Internal US highway immigration checkpoints?

Old Nov 26, 2007, 5:30 am
  #16  
 
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Originally Posted by WHBM
Is this an official US requirement ? When I go swimming on the beach at Miami Beach I don't bring any documentation over from the hotel. How could I ?
Legally, you are probably required to. However, officer discretion would certainly apply if you were swimming in Miami!

I can't think of any officer who would harrass people who were swimming in order to check their documentation, but I suppose if they really, really wanted to press the issue, they could escort you back to your room to show them your paperwork. I don't carry my passport with me when I'm outside the US (it is locked in the room safe), although legally I probably should. I've never met an officer so wretched as to want to be such a stickler.

In any case, imprisonment (if ever invoked) would certainly only be possible if you could not produce any ID at all (and didn't have it in your hotel room.)
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 5:31 am
  #17  
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I don't quite understand this ID thing, it seems like a vicious circle to me.

If US citizens don't have to carry ID, then surely everybody can just say "I'm a US citizen and therefore don't have to carry ID" when challenged? What discretion does a police officer or non-border immigration officer have in this instance?
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 6:30 am
  #18  
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When it happened to us on the freeway between Nogales AZ and Tucson AZ, cars were being directed off the freeway and up the offramp for checking.

The officer asked 'Going home?' (we were driving a CAL-registered car). I said yes, to LAX and then home. My Brit accent must have been my ID and we didn't show any documents.

Is that freeway the only road in the US where distances are marked in km instead of miles?

Then there was the border check between AZ and CA, in case we had an apple ...
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 7:28 am
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Some states have active truck weigh stations some do not. Freedom of movement is not stopped as in "Soviet Russia" as WHBM suggests, same with the Ag checkpoints at Arizona and California, where they check for plants and fruit. Overweight trucks do massive amounts of damage to highways and are fined if overweight. Bugs in fruits and plants can damage crops, thus some states take action, others like Texas and Louisana used to have animal check points for cattle and others beasts but stopped funding them years ago.

WHBM there are several roads marked with kmh signs, Houston for example has them near the airports, and the medical centre (the worlds largest and full of foreigners). Orlando is another example. As for KM markings, that road south of Tucson is one as is Deleware highway 1, but I have read that has changed recently. I have seen signs in Maine in both kms and miles also.

As for in Europe, you should carry your passport if you cross borders. I lived (and still do part of the year) on the tri-border, dreilandpunt, literally on the German-Dutch border and very closs to Belgium. The Dutch can fine you 100s of Euros for not having a passport (or EU id), and I have seen it happen.


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Old Nov 26, 2007, 7:48 am
  #20  
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Originally Posted by stut
I don't quite understand this ID thing, it seems like a vicious circle to me.

If US citizens don't have to carry ID, then surely everybody can just say "I'm a US citizen and therefore don't have to carry ID" when challenged? What discretion does a police officer or non-border immigration officer have in this instance?
This is something that I was wondering also.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 7:59 am
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Originally Posted by FlyingHoustonian
WHBM there are several roads marked with kmh signs, Houston for example has them near the airports, and the medical centre (the worlds largest and full of foreigners). Orlando is another example.
FH
Florida had dual signage for a short time a few years ago, but the kmh signs are long gone now.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 8:10 am
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Originally Posted by djk7
Florida had dual signage for a short time a few years ago, but the kmh signs are long gone now.
Odd since I saw one Saturday driving from Orlando to Vero Beach...
Maybe they missed it.

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Old Nov 26, 2007, 8:27 am
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Originally Posted by WHBM
Is this an official US requirement ?
Failing to carry the "green card" is technically a misdemeanor. Section 264 of the INA, in pertinent part, reads as follows:

(d) Every alien in the United States who has been registered and fingerprinted under the provisions of the Alien Registration Act, 1940, or under the provisions of this Act shall be issued a certificate of alien registration or an alien registration receipt card in such form and manner and at such time as shall be prescribed under regulations issued by the Attorney General.

(e) Every alien, eighteen years of age and over, shall at all times carry with him and have in his personal possession any certificate of alien registration or alien registration receipt card issued to him pursuant to subsection (d). Any alien who fails to comply with the provisions of this subsection shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall upon conviction for each offense be fined not to exceed $100 or be imprisoned not more than thirty days, or both.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 9:29 am
  #24  
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RE: Metrics, Delaware has its own metric highway. Details on metric signs on US highways can be found here.

