United States Ninth Circuit

The district court's order suppressing evidence obtained to support the charge of conspiracy to transport illegal aliens, when a border patrol agent answered incoming calls on defendant's cell phones when defendant consented to a search of the phones, is affirmed, where: 1) defendant had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the phones; 2) the district court did not clearly err in finding that the evidence fell short of demonstrating an unequivocal abandonment; 3) the agent's answering the calls exceeded the scope of the defendant’s consent to look in or search the phones; and 4) the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the government's motion for reconsideration to consider an argument, raised for the first time in that motion, that exigent circumstances justified answering the calls.

Appellate Information

• Decided 09/12/2013
• Published 09/12/2013

Judges

• REINHARDT

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel