Court Opinion

ID: 9462372
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:39:25.120232+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:33.674920
License: Public Domain

BELL, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
The law pertaining to searches by border patrol agents as distinguished from customs officials, has been clarified to the point that I now believe the search of Byrd’s vehicle to have been proper; hence I would grant the petition for rehearing and affirm the conviction.
My view is faithful to what this court said in its two most recent decisions touching the subject. United States v. Soria, 5 Cir,, 1975, 519 F.2d 1060, 1062; United States v. Thompson, 5 Cir., 1973, 475 F.2d 1359, 1361-63. It also comports with the Supreme Court decisions in United States v. Peltier, 1975, 422 U.S. 531, 95 S.Ct. 2313, 45 L.Ed.2d 374 and Bowen v. United States, 1975, 422 U.S. 916, 95 S.Ct. 2569, 45 L.Ed.2d 641, and Peltier, at least, is a physical precedent for reversal of the panel decision.
In United States v. Soria, supra at 1062, speaking to the pre-Almeida-Sanchez1 law and the difference between the authority of customs officials and border patrol agents to conduct searches beyond the border itself, we said:
The search in question here preceded Almeida-Sanchez. In Peltier and Bowen the Court refused to apply the probable cause requirements for roving patrol and checkpoint searches to those searches conducted before June 21, 1973. The Court in both cases noted the absence of a statutory probable cause requirement and the agents’ reasonable reliance on numerous circuit court decisions indicating that immigration officials had unfettered discretion to search any vehicle for aliens within the 100 mile radius of the border. The effect of the Court’s decisions in Peltier and Bowen is to insulate all pre-June 21, 1973 immigration searches conducted within 100 miles of the border from constitutional challenge.3
Customs agents however did not have the same unfettered discretion. Prior to Almeida-Sanchez our circuit consistently imposed a reasonable suspicion requirement at points beyond the border itself. See United States v. McDaniel, 463 F.2d 129 (5th Cir. 1972), cert. denied, 413 U.S. 919, 93 S.Ct. 3046, 37 L.Ed.2d 1041 (1973); Morales v. United States, 378 F.2d 187 (5th Cir. 1967); Thomas v. United States, 372 F.2d 252 (5th Cir. 1967). See also Bowen v. United States, 422 U.S. 916, 95 S.Ct. 2569, 2572 n. 1, 45 L.Ed.2d 641 (1975). Under these circumstances, the rationale of the Supreme Court in Peltier and Bowen is inapplicable, and we must judge this search under the standards set out in our decisions on customs searches.
As the Supreme Court noted in Bowen, n. 1, there is some confusion in our cases on this question. It seems apparent from a reading of the decisions *551there cited that much of the confusion is the result of a failure to distinguish between the differing authority of the two types of officer, border patrol and customs. I would follow Soria and Thompson which recognize the difference. That recognition forecloses Byrd on his claim of an illegal search.
I therefore respectfully
Dissent.