Court Opinion

ID: 9568645
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:06:03.478977+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:52:47.496673
License: Public Domain

EDITH BROWN CLEMENT, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the judgment only:
Pickett’s sole argument on appeal is that there was no “border crossing” within the meaning of Stone because he moved to shore from a federal enclave as defined in OCSLA and government agents were aware that he had not made an intervening stop in a foreign country. Confronting this argument requires, as a first step, that we determine whether CM15 is an OCSLA *236situs and thus a federal enclave in international waters. Applying longstanding Fifth Circuit precedents, I would hold that CM15 is not an OCSLA situs and affirm the district court on this ground, without reaching the question whether we may consider point of origin in Fourth Amendment border search cases.
Our cases have recognized a basic distinction regarding the application of OCS-LA: for a rig or platform to be a federal enclave in international waters, it must be “erected” upon the Outer Continental Shelf (“OCS”); OCSLA does not apply to vessels that float on the water. See 43 U.S.C. § 1333(a)(1) (noting that OCSLA does not apply to “a ship or vessel”). In Longmire v. Sea Drilling Corp., we stated that
OCSLA covers fixed platform workers, while floating rig workers, even those whose tasks are essentially identical to the tasks performed by fixed platform workers, are treated differently. The reason for the different treatment of fixed and floating rig workers is that floating rigs are treated like vessels while fixed platforms are considered “artificial islands.”
610 F.2d 1342, 1348 (5th Cir.1980) (footnote omitted). Likewise, in Parks v. Dowell Division of Dow Chemical Corp., we held that OCSLA did not govern the claim of a worker who performed a substantial part of his work aboard “a floating barge-like structure used for transporting and housing men and equipment on and over water,” even when the vessel was attached to a fixed platform. 712 F.2d 154, 157 (5th Cir.1983). As we noted in that case, OCS-LA does not apply to “vesselfs] designed to float on water.” Id. at 158. This distinction between floating rigs and fixed rigs also drove our opinion in Demette v. Falcon Drilling Co., Inc., where we held that a jack-up rig is erected within the meaning of OCSLA when the rig is jacked up and its legs are resting upon the OCS, even temporarily. 280 F.3d 492, 498 (5th Cir.2002), overruled on other grounds, Grand Isle Shipyard, Inc. v. Seacor Marine, LLC, 589 F.3d 778 (5th Cir.2009). In that case, we also noted that “[a]lthough arguably an anchor ‘attache[s]’ a ship to the seabed, a tender, unlike a jack-up rig, is not ‘erected’ on the OCS.” Id. at 500 n. 28 (second alteration in original). See also Becker v. Tidewater, Inc., 581 F.3d 256, 264-66 (5th Cir.2009) (applying Demette).
CM15 is not a fixed platform. Nor is it a jack-up rig. As was undisputed at the evidentiary hearing, it is a 220-foot barge, powered by a tug boat, that moves from point to point on the open seas as frequently as every thirty minutes. When it is working, the vessel drops eight large anchors to stabilize its position but is not erected on the OCS within the meaning of Demette. In this sense, it is indistinguishable from the floating barges at issue in both Longmire and Parks. CM15 also fits squarely within the maritime law definition of “vessel” as a “watercraft or other artificial contrivance used, or capable of being used, as a means of transportation on water.” 1 U.S.C. § 3. The fact that CM15 is not a traditional boat, or that it does not power itself, is irrelevant. Courts have defined a number of non-traditional craft as “vessels.” See, e.g., Stewart v. Dutra Const. Co., 543 U.S. 481, 125 S.Ct. 1118, 160 L.Ed.2d 932 (2005) (floating dredge with limited means of self-propulsion); Holmes v. Atlantic Sounding Co., Inc., 437 F.3d 441, 448-49 (5th Cir.2006) (housing barge incapable of self-propulsion); Bunch v. Canton Marine Towing Co., Inc., 419 F.3d 868, 873-74 (8th Cir.2005) (cleaning barge attached to the river bed by poles); Burks v. Am. River Transp. Co., 679 F.2d 69, 75 (5th Cir.1982) (drilling barge and submerged barge in use as a drilling platform); Marine Drilling Co. v. Autin, 363 *237F.2d 579 (5th Cir.1966) (not reversing jury finding that a submersible drilling barge “stabilized in navigable water” was a vessel); Producers Drilling Co. v. Gray, 361 F.2d 432, 433 (5th Cir.1966) (submersible drilling barge “resting on the bottom of a canal”); Kibadeaux v. Standard Dredging Co., 81 F.2d 670, 673-74 (5th Cir.1936), cert. denied, 299 U.S. 549, 57 S.Ct. 12, 81 L.Ed. 404 (1936) (floating dredge without self-propulsion connected to shore by pontoons).
Pickett cites to Union Tex. Petroleum Corp. v. PLT Eng’g, Inc., 895 F.2d 1043 (5th Cir.1990) and to Grand Isle Shipyard, Inc. v. Seacor Marine, LLC, 543 F.3d 256 (5th Cir.2008), rev’d en banc, 589 F.3d 778 (5th Cir.2009), in support of his argument that CM15 is an OCSLA situs.1 These cases do not support Pickett’s position. In both cases, the court was attempting to determine whether the OCSLA situs requirement was met where the claims arose from contractual agreements. In this criminal appeal, however, there is no dispute that the relevant location for determining whether Pickett departed from an OCSLA situs is CM15.
CM15 is not an OCSLA situs and it was working within international waters. When Pickett moved from CM15 to shore, he moved from international waters into United States territorial waters, crossing the United States border as he did so. This movement is indistinguishable from that in Stone, in which the defendant moved from international airspace to domestic airspace and was stopped and searched at the functional equivalent of the border.
The per curiam opinion holds that Pickett crossed the border within the meaning of Stone regardless of whether he departed from a federal enclave, concluding that the point of origin preceding a border crossing makes no difference in the constitutional analysis. This is an issue of first impression in this circuit and it is not an easy one. Two circuits have considered a similar question and have concluded that point of origin does matter in determining whether there has been a border crossing for purposes of the drug importation statute. See United States v. Cabaccang, 332 F.3d 622, 626-27 (9th Cir.2003) (en banc) (rejecting contention that drugs shipped by air from California to Guam were imported from “place outside” United States because they moved through international airspace); United States v. Ramirez-Ferrer, 82 F.3d 1131, 1135 (1st Cir.1996) (en banc) (rejecting contention that statute is applicable to movement from international waters to domestic waters “without regard to the ‘place’ from which the shipment actually originated”); see also United States v. Garcia, 672 F.2d 1349, 1357 (11th Cir.1982) (casting doubt on assertion that “point of origin has no bearing on the reasonableness of a search so long as a border crossing has been established”). The per curiam opinion’s holding is not only unnecessary, but creates a circuit split.2 The defendant’s argument on ap*238peal rests on the assertion that CM15 is an OCSLA situs. That assertion is untenable. The doctrine of constitutional avoidance suggests that we should decide the case on the well-traversed ground of our OCSLA precedents, and leave the difficult constitutional question for another day when it is squarely before us.

