Someone at my work had his laptop computer confiscated by the TSA agents while boarding a domestic US flight. It was part of a random check.
Has anyone heard of CBP agents confiscating and checking laptops while crossing the border from Mexico? Has this become a common practice?
IF it's happened, it certainly isn't common.
MrBillM - 12-30-2008 at 12:17 PM
I always have my Laptop along. Most everybody I know does. I've never heard a firsthand account of the officials "retaining for inspection" (not
confiscating) a Laptop.Bajahowodd - 12-30-2008 at 12:19 PM
I've read of it happening at airports in the U.S. Beleive there have been some lawsuits filed over it.AcuDoc - 12-30-2008 at 02:22 PM
But that link requires one to login with a member account. bacquito - 12-30-2008 at 03:19 PM
I've never had any problems (yet!) and I frequently cross into the U.S. at Tijuana and Mexicalli.
expect more of these
BajaVida - 12-30-2008 at 06:55 PM
9th Circuit OKs Border Guards' Search of Traveler's Laptop
Mike McKee
The Recorder
April 22, 2008
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The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Monday that border control agents who found child porn on a traveler's laptop didn't violate the man's
right to be free from unreasonable searches.
"We are satisfied that reasonable suspicion is not needed for customs officials to search a laptop or other personal electronic storage devices at the
border," Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain wrote.
O'Scannlain went on to say that the defendant "has failed to distinguish how the search of his laptop and its electronic contents is logically any
different from the suspicionless border searches of travelers' luggage that the Supreme Court and we have allowed."
He was joined by Judge Milan Smith Jr. and U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman, sitting by designation from Oregon.
The ruling appears to be the second upholding computer searches by border guards. The first, U.S. v. Ickes, 393 F.3d 501, was handed down by the
Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2005. It involved a man who tried to drive into the United States from Canada with child porn on
his computer.
In Monday's case, Michael Arnold, who was 43 at the time, was pulled aside for secondary questioning upon arriving at Los Angeles International
Airport from the Philippines on July 17, 2005. Customs agents examined the contents of his laptop computer, Monday's ruling noted, and found "numerous
images depicting what they believed to be child pornography."
A federal grand jury later charged Arnold with possessing and transporting child porn and with traveling to a foreign country with the intention of
having sex with children.
However, U.S. District Judge Dean Pregerson of Los Angeles suppressed the evidence after finding that customs agents violated Arnold's Fourth
Amendment right against unreasonable searches. He held that they didn't have reasonable suspicion to search the contents of Arnold's laptop.
In reversing, the 9th Circuit ruled that Pregerson erred in holding that a "particularized suspicion" was necessary before a laptop computer could be
searched. The court also rejected Arnold's claim that the border agents had exceeded their authority by conducting a search in a "particularly
offensive manner."
"There is nothing in the record," O'Scannlain wrote, "to indicate that the manner in which the [customs] officers conducted the search was
'particularly offensive' in comparison with other lawful border searches. According to Arnold, the [customs] officers simply 'had me boot (the laptop)
up, and looked at what I had inside.'"
Los Angeles-based U.S. Attorney Thomas O'Brien praised the decision in a prepared statement.
"The government needs to have the ability," he said, "to restrict harmful material from entering the country, whether that be weapons used by
terrorists, dangerous narcotics or child pornography."
Marilyn Bednarski, who represented Arnold, said the case has been widely followed "because laptops are so much a part of our lives, and the level of
intrusion [allowed by the 9th Circuit ruling] into what we keep stored in our laptops is extraordinary."
Bednarski, a partner in Pasadena, Calif.'s Kaye, McLane & Bednarski, said she plans to seek an en banc review by the 9th Circuit. She said she
could understand that customs agents need to turn on a laptop computer to make sure it's not a bomb or a container full of illegal substances. But
opening files bothered her.
"What this decision allows [border agents] to do without limits," she said, "is keep opening up and keep reading forever."
The ruling is U.S. v. Arnold, 08 C.D.O.S. 4533.
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[Edited on 12-31-2008 by BajaVida]woody with a view - 12-30-2008 at 07:12 PM
long/short is don't have stuff you don't want them to find, whether in your rig when crossing or on your laptop......
what's the problem? other than a sick pig who needs to be neutered got caught? oh, and the lawyer needs to look in the mirror more often, if ever!
In a Strange Place
MrBillM - 12-30-2008 at 08:37 PM
Applauding a decision by the Ninth Circuit is a truly odd circumstance to find myself, but they got this one right.
you might want to applaud the California Supreme Court
Defendant was charged with 10 counts of possession or control of child pornography. The evidence was discovered during a routine suspicionless border
search of defendant's computers and other digital media at the Los Angeles International Airport. The trial court denied defendant's motion to
suppress the evidence. Defendant pleaded no contest to one count of possession or control of child pornography. (Superior Court of Los Angeles County,
No. SA062077, James R. Dabney, Judge.)
The Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment. The court concluded that the suspicionless border search did not violate U.S. Const., 4th Amend. Although
defendant argued that his computers were entitled to greater protection than other items that may be searched at the border because they contained
expressive materials, defendant's computers were entitled to no more protection than any other container. The court also concluded that a subsequent
search of defendant's computers and digital media detained by customs agents was valid. The same circumstances that authorized the initial search were
present at the subsequent search. That customs agents allowed defendant to leave and resumed the search two days later did not make the search
invalid. (Opinion by Gilbert, P. J., with Coffee and Perren, JJ., concurring.)AcuDoc - 12-30-2008 at 09:33 PM
tj
If you like join the board. For the most part its a great bunch in San Carlos. I have been hanging out in SC for the last few years and Baja for many
years back to the days of the Amigos board.