Regarding checkpoints, my mother was a naturalized US citizen. She was once given a hard time by CBP because she didn't carry her naturalization papers with her some 25 years after she became a US citizen. This was on a mid-80s entry to the US from Canada. They seemed to give her a hard time because they could, not because they had any doubt that she was a citizen.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 9:50 am
  #25  
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Perhaps some of FT's Legal Beagles can weigh in because my memory is fuzzy. I recall reading that the courts permit the CBP to operate internal border checkpoints as "extentions" of the actual border checkpoints. In order to conduct a search, they must have reasonable suspicion or someone would need to be intimidated enough to consent. The courts came up with different definitions of "fixed" and "roving" checkpoints. There were (I think) four criteria for these checkpoints and for conducting a warrantless search:

1. They had to establish that you, your vehicle occupants, and your vehicle had actually crossed the US border. I always wondered about this when the I-5 and AZ internal checkpoints have multiple off amd on-ramps (like the entire city of San Diego!) long before you get to the I-5 checkpoint.

2. The trip, if it did include a border crossing, had to have been continuous. For example, crossing the border on Monday, staying overnight somewhere, and confronting a checkpoint on Tuesday doesn't count as "continuous."

3. I don't remember the other two criteria.

There is a huge temptation to use these internal checkpoints to catch people for all sorts of things for which they would normally need probable cause or an actual search warrant. If you have not crossed a border and the CBP did not establish that you had crossed a border, they can't conduct a warrantless search, but they do... This kind of dragnet scares the daylights out of me.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 10:00 am
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Originally Posted by xyzzy
Regarding checkpoints, my mother was a naturalized US citizen. She was once given a hard time by CBP because she didn't carry her naturalization papers with her some 25 years after she became a US citizen. This was on a mid-80s entry to the US from Canada. They seemed to give her a hard time because they could, not because they had any doubt that she was a citizen.
I am a Naturalized US Citizen. However, I have a strong accent and have to carry a passport in order to get through these checkpoints. I was once told directly by a CBP officer that "if I don't have a passport, I could be subject to detention until my status is verified". Any guesses how long such detention might be?

In 2004-2006 I had to go through one of those checkpoints on the way to work. Having to carry a passport every day certainly reminded me of the Soviet Union, where it was a requirement for evryone over the age of 16.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 10:20 am
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Originally Posted by stut
I don't quite understand this ID thing, it seems like a vicious circle to me.

If US citizens don't have to carry ID, then surely everybody can just say "I'm a US citizen and therefore don't have to carry ID" when challenged? What discretion does a police officer or non-border immigration officer have in this instance?
Good question, I have wondered this too. However, keep in mind that if you are driving a car and you approach a checkpoint, saying that you "don't have to carry ID" isn't true, in the sense that you are required to carry a drivers license. While it isn't up to CBP to enforce traffic regulations, they probably won't buy the argument that you don't have ID on you.

As a passenger, however, you would not be required to have ID on you so I guess the verbal assertion would be harder to challenge.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 10:23 am
  #28  
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 10:54 am
  #29  
 
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Originally Posted by FliesWay2Much
Perhaps some of FT's Legal Beagles can weigh in because my memory is fuzzy. I recall reading that the courts permit the CBP to operate internal border checkpoints as "extentions" of the actual border checkpoints. In order to conduct a search, they must have reasonable suspicion or someone would need to be intimidated enough to consent. The courts came up with different definitions of "fixed" and "roving" checkpoints. There were (I think) four criteria for these checkpoints and for conducting a warrantless search:

1. They had to establish that you, your vehicle occupants, and your vehicle had actually crossed the US border. I always wondered about this when the I-5 and AZ internal checkpoints have multiple off amd on-ramps (like the entire city of San Diego!) long before you get to the I-5 checkpoint.

2. The trip, if it did include a border crossing, had to have been continuous. For example, crossing the border on Monday, staying overnight somewhere, and confronting a checkpoint on Tuesday doesn't count as "continuous."

3. I don't remember the other two criteria.

There is a huge temptation to use these internal checkpoints to catch people for all sorts of things for which they would normally need probable cause or an actual search warrant. If you have not crossed a border and the CBP did not establish that you had crossed a border, they can't conduct a warrantless search, but they do... This kind of dragnet scares the daylights out of me.
While a checkpoint needs no cause for stopping (unlike, say, a roving vehicle stop) they are not the same as a port of entry (POE). At a POE they need little or no suspicion to search. At a checkpoint they still need PC.

Most of this was established by United States v Montoya de Hernandez, although there are other precedents as well that apply, of course.
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Old Nov 26, 2007, 10:55 am
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No one has mentioned the small, sometimes operational, checkpoint on I-8 in CA ~40 mins outside of San Diego. It is for westbound traffic only, although the highway is pointing north at that section. It is a popular area for illegal border crossings.

The huge check point that stops all traffic on I-5 north of Camp Pendalton between San Diego and LA/the-OC has always bothered me. Why is it presumably OK for illegals to be in the San Diego area, but don't you dare try to come up to Orange County?!
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