United States v. Chavez

• Decision Date: 20 January 2021
• Docket Number: No. 19-2123,19-2123
• Citation: 985 F.3d 1234
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. Manuel CHAVEZ, Defendant - Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

985 F.3d 1234

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.Manuel CHAVEZ, Defendant - Appellant.

No. 19-2123

United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit.

January 20, 2021

William D. Lunn of William D. Lunn Attorney at Law, Tulsa, Oklahoma (Shammara H. Henderson of Freedman Boyd Hollander Goldberg Urias & Ward, Albuquerque, New Mexico, with him on the brief), for Defendant-Appellant.

Dustin C. Segovia, Assistant United States Attorney (John C. Anderson, United States Attorney, with him on the brief), Las Cruces, New Mexico, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Before PHILLIPS, BALDOCK, and McHUGH, Circuit Judges.

PHILLIPS, Circuit Judge.

We must decide whether a deputy sheriff's warrantless seizure of a firearm from a car was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. Before the seizure, the driver, Manuel Chavez, had driven the car at least a couple hundred feet up a private, dirt roadway and parked it outside his isolated trailer home. In a thorough order, the district court approved just one of the government's asserted justifications for the seizure of the firearm (a .38 special caliber Amadeo Rossi S.A.). It ruled that the deputy's seizure of the firearm was reasonable as part of an inventory of the car's contents in preparation for impounding it. But during the inventory, a woman emerged from the trailer and satisfied the deputy that she owned the car. So the deputy left the car with her where it was parked, mere feet from her and the defendant's trailer, but the deputy kept the firearm.

In denying an ensuing motion to suppress, the district court held that the deputy could lawfully seize and keep the firearm, even without admissible evidence that anyone had illegally possessed or used it. The court did not evaluate whether it mattered that the deputy never in fact impounded the car. We reject the district court's denying the motion to suppress on inventory-impoundment grounds. Further, we reject all the government's other asserted bases to validate the deputy's seizing and keeping the firearm. We hold that the district court erred by denying the motion to suppress, so we reverse.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Factual Background

On January 8, 2018, soon after midnight, Deputy Sheriff Eric Castañeda saw a car run a stop sign in Albuquerque, New Mexico. After catching up to the car, Deputy Castañeda activated his patrol lights as a signal for the car to pull over. With the deputy behind him, the driver slowly made his way to a nearby gas station. The driver parked near a gas pump, and the deputy parked behind him. As the deputy approached on foot, he noticed that the driver—later identified as Manuel Chavez¹ —was a Hispanic male wearing a camouflage jacket, a red-and-white beanie, jewelry around his neck, and an earring in his left ear. The deputy also noticed a small brown-and-white dog moving around inside the car.

The deputy further noticed that Mr. Chavez was steadily gazing at him in the car's mirrors, and he saw Mr. Chavez roll his shoulder forward as if reaching for something under his car seat. Concerned for his safety, the deputy proceeded slowly, pausing momentarily after reaching the car and touching its trunk. Taking his hand off the trunk, he unfastened his holster and placed his hand on his gun, preparing to draw it if necessary. After the deputy took another step or two, Mr. Chavez sped away.

During the ensuing pursuit, Mr. Chavez ran another red light, exceeded the speed limit, and risked colliding with an ambulance by swerving lanes. The deputy again activated his patrol lights. Though the deputy temporarily lost sight of the car, he soon saw dust hovering above an intersecting dirt road and turned down it.

The dirt road ran about 200 or 300 feet. At its end, the deputy saw, through more raised dust, a trailer, an RV, and the same car with its headlights and taillights shining in the darkness. The car was sitting a few feet from the trailer. The area around the dirt road and the trailer was open property, full of tumbleweeds and tall, dried brush. The deputy saw "a lot of opportunity for someone to hide around those places." R. vol. 1 at 146. The dirt roadway had no streetlights.

The deputy exited his patrol car with his gun drawn, and after letting the dust settle some, approached the car. Using his gun light, he saw that the driver was gone but that the dog remained inside the car. The deputy then called for backup assistance. Within three minutes, other deputies and officers arrived and began setting up a perimeter.

One responding officer, Deputy Leroy Chavez, noticed that the car's "engine was still running" and that its RPMs were "fluctuating." Id. at 235, 242. He also saw that the car was in the drive gear and that it had a "slight rock to it" from idling. Id. at 245, 248. As he approached, he confirmed that the car had no occupants except for the dog. With officers standing in front of the car, and the unrestrained dog inside, Deputy Chavez worried that the car might move forward. For safety's sake, he opened the unlocked driver's side door, balanced himself on the steering wheel with his left hand, put his right foot on the brake, and shifted the vehicle into park with his right hand. As he pushed back out of the car, he saw on the driver-side floorboard a "rubber grip which appeared to be a handgun in a black holster." Id. at 253–54. Leaving the firearm in place, he shut the door.

Meanwhile, a man emerged from the RV and asked what was going on. Deputy Castañeda told him why the officers were there. The man gave helpful information. He told the deputy that the car belonged to the man and woman who lived in the trailer but that he did not know their names. He also recognized the dog inside the car as one "usually here in the yard." Manuel Chavez Belt-Tape Recording Part 1 Ex. 2, at 1:49–1:55.

After this encounter, Deputy Castañeda heard another deputy yell several commands from a corner of the property. That deputy had found a man lying face down in a large pit. Deputy Castañeda soon identified the man as the driver of the car. About this time, Deputy Chavez sidled up to Deputy Castañeda and told him about the firearm he had seen inside the car by the "driver's seat." Id. at 8:34–40. Without giving Mr. Chavez a Miranda warning, Deputy Castañeda asked him, "Are you a felon?" Id. at 8:40–8:41. Mr. Chavez responded, "Yes, sir." Id. at 8:41–8:42.

After arresting Mr. Chavez, Deputy Castañeda began walking him to the patrol car. On the way, the two men approached the car that Mr. Chavez had driven. As they were alongside it, Deputy Castañeda peered through the driver's side window and saw the firearm "kind of tucked in ... underneath the seat and outside on the floorboard." R. vol. 1 at 159. Back in his patrol car, Deputy Castañeda ran Mr. Chavez's licensing information through a law-enforcement database. This revealed that Mr. Chavez had been arrested several times and was driving with a suspended driver's license. So Deputy Castañeda decided to inventory the car and have it towed and impounded.

A Deputy Heredia began inventorying and photographing the car's contents. After she photographed the firearm, Deputy Castañeda took it and secured it in his patrol car. When the officers were "pretty much already done with the inventory prior to tow," a female ("C.B.") appeared from the trailer and claimed to own the car. Id. at 161. After verifying her ownership, Deputy Castañeda released the car to her. The deputy learned from C.B. that she and Mr. Chavez were in a relationship and that he sometimes used her car. When asked about the firearm inside her car, C.B. denied knowing about it or owning it. Deputy Castañeda kept the firearm and it was tagged into evidence. He testified that he "wasn't just going to hand the gun out to someone, and the gun couldn't stay in the car if it was going to get released to her."² Id. at 163.

Soon after this, Deputy Castañeda took Mr. Chavez to the South Valley Command Center, where he accessed the National Crime Information Center database. From that, he confirmed Mr. Chavez's felon status and that no one had reported the firearm as stolen.

B. Procedural History

A federal grand jury indicted Mr. Chavez on a single count: felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). Before trial, Mr. Chavez filed a motion to suppress the firearm, arguing that the officers had violated his Fourth Amendment rights by searching the car without a warrant and outside any warrant exception. He disputed the deputies' testimony that they had seen the firearm in plain view.

After a two-day hearing, the district court denied Mr. Chavez's motion to suppress.³ In doing so, the district court made three core rulings. First, the court ruled that Mr. Chavez had standing⁴ to assert his Fourth Amendment claim. In this regard, the court rejected the government's argument that Mr. Chavez had abandoned the car by fleeing from it, with the engine running, keys in the ignition, and headlights and taillights on. In concluding that Mr. Chavez had standing, the district court relied on Mr. Chavez's having permission to drive the car and his having left it outside his residence.

Second, the court credited both deputies' accounts of seeing the firearm in plain view on the floorboard. But the district court concluded that seeing the firearm in plain view did not authorize a warrantless seizure of the firearm, because Mr. Chavez's possession of the firearm gave no probable cause of a crime. For instance, rejecting one of the government's arguments to the contrary, the court ruled that Mr. Chavez's furtive movements at the service station had not established probable cause of a crime involving the firearm.

Third, the court ruled that the inventory search complied with the Fourth Amendment. According to the district court, the deputies followed "written standardized procedures, and there [was] no evidence that they acted in bad faith or for the sole purpose of investigation." R. vol. 1 at 394 (internal quotation marks and...