Opinion ID: 1448445
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Classification of the subject search and seizure

Text: The government argues that the search and seizure at issue here occurred at the functional equivalent of the border. We are inclined to disagree. Our cases are consistent with the Fifth Circuit's observation that [t]he main difference between the functional equivalent of the border search and an extended border search is that the latter takes place after the first point in time when the entity might have been stopped within the country. United States v. Niver, 689 F.2d 520, 526 (5th Cir.1982); see United States v. Abbouchi, 502 F.3d 850, 855-56 (9th Cir.2007) (holding that centralized parcel processing hub provided the last practicable opportunity for customs agents to inspect foreign-directed packages, notwithstanding the possibility that the packages might stop at other points before leaving the country); United States v. Potter, 552 F.2d 901, 907 (9th Cir.1977) (holding that the first practicable opportunity to conduct a search of an international flight is the first domestic point of arrival). Here, although Appellants' vehicle passed the agents' unmarked patrol cars at approximately five to ten miles per hour upon exiting the Buttercup Campground, the agents followed the vehicle onto the highway for nearly ten miles. While it may well have been inadvisable to stop the vehicle before it had passed several points at which suspects frequently flee in a dangerous manner towards Mexico when pursued by law enforcement, we doubt whether it was wholly impracticable for the agents to do so, particularly since the situation at hand hardly appears to have been unique. By contrast, the extended border search doctrine clearly contemplates the situation we confront here. Extended border searches are typically separated from the border by `a greater spatial and temporal distance' from the actual border than searches at the functional equivalent of the border, Abbouchi, 502 F.3d at 855 (citing Cardona, 769 F.2d at 628), and encompass a wide range of spatial and temporal relationships with the border, see, e.g., Alfonso, 759 F.2d at 734-35 (upholding extended border search of boat thirty-six hours after it crossed the border); United States v. Martinez, 481 F.2d 214 (5th Cir.1973) (finding that search conducted one-hundred-fifty miles from the border and one-hundred-forty-two hours after a border crossing was an extended border search); Rodriguez-Gonzalez v. United States, 378 F.2d 256 (9th Cir.1967) (finding that search conducted fifteen hours after a border crossing at a distance of twenty miles from the border was an extended border search). The flexibility inherent in the extended border search doctrine reflects a balancing of the individual's right to freedom from arbitrary intrusions against the myriad difficulties facing customs and immigration officials who are charged with the enforcement of smuggling and immigration laws. United States v. Richards, 638 F.2d 765, 771 (1981). That flexibility has led us to define an extended border search as any search away from the border where entry is not apparent, United States v. Corral-Villavicencio, 753 F.2d 785, 788 (9th Cir.1985) (emphasis added), but where the dual requirements of reasonable certainty of a recent border crossing and reasonable suspicion of criminal activity are satisfied. Sahanaja, 430 F.3d at 1053-54. There are two reasons why we need not decide precisely what type of border search occurred here. First, the seizure required to effect the search of Appellants' vehicle clearly was more than a routine search of the kind permissible in the absence of suspicion. Highly intrusive searches require reasonable suspicion, even if they are conducted at the functional equivalent of the border. United States v. Flores-Montano, 541 U.S. 149, 152, 124 S.Ct. 1582, 158 L.Ed.2d 311 (2004) (emphasis added); see also Seljan, 547 F.3d at 1001-02. In assessing whether a vehicle search is sufficiently intrusive to require reasonable suspicion, we focus on two main issues: (1) Did the search damage the vehicle in a manner that affected the vehicle's safety or operability, and (2) Was the search conducted in a particularly offensive manner. United States v. Cortez-Rivera, 454 F.3d 1038, 1042 (9th Cir.2006). The damage factor alone is decisive here because Appellants' vehicle was rendered inoperable when its tires were destroyed in the course of the seizure. Cf. Flores-Montano, 541 U.S. at 155-56, 124 S.Ct. 1582 (authorizing suspicionless disassembly and reassembly of gas tank); Cortez-Rivera, 454 F.3d at 1042-43 (authorizing customs agents to pry open quarter of vehicle's interior door panel without particularized suspicion); United States v. Cortez-Rocha, 394 F.3d 1115, 1125 (9th Cir. 2005) (authorizing suspicionless slashing of spare tire to search for contraband); United States v. Chaudhry, 424 F.3d 1051, 1053-55 (9th Cir.2005) (authorizing suspicionless exploratory drilling of small hole in truck bed). Thus, even if the seizure were deemed incident to a functional-equivalent border search, the requirements of an extended border search  reasonable certainty of a border crossing and reasonable suspicion of criminal activity  would have to be satisfied. Second, as we explain below, and as Appellants effectively concede, the presence of reasonable suspicion is beyond dispute in this case. We are constitutionally forbidden from issuing advisory opinions, and we decline to decide a dispute over whether or not a particular search may be conducted in the absence of any suspicion[,][where that dispute] is an entirely fictional construct. Chaudhry, 424 F.3d at 1054-55 (B. Fletcher, J., specially concurring) (emphasis removed). Accordingly, in this instance the government must demonstrate that its agents possessed a reasonable certainty that a border crossing had occurred and reasonable suspicion that criminal activity was afoot. Because the subject search appears to fit most comfortably within the extended border search doctrine, we will evaluate it as such for the sake of clarity.