Opinion ID: 3034529
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: INS v. Lopez-Mendoza

Text: The majority evades the established law of Hayes, Davis, and Wong Sun by its categorical assertion that “identity evidence” can “never” be suppressed. Majority op. at 14816. For 14824 UNITED STATES v. ORTIZ-HERNANDEZ that assertion, it relies on a single sentence by the Supreme Court in INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. 1032, 1039-40 (1984): The “body” or identity of a defendant or respondent in a criminal or civil proceeding is never itself suppressible as a fruit of an unlawful arrest, even if it is conceded that an unlawful arrest, search, or interrogation occurred. See Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U.S. 103, 119 (1975); Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519, 522 (1952); United States ex rel. Bilokumsky v. Tod, [263 U.S. 149,] 158 [(1923)]. The majority misreads this sentence and misunderstands Lopez-Mendoza. Far from supporting the majority’s conclusion, Lopez-Mendoza directly conflicts with it. There were two respondents in Lopez-Mendoza. The quoted sentence is relevant only to the first of them, Lopez-Mendoza. After an illegal arrest, Lopez-Mendoza was placed in deportation proceedings. The immigration judge, relying on a famil- iar and established rule, held that the illegality of LopezMendoza’s arrest could not be used as a defense in his deportation proceeding. Id. at 1035. The Supreme Court made quick work of Lopez-Mendoza’s argument to the contrary in the single sentence just quoted, invoking the same rule upon which the immigration judge had relied. The three cases cited by the Court in support of its sentence all refer to and rely on this same established rule. In Gerstein, at the page cited in Lopez-Mendoza, the Court wrote, “Nor do we retreat from the established rule that an illegal arrest or detention does not void a subsequent conviction. Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519 (1952)[.]” 420 U.S. at 119. In Frisbie, at the cited page, the Court wrote, “This Court has never departed from the rule . . . that the power of a court to try a person for a crime is not impaired by the fact that he had been brought within the court’s jurisdiction by reason of a ‘forcible UNITED STATES v. ORTIZ-HERNANDEZ 14825 abduction.’ ” 342 U.S. at 522. Finally, in Bilokumsky, at the cited page, the Court wrote, “Irregularities on the part of the Government official prior to, or in connection with, the arrest would not necessarily invalidate later proceedings in all respects conformable to law.” 263 U.S. at 158. There is no hint in Lopez-Mendoza that the quoted sentence was intended to go beyond the familiar and established rule. There is certainly no hint that the sentence was intended to articulate a categorical new rule, that evidence of the identity of a criminal defendant could always be introduced in court regardless of its source. This was not the issue in LopezMendoza. Nor was it the issue in Gerstein, Frisbie, and Bilokumsky. The question in those cases was whether a defendant could assert as a defense in a deportation or a criminal case that he had been illegally arrested. The answer, under long-established law, was “no.” The second respondent in Lopez-Mendoza was SandovalSanchez. His case is directly comparable to the case now before us. Sandoval-Sanchez was arrested in an immigration sweep conducted by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). After his arrest, Sandoval-Sanchez stated his name to INS investigators and admitted that he had re-entered the country illegally. At his civil deportation hearing, he contended that his arrest had been illegal. He therefore challenged the admission of the Form I-213 on which his name, as well as his illegal re-entry, were recorded. Petition for Writ of Certiorari at 111a, INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. 1032 (1984) (No. 83-491). That is, Sandoval-Sanchez did not merely challenge the legality of his arrest. Rather, he challenged the admission of evidence — including evidence of his identity (his name) — obtained as a result of the illegal arrest. The Supreme Court explicitly recognized the difference between his challenge and Lopez-Mendoza’s. It wrote, “Respondent Sandoval-Sanchez has a more substantial claim. He objected not to his compelled presence at a deportation, but to evidence offered at that proceeding.” 468 U.S. at 1040. 14826 UNITED STATES v. ORTIZ-HERNANDEZ The Court held that the challenged evidence, including evidence of Sandoval-Sanchez’s identity, was admissible. But the Court held that it was admissible only because SandovalSanchez was appearing in a civil deportation hearing. In a lengthy discussion, the Court described the ways in which a civil deportation proceeding is different from a criminal trial. Based on these differences, it concluded that the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule does not apply in a deportation proceeding: “In these circumstances, we are persuaded that the . . . balance between costs and benefits comes out against applying the exclusionary rule in civil deportation proceedings held by the INS.” Id. at 1050. However, the Court was explicit in saying that the evidence contained in Sandoval-Sanchez’s Form I-213 would have been properly suppressed if it had been a criminal proceeding. Citing Wong Sun, the Court wrote, “The general rule in a criminal proceeding is that statements and other evidence obtained as a result of an unlawful, warrantless arrest are suppressible if the link between the evidence and the unlawful conduct is not too attenuated.” Id. at 1040-41. If the proceeding is criminal, the exclusionary rule requires the suppression of identity evidence obtained as a result of the Fourth Amendment violation. But if the proceeding is a civil deportation hearing, the evidence is admissible. As the Court wrote, “When the crime in question involves unlawful presence in this country, the criminal may go free, but he should not go free within our borders.” Id. at 1047 (emphasis added). The conclusion reached by the majority in this case is thus not supported by Lopez-Mendoza. Quite the opposite. The sentence upon which the majority relies was applied to Lopez-Mendoza’s case, where the only issue was whether a defendant could defend against deportation based on his illegal arrest. The Court gave the established answer: When a defendant’s only defense is the illegality of his arrest, he cannot suppress his “ ‘body’ or identity.” Id. at 1039. By contrast, in Sandoval-Sanchez’s case, where the issue was whether a UNITED STATES v. ORTIZ-HERNANDEZ 14827 criminal defendant could object to the introduction of illegally obtained evidence (including identity evidence) in a criminal proceeding, the answer was quite different: Any illegally obtained evidence (including identity evidence) must be suppressed. As the Court wrote, in differentiating SandovalSanchez’s case from Lopez-Mendoza’s, “[Sandoval-Sanchez] objected not to his compelled presence at a deportation proceeding, but to evidence offered at that proceeding.” Id. at 1040. In United States v. Guevara-Martinez, 262 F.3d 751, 753, 754 (8th Cir. 2001), the Eighth Circuit carefully analyzed Lopez-Mendoza and came to the same conclusion: In the jurisdictional case (Lopez-Mendoza), the Court said that the “body or identity of a defendant or respondent in a criminal or civil proceeding is never itself suppressible as the fruit of an unlawful arrest.” [468 U.S. at 1039] But the Court addressed the evidentiary case (Sandoval-Sanchez) from a different tack. There the Supreme Court acknowledged the “general rule in a criminal proceeding [ ] that statements and other evidence obtained as a result of an unlawful, warrantless arrest are suppressible if the link between the evidence and the unlawful conduct is not too attenuated.” Id. at 1040-41 . . . (emphasis added). Thus, the Court’s reference to the suppression of identity appears to be tied only to a jurisdiction issue, not to an evidentiary issue.