Case o' The Week: Camou no L’Étranger to Cell Phone privacy - Fourth Amendment and Cell Phone Searches

  The risk, for the government, when it “throws it all up against the barn

Hon. Judge Harry Pregerson

to see what sticks?”

   You may draw the wrong barn.

   United States v. Camou, 2014 WL 6980135 (9th Cir. Dec. 11, 2014), opinion available here.

Players: Decision by Judge Pregerson, joined by Judges Fisher and DJ Gwin. Big win for James Fife and Jason Ser, Federal Defenders of San Diego, Inc.

Facts: Border Patrol agents stopped a truck driven by Camou, and found an undocumented alien hiding within. Id. at *1. Camou’s girlfriend was also inside. Id. Agents found a cell phone in the truck. Id. Camou’s girlfriend described smuggling trips, arranged by “Mother Teresa” who would call with details. Id. During the interview Camou’s cell rang, the girlfriend identified the number as belonging to “Mother Teresa,” and Camou admitted the cell was his. Id. An agent searched the phone without a warrant and discovered child porn. Id. at *2. Camou was never charged with alien smuggling, but after an FBI search warrant revealed hundreds of child porn images on the phone he was charged with possession of child pornography. Id. His motion to suppress was denied, and he entered a conditional plea that preserved his right to appeal.

Issue(s): “Camou argues that the warrantless search of his cell phone was unconstitutional because the search was not incident to arrest, and no other exceptions to the warrant requirement apply. Camou also argues that the exclusionary rule bars the admissibility of the images found on his phone.” Id. at *3.

Held: “We agree.” Id. “Agent Walla’s search of Camou’s cell phone was too far removed in time from Camou’s arrest to be incident to that arrest.” Id. at *4. “Given both the passage of one hour and twenty minutes between arrest and search and the seven intervening acts between arrest and search that signaled the arrest was over, we conclude that the search of the phone was not roughly contemporaneous with arrest and, therefore, was not search incident to arrest.” Id. at *5. “Even if there was probable cause to search Camou’s cell phone, we conclude that the government failed to meet the second prong of the exigency exception: exigent circumstances that require immediate police action.” Id. at *6. “If the vehicle exception applies to this case . . . . the one hour and twenty minute delay between the seizure of Camou’s cell phone and the search of its contents would not invalidate the search. We hold, however, that cell phones are not containers for purposes of the vehicle exception.” Id. at *7. “[C]ell phones are non-containers for purposes of the vehicle exception to the warrant requirement, and the search of Camou’s cell phone cannot be justified under that exception.” Id. at *9.

Of Note: A cell phone is not a “container” subject to search incident to arrest. See id. at *9. That logical extension of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Riley, 134 S.Ct. 2473, 2491 (2014) is the best of many great holdings in this terrific opinion. Judge Pregerson reviews the Supreme’s rejection of cell phones as containers in the vehicle context in Riley, and finds “no reason” not to extend that reasoning to cell phones recovered when our clients are arrested. Judge Pregerson may be the most-senior non-Senior judge in the Ninth Circuit, but this Fourth Amendment jurisprudence on cell phones is bleeding edge, and drags the Ninth back into the modern world on technology issues.  

How to Use: Read Camou. The government takes a shotgun approach to try to salvage this (bad) search, and as the Court methodically knocks each argument down it gives the defense great tools on many fronts for our Fourth arsenal. Search incident to arrest, exigency, the automobile exception – each is covered (well) and merits quotation. Don’t overlook, however, a great Herring “good faith” discussion at the end of the opinion. Id. at *10-11. Judge Pregerson rejects a negligent agent’s attempt to assert the “good faith” discussion – a section that merits heavy quotation whenever the government throws that red Herring into its Fourth Amendment briefing.

                                               

For Further Reading: Little rusty on Riley? For a particularly thoughtful summary of this important decision, see Ten Key Issues from the Riley Opinion Protecting Cell Phone Data Seized During an Arrest, available here. 

Image of the Honorable Judge Harry Pregerson from http://www.usvetsinc.org/salute/

Steven Kalar, Federal Public Defender N.D. Cal. Website at www.ndcalfpd.org

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