. The en banc opinion in Grand Isle had not been issued at the time Pickett filed his briefs. The en banc court affirmed the district court, which the panel had reversed. Regardless, Grand Isle was never applicable to Pickett's case because it dealt with how to determine situs in cases arising out of contract claims.

. The per curiam opinion attempts to reserve the question whether there is a distinction to be made between crossing the border by boat and crossing it by plane. But a fair reading of the per curiam opinion is that under Stone, because point of origin is not relevant to whether a border crossing has occurred, ICE agents can indeed conduct warrantless searches of passengers on a flight that takes off in Miami, crosses into international airspace over the Gulf of Mexico, and lands in Houston. Regardless of whether the court were to accept such a premise — one that *238three circuits have cast serious doubt upon — I believe that the facts of this case do not require us to reach this question, especially given the cursory briefing before us.
Stone certainly does not compel this conclusion. There is language in Stone suggesting that the border search exception is broad enough to apply to movement from a domestic site through international space and across the border. This language is dicta. The issue in Stone was whether the border search exception applied in a case where the point of origin was unclear. 659 F.2d at 573. The court held that it did. In this case, the point of origin is clearly foreign territory, because CM 15 is not an OCSLA situs. There is no reason to expand the holding of Stone, and especially to venture into unsure constitutional waters, when Stone already suffices to decide this case.