Court Opinion

ID: 9478619
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 06:53:23.307186+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:46:31.431866
License: Public Domain

WALTER E. HOFFMAN, District
Judge, dissenting:
The central issue on this appeal is the power of the United States Customs Service to board and search vessels outside the United States customs waters. This issue has previously been addressed by this court in United States v. Sarmiento, 750 F.2d 1506 (11th Cir.1985), where the panel, in a per curiam opinion, stated that “the plain language of the statute [19 U.S.C. § 1581(a) ] prohibits customs officers from boarding and searching vessels on the high seas.” Id. at 1506.
I.
The majority opinion in this case attempts to distinguish the present fact situation from the holding in Sarmiento through use of the statutory scheme authorizing customs jurisdiction. See ante pages 1182-1184. See generally 19 U.S.C. § 1581(a) (general jurisdiction of customs officers); 19 U.S.C. § 1701 (creation of customs enforcement zones); 19 U.S.C. § 1587 (examination of hovering vessels). Although the result reached by the majority’s interpretation is reasonable and seems to have found acceptance by courts outside this circuit, see, e.g., United States v. Gonzalez, 688 F.Supp. 658 (D.D.C.1988), the operative language from Sarmiento, which is binding upon this panel, rejects the asserted authority of customs officers to board and search vessels on the high seas. The result reached by the majority opinion in this case may be a desirable outcome, especially given the pervasive threat posed by the drug problem in this country and the disadvantages facing our law enforcement authorities, including customs officers, in combating this problem. Such a result, however, should not be reached *1186through “opaque” distinctions with binding precedent. For this reason, I must respectfully dissent from the majority opinion in this case.
II.
Sarmiento involved the authority of customs officers to board a vessel on the high seas and seize marijuana found on board. Sarmiento 750 F.2d at 1506.1 The government argued that the boarding and search were within the statutory authority of customs officers2 to board and search “at any other authorized place” because the other place where a vessel could be located (within customs waters) is included within the language of the statute. Id. The court broadly rejected this contention by asserting that the plain language of the statute prohibited customs officers from boarding and searching vessels on the high seas.
In support of this holding, the court said that acceptance of the government’s interpretation “would make customs and coast guard jurisdiction almost concurrent, and would do violence to the coast guard’s authority contained in 14 U.S.C. § 89(a) (1956).”3 For the court to reach its decision in the present case and still adhere to the holding and language of Sarmiento is an impossibility. Sarmiento interpreted section 1581(a) as a prohibition to customs officer boardings of vessels on the high seas. The majority opinion in the present case states that this holding is not rejected but adds an exception onto the Sarmiento interpretation — customs cannot board a vessel on the high seas unless that boarding is at “any other authorized place.”4 *1187As this exception does not clearly arise from a reading of Sarmiento, I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion insofar as it deviates from the binding authority of this circuit. The proper avenue to correct any misinterpretations in Sarmiento should be an en banc review of the issues in this case.

. Whether the vessel in Sarmiento could have been classified as a hovering vessel within the meaning of 19 U.S.C. § 1401(k) is not clear from the facts of the opinion. The majority opinion in the present case, however, will certainly encourage customs officers operating on the high seas to seek any evidence available to satisfy the requirements for classifications as a “hovering vessel."

. Customs officers are defined by 19 U.S.C. § 1401(i) as:
any officer of the Bureau of Customs of the Treasury Department (also hereinafter referred to as the "Customs Service”) or any commissioned, warrant, or petty officer of the Coast Guard, or any agent or other person authorized by law or designated by the Secretary of the Treasury to perform any duties of an officer of the Customs Service.
19 U.S.C. § 1401(i).

. A more accurate statement of the division between coast guard and customs authority is found in United States v. Ceballos, 706 F.2d 1198, 1199-1200 (11th Cir.1983), which is also cited in Sarmiento. See Sarmiento, 750 F.2d at 1507. In Ceballos, the court stated that "the jurisdiction of the customs service does not generally extend to the high seas. It is usually limited to customs waters."
Ceballos, 706 F.2d at 1199-1200 (emphasis added). Although it may be argued that the court's reference in Sarmiento to Ceballos incorporated the recognition of certain exceptions to the general restriction, this reference is not sufficient to limit the broad sweep of earlier language in Sarmiento. This is especially true given the reference in Sarmiento to United States v. Williams, 617 F.2d 1063 (5th Cir.1980) (en banc). Williams stated that "[sjection 1581(a) empowers both the customs service and the coast guard to board vessels and conduct customs searches, but only in customs waters— within the twelve-mile limit.” Id. at 1073. The court in Williams, therefore, also limited the application of section 1581(a) to customs waters and did not recognize any exceptions to this application.

.The correctness of the court’s addition is not at issue. The authority of section 1587(a) contemplates several situations in which a customs officer is authorized to board a vessel "as well without as within his district." 19 U.S.C. § 1587(a). One such situation authorizing boarding and search under section 1587(a) is when customs officers encounter a "hovering vessels.” A "hovering vessels”, as defined in 19 U.S.C. § 1401(k), may be "any vessel which is found or kept oft the coast of the United States within or without the customs waters." 19 U.S. C. § 1401(k). Thus, if customs officers can satisfy the proof that a ship is a hovering vessel, they may board the ship under authority of 19 U.S.C. § 1587(a) even if the ship is not within customs waters.
Such a result appears to have been the intention of Congress in passing section 1587, although the evil contemplated during passage of the Anti-Smuggling Act of 1935 was illegal importation of alcohol rather than the current problem imposed by drug importation. See generally S.Rep. No. 1036, 74th Cong., 1st Sess. (1935); H.Rep. No. 868, 74th Cong., 1st Sess. (1935). The Senate report accompanying the hovering vessel statute stated that section 587 (19 U.S.C. § 1587) of the 1935 act—
[sjubjects to customs examination in some cases outside of customs waters, vessels which are displaying particularly suspicious indicia of smuggling activity, such as failing to stop when properly required by customs officers, *1187hovering suspiciously off the coast, or failing to display proper lights.
S.Rep. No. 1035, 74th Cong., 1st Sess. at 13 (1935).
This interpretation is further supported by reviewing the legislative history behind the 1936 enactment of Coast Guard authority to board American vessels on the high seas. See 14 U.S. C. § 89. See also S.Rep. No. 2211, 74th Cong., 2d Sess. (1936); H.Rep. No. 2452, 74th Cong. 2d Sess. (1936).
Should this issue come before this circuit for en banc review, recognition should be given to the authority of customs officers to board and search vessels either outside the customs waters if they meet the requirement of 19 U.S.C. § 1587 or within a customs enforcement zone as defined in 19 U.S.C. § 1701.