The Eighth Circuit doesn’t follow Ninth on bad faith equaling an “egregious” Fourth Amendment violation warranting the exclusionary remedy in an alien removal case. They have a damages remedy [ha!]. Carcamo v. Holder, 2013 U.S. App. LEXIS 7841 (8th Cir. April 19, 2013):

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Defendant cannot show standing merely by relying on the government’s theory of the case. Defendant failed to show standing by some clothes in the closet that the government thought were his. The place was rented by him but subrented to somebody else. United States v. Henry, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 50324 (N.D. Ga. January 30, 2013):

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Defendant’s garage was part of the home. She parked there and entered the house through its door. Therefore, the officer’s entry there violated the curtilage. Even if the officer had probable cause defendant had been driving recklessly, he lacked exigent circumstances