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Deleted. No point.
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Originally Posted by Firebug4
(Post 20973535)
It is not uncommon for a US Citizen at a Border Patrol checkpoint to not be able to provide documentation of US Citizenship. That fact alone is not going to rise to the level of reasonable suspicion let alone probable cause for arrest. It can be used with other factors to consider if the circumstances rise to the level of reasonable suspicion. It is conceivable and has happened that a US Citizen has been detained because they could not provide documentation. There were other factors present. The officer or agent is not expected or required to be correct 100 percent of the time. The officer or agent just has to have acted reasonably as decided by the legal system.
FB The only point I would clarify is that an officer or agent is not required to be correct 100 percent of the time. Though that may be true as a matter of practice, any time a state actor transgresses a constitutional limitation on state power, that transgression is actionable and redressable. |
I think there is a piece that has been completely overlooked in this thread. As has been mentioned, these are immigration checkpoints. The Agents are looking for immigration violations, which have and will continue to consist of US citizens smuggling people in vehicles. Sometimes, these people will not be visible occupants. They can be hidden in trunks, dashboards, quarter panels, gas tanks, and numerous other places with a little creativity.
So, my perception is that while simply stating oneself to be a U.S. Citizen at a checkpoint will be the end of the interaction 99 times out of 100. There are, and can be, other aspects of an immigration inspection that may follow. |
Originally Posted by chollie
(Post 20975076)
F4, your answers are thorough and straight from the manual. They do not reflect actual practice. They reflect the official line.
What is the purpose of the CBP roadblock? To ascertain citizenship? Or a catch-all (like TSA checkpoints have become) to check for any sort of offense, citizenship-related or not? If the former, then it is clear that if a CBP agent has asked the question - US citizen? - and gotten a clear and unambiguous answer, any further questions or secondary or delays on the part of CBP are clearly either a fishing expedition or the result of 'suspicion', suspicion that can be, according to you and others, based on nothing more than the CBP agent's gut feeling (twitches, bits of behavior, mud on the car, bla-bla). To be very clear: if I am stopped at a roadblock and asked my citizenship and I reply 'US', any further CBP action beyond sending me my way, any further questions, indicate a level of suspicion - and that's never good from the perspective of an innocent-but-guilty-until-CBP-verifies-you're-innocent' citizen. What other reason is there for a CBP to continue to question me? Unless, of course, the roadblocks are there to check for much more than just citizenship - traffic violations, drug smuggling, fugitives... Isn't it interesting that the only time you even mention video, it is to point out the weaknesses that exonerate CBP under examination? Are you aware of a single instance in which examination of video demonstrated that CBP had, in fact, not been truthful about the events that took place? As you know, such instances are shockingly common with LE - shocking, because if you're an LE on camera, surely you know even better than the public what's being captured on a dash cam. You should understand that your perception clouds what you believe that you know about the law, and rules in which law enforcement are allowed and required to operate under. You believe that all an CBP agent is allowed to ask is citizenship related questions and any other questions should not be allowed. You are entitled to your opinion. However, that is not reality nor actual practice. If a state or local officer stops you for a traffic violation, is he limited to only talking about that traffic violation or does he ask other things. The law enforcement officer's job is always to ascertain if there is probable cause to believe there is illegal activity occurring. This is done by observation, and asking questions. Even though it appears that you don't believe it to be the case law enforcement officers are not required to have any suspicion what so ever to ask questions. Law enforcement officers are by nature curious, inquisitive people. There really is no other way to do the job. That is why the courts have allowed the techniques the officers use to do the job. I will again try to explain my personal opinion regarding video. You are absolutely correct. I am well aware of what can and does get captured on a dash cam or any video camera in fact much more aware and knowledgeable than yourself. I have in previous posts tried to explain to you why video is not the end all be all evidence that you believe that it is. Certainly not the video that most of the general public sees. Video is a great tool if you understand the limitations of what it can and can't do. The video clips that we are all most familiar with are U tube videos and news media videos. Almost without fail those videos are edited. You don't get to see the whole thing. You only get a two dimensional narrow view. You aren't seeing the scene in the same way or light (I will touch more on that in a second) that the participants in the event see it. In video angles can mean everything. As I said before, I can show you numerous videos that you would swear that the authorities were absolutely wrong. However, after all the facts were discovered and investigated the exact opposite conclusion than what was drawn from the video was in fact true. When I mentioned light above I was not referring to brightness. What I meant was you are not seeing the events transpire in the same way that an officer will see events transpire. This is because of the officer's training and experience. There is an ongoing phenomena in this country concerning law enforcement and video. The public believes that they can watch video, critique and decide if what they are seeing is correct or not. They do this without the benefit of any training, legal knowledge, or experience. If this is possible, why are the governments wasting all this time, money, and resources to send law enforcement officers to training academies. Why are we spending more money to update that training when things change. Why don't we just throw people in uniforms and send them out to work. After all look at the individuals in the public that can recognize the proper way to do things and the proper decisions to make without any of those pesky things like knowledge of law and policies, training or experience. Sounds ridicules doesn't it, because it is. You really don't have this type of belief in other professions. You don't have the public watching video of houses being built, fires being put out, surgeries being performed, planes being flown, or any other number of activities being performed by the practitioner of that profession and the public believing they have the qualifications to judge if it was done correctly. That being said I agree that video has its place. It is tool that can be used to document and recreate events. That video should be evaluated by individuals that are trained to recognize what they are looking at. They should have an understanding of the rules that apply and ideally have experienced applying to rules, laws, and performing the tasks that they are evaluating. They should also be able to take other evidence such as physical evidence, witness statements, into account you know those types of things that the general public do not have access to when they are judging these events. The environment that I have operated in since I started this career has been under constant video surveillance. That is the nature of where I have been assigned. I have certainly seen officers disciplined due to video. It is the nature of human beings. They are not perfect. They make mistakes. The other problem that enters into this equation is that is usually is not matter of the agency, mine or otherwise, not being truthful. It usually is a matter of the agency is not allowed to comment one way or the other due to privacy laws. It very often is unfortunate because the agency and through association the officer doesn't really get to defend themselves until the event has worked it through the system. By that time, the public as judged the event on incomplete or inaccurate information and is not interested in the actual outcome because they have moved on to the next one. FB |
Done.
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Originally Posted by chollie
(Post 20975174)
When has a CBP officer ever over-stepped his/her bounds at a roadblock and been held accountable? What were the sanctions (or is that information private)?
I am aware of one CBP agent in WA who was arrested and convicted of a road rage incident - not in the line of duty, but he made the connection between his actions and his job. IIRC, he bragged about the number of non-citizens he had taken action against. AFAIK, he is still on the job. I find it disturbing that your post seems to assume that an upset or incredulous reaction from a passenger is likely manufactured indignation designed to divert the agent from wrong-doing. Is it part of CBP training to make this assumption? And people scoff when I advocate cringing, obsequious, groveling behavior in any encounter with CBP or, indeed, LE in general. Hint: sometimes innocent people are incredulous and indignant too. I am aware of the CBP officer in WA that you are referring to. I certainly don't condone his behavior and as a manager I certainly would move to terminate him. There are policies that address his off-duty conduct. The agency did in fact move to terminate him. What more would you like the agency to do. The agency cannot control the recourse's the employee has available to him anymore than the agency can control the recourse's available to the public. I am not sure what the final outcome was I will certainly see if I can find that when I go back to work. However, that is much different circumstances than an officer legally doing his job within the legal parameters that are giving to him and him being incorrect in his conclusions. I think the biggest issue is you don't get to decide if the officer overstepped or not. You also don't get informed as to why the officer was found not to have overstepped and as with most employers personnel actions are confidential unless it involves criminal action which is a matter of public record. |
Originally Posted by PTravel
(Post 20975183)
Firebug4's entire post is, to my understanding, completely consistent with constitutional law. I've highlighted the sentence which i most relevant to the OP's question.
The only point I would clarify is that an officer or agent is not required to be correct 100 percent of the time. Though that may be true as a matter of practice, any time a state actor transgresses a constitutional limitation on state power, that transgression is actionable and redressable. FB |
No more insults.
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So Firebug, say a US citizen is driving north from San Diego and passes Oceanside. The next exit is beyond the CBP booths in I-5. Now, I haven't driven through there northbound in a number of years, but that checkpoint is usually not in operation. However, sometimes, at night, it is.
So, blond haired, blue eyed San Diego State co-ed is driving back to LA at night, and CBP is manning the checkpoint. They ask her her citizenship, she says 'U.S.". Then, they ask for a passport or proof of citizenship. I find it hard to believe that would happen, just based on my own experiences and the experiences of others I know. I've been stopped at regular checkpoints on interstates like I-5 and I-19, a somewhat fixed checkpoints like heading north from Bisbee-Douglass through Tombstone and Benson to I-10 or even back from Ft. Huachuca up to I-10. I've been stopped on the road from El Paso to Alamogordo, and I'm pretty sure I've been through a few checkpoints in Texas, either coming back from Laredo or up from Brownsville. I also had BP come after me when I was showing a friend around Border Field Park south of San Diego, and I'm still trying to figure that out, since we parked right next to the BP truck on the hill in the park and sat walked around for 15 minutes. But, getting back to the OP, it seems that the co-ed scenario is what happened. If it did in fact happen as the OP states - a verbal declaration of "US" was given, then proof was asked - what is a citizen to do? A lot of readers on Flyertalk may not truly know how infuriating these checkpoints are. They are north of some large cities, and the message I tend to take away is that CBP has decided set up a frontier buffer zone. If you live in San Diego, El Paso, Laredo or Brownsville, you're in this zone. If you work or serve at Laughlin Air Force Base, Ft. Huachuca, Ft. Bliss and all of the military facilities in San Diego County, you're in this zone. Apparently, this zone is not be trusted, as far as CBP is concerned. There are illegals everywhere, but apparently, if they stay close to the border, it's cool. Just don't try and drive or take a bus to LA or Tucson or Albequerque or San Antonio. Stay in the frontier zone if you can. |
Originally Posted by Firebug4
(Post 20974920)
You are wrong. The law was cited by link several posts above. All non-immigrants are required to carry their registration document. That was the I-94 until recently due to the I-94 going paperless. The registration document is now the admission stamp which is in the passport. Again, see the link to the Federal register to see the addition to the regulation.
FB There are three items in question: passport (with appropriate stamp), I94, and ARC/green card. All can, as you say, constitute a registration document, whether individually or severally. Several categories of people must carry certain items. LPR's must carry their ARC, for example. Hence the "papers please" comment. Other must carry their passports. As I said, yet others must only carry the I94 and I specifically left them out in my original reply pointing out the error of the person that said "You have to carry your passport". I specifically pointed to the L & H visa categories as examples and said that certain classes of those SOR's are in that camp. I later clarified that they might have to carry an I94 and that the print out will suffice. That does not invalidate what I wrote earlier. The Federal register states that the I94 printout is sufficient for presentation as an ARD: Under 'New Form Definition" we find: "For example, the definition specifies that “presentation” of the Form I-94 includes providing a printout of the electronic record." The only real question is whether a PDF stored on a personal electronic device of some sort that enables viewing of the I94 print out will constitute "carrying" the print out. I suspect that it won't, given the woeful nature of the US immigration system. :cool: |
CBP officers catch drug smugglers all of the time. A search in the Arizona Daily Star newspaper over the last year will find several headlines of people attempting to smuggle all sorts of illegal substances across the border and many time those smugglers use the same freeways as the rest of us do.
