D.Neb.: Getting defendant off a train was a seizure without PC

Defendant was confronted by officers during a train stopover in Omaha. One bag was found with a lock and no tags and the officers asked who it belonged to and nobody claimed it. The officers saw defendant and decided that he was nervous looking, so they started talking to him and he told them his name, provided ID, told them where he was going to visit a girlfriend, and, when the train was about to leave, they got him off the train. He was effectively seized at that point, and the seizure of the second bag was unlawful. United States v. Posadas, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104618 (D. Neb. December 29, 2008):

Even if the evidence could show that the officers were operating on anything more than a “hunch,” the defendant in this case was effectively taken into custody when he was asked to leave the train, which would require probable cause. A reasonable person in the defendant’s position would not have felt free to leave or to refuse the officers’ request. See, e.g., also Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 503 n. 9 (1983) (noting officers taking possession of defendant’s airline ticket, luggage, and identification contributed to determination defendant had been seized because “[a]s a practical matter, Royer could not leave the airport without them.”); United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 554, (1980) (stating that “[a] person has been ‘seized’ within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment only if, in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave.”). Whatever consent the defendant had provided to officers for a search of his bag before the seizure, the consent did not extend to the removal of the defendant and his bag from the train and the attendant consequence that the train would leave without him. The officers lacked probable cause to remove the defendant and his bag from the train.

Administrative search warrant for animal control violations was issued with probable cause and was sufficiently particular for “animals” in violation of law. Armon v. McHenry County, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104553 (N.D. Ill. December 29, 2008):

The warrant was by no means a general warrant and was limited to authorizing a seizure of “any animals” that were being kept on the property in violation of animal control ordinances and statutes. While it is true that the warrant did not specify each and every animal that was to be seized, that type of detail would have been impossible, especially considering the sheer volume of animals that were present on the property and the fact that animals of the same type are not necessarily readily distinguishable.