D.P.R.: The defense argument to suppress is “nonsense” and “stunningly irrational and baseless”

Actually from last summer, is the failed argument of the summer:

From the carjacking capital of the United States, a claim that the carjacking was justified as their own extralegal drug investigation with probable cause, allegedly to steal drugs. United States v. Torres-Sobrado, 733 F. Supp. 2d 325 (D. P.R. 2009):

The arguments made by the defendants, first, that no property was unlawfully seized because the property in question consisted only of illegal substances and, second, that the defendants had probable cause to conduct the fateful traffic stop and therefore, presumably, that the resulting search and seizure were lawfully conducted is, quite simply, nonsense. Even if the property taken from the victim is property that is not constitutionally protected, and even if the movants were accompanied during the traffic stop by a “real” member of the Puerto Rico Police Department acting on a tip from a reliable source, the defendants’ stop, detention, and search of Andrades were illegal according to the allegations in Count Six. Defendants are charged with staging a false traffic stop, motivated not by any attempt on the part of real law enforcement officers to enforce real laws, but motivated by a goal to procure drugs for resale and profit. For the defendants to argue that they had probable cause for the actions they are charged with, despite the fact that they are charged with staging that stop, despite the fact that neither is a real law enforcement official, despite the fact that they allegedly dressed up as law enforcement officials, is stunningly irrational and baseless. The Court rejects these arguments outright.

Also linked at Volokh Conspiracy.