And it is not just people with a particular skin tone who smuggle drugs...people as white as can be do it, too. My DH works for a group of community health centers in the Tucson CBP sector and due to the nature of his job, he often has to make road trips to rural community health centers to work on I/T stuff for them. He is ALWAYS asked a million questions by Border Patrol...where are you going, why are you by yourself, why are you so far from home, why are you doing this on a weekend, how long will you be there? On two occasions, he had to get out of his car while CBP searched his car top to bottom. Turns out that a drug sniffing dog alerted that something was up w/my DH's car but DH does not do drugs nor does he transport or sell them either. The whole experience angered my DH a lot but he got his knickers untwisted when he realized why they had been so thorough. What FB said about the technology and tactics is correct. CBP has technology in use today that allows them to zero in with a camera in a location a mile or so away and be able to make out your face and license plate. Said cameras are on mobile towers that are moved around. Mexican drug cartels know this and take pot shots at the mobile camera towers. DH and I regularly travel on I-8 between Casa Grande and San Diego to visit family in CA. Even when I am driving our minivan, I get questioned at the CBP stop on I-8 near the sand dunes or near Gila Bend. I chock it up to that corridor having heavy drug trafficking activity and I just expect to be scrutinized more than in CA. In CA on the other hand...on I-15 between Temecula and San Diego, CBP just waves us through. |
Originally Posted by chollie
(Post 20975665)
You are correct. The public does not get to decide if an officer has overstepped his/her bounds. There is no outside independent oversight. There is no assurance that if the officer has behaved incorrectly the matter will be fairly addressed. This is not unique to CBP. A similar set-up is what led to Seattle PD nearly getting taken over by the DoJ - a secretive internal evaluation and disciplinary process with no independent oversight that clearly wasn't protecting the rights of police and citizens equally.
LE is nothing special. It's a job. The risks for some can be higher than some jobs, but lower than others. The stress can be higher, but it can also be lower. They applied for the job. They deserve respect in so far as they are doing their job, but all people doing their jobs deserve respect in and of that. It doesn't deserve any special respect just for the fact of the job itself. |
Originally Posted by Firebug4
(Post 20975391)
Why don't we just throw people in uniforms and send them out to work.
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Originally Posted by buggysmama
(Post 20975759)
CBP officers catch drug smugglers all of the time.
Lets say CBP finds drugs on you on I-8. What if you grew them in California and are driving them to Phoenix? You haven't crossed an international border, so thus Customs has nothing to do with it, and since you didn't cross a border, there's no Border to be Protected. If you agree that CBP can setup checkpoints inside US territory, and check for anything they feel like checking, then you're saying that CBP can de facto operate well outside the scope of their assigned missions on anything within this new Frontier Buffer Zone. They could set up at a mall in San Diego and ask everyone that passes what their citizenship is. They could pull you over in downtown McAllen Texas and ask your citizenship. The 50-mile checkpoints were supposedly to search for illegals. Now, it appears they're looking for drugs. What's next? That's the point, there's a constant pushing on the boundaries of jurisdiction and scope of responsibility, not just by CBP but by a lot of LEO and pseudo-LEO agencies. You seem to say you're ok with CBP catching drugs in the middle of Southern Arizona or New Mexico. My question is, how is that in any reasonable sense a Border Protection function? |
actually much of I-8 between Gila Bend and El Centro is within visual sight of the Mexico border, so it definitely falls within your 50 mile framework. But CBP actually operates within 90 or so miles of the border...otherwise they would not have an office in Casa Grande off of I-10.
If someone has a serious enough concern about what is and is not legal with regards to CBP operations and immigration matters, then I would highly recommend that one consults with an attorney for formal legal advice...preferably one specializing in immigration matters...in addition to reading the laws for oneself (something that I admit I have not done). Realistically, even my comments are mere speculation. Your mileage may vary. We certainly are not going to change each others' minds today on such a hot topic. But if the original question is pertaining to what is and is not legal, then one really should ask a knowledgable lawyer instead. |
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