We disagree. Intrigue asserts that the Rudalevige test proved wrong the initial field tests indicating that the cigarettes might be counterfeit. That is not correct. The Rudalevige test report identifies a number of characteristics of the tested cigarettes that were similar to genuine gray market cigarettes, including the filter holes, the glue, the printing, the cigarette packing, the control number, the folding pattern of the foil, the lack of fluorescence, the placement of the material codes, and the statement `Blend of USA.' However, the report also notes that the lack of codes on the filter paper, the misspelling of Switzerland on two of the sample packs, and a number of signs of poor quality control, such as uneven folds, poorly aligned bands on the filters, and loose tobacco in the packages, raised red flags about their genuineness. Due to these potentially troubling factors, the Rudalevige test report stated, We cannot draw any conclusion based on these observations. The report recommended sending the cigarettes to Phillip Morris for further testing. The Rudalevige test results did not dispute, or even address, the findings of the initial field tests. They merely indicated that additional testing would be required to determine with any certainty whether the cigarettes were counterfeit or not. 49 The inconclusive Rudalevige test did not extinguish probable cause. Indeed, the test report noted several additional factors that would have supported a probable cause determination. Rudalevige found these elements troubling enough that he sought further testing from the supposed manufacturer. Furthermore, virtually all of the factors that had generated support for the initial seizure, including the suspicious circumstances of Intrigue's storage and the field tests indicating that the cigarettes were possibly or likely counterfeit, remained in play and supported probable cause. 50 Intrigue points to one out-of-circuit district court case to support its argument that an inconclusive test result nullifies probable cause to continue seizure. See United States v. One DLO Model A/C, 30.06 Mach. Gun, 904 F.Supp. 622 (N.D.Ohio 1995). One DLO Model dealt with the arcane issue of whether a 28 U.S.C. § 2465 certificate of reasonable cause, which exempts federal officials from liability after a judicial determination that the government wrongly seized property for forfeiture, should be predicated on the appropriateness of the initial evidentiary seizure or alternatively on the appropriateness of the warrant for the arrest of property that enables forfeiture. Id. at 636, 638. The claimant had been charged with federal weapons violations and the case turned only on whether or not he had forged documents transferring ownership of the weapons to himself. Id. at 641-42. However, during the investigation that followed the initial seizure, neither the government's nor the claimant's forensic experts found anything that would indicate that the claimant had forged the documents. Id. at 642 (noting that [t]here was no longer any evidence linking [claimant] to the forgery . . . rising above mere suspicion). Therefore, the court held, while the government might have had probable cause to seize the weapons pursuant to the search warrant, that probable cause had evaporated by the time the government filed the complaint to forfeit them. Id. Even if One DLO Model were controlling authority, it would not compel the result Intrigue seeks. In One DLO Model, the forensic tests exonerated the claimant. The Rudalevige test, on the other hand, produced findings both inculpatory and exculpatory. In addition, the Customs Service still possessed evidence from the initial field test that the cigarettes might indeed be counterfeit. Intrigue was not exonerated on the counterfeiting charge until April 19, days after the new violations were discovered. Cf. One DLO Model, 904 F.Supp. at 642 (noting that the exonerating evidence was possessed by government officials well before the filing of the complaint and the subsequent seizure). The probable cause that existed on April 6 did not lapse before the additional bases for probable cause (for violating other importation laws) arose on April 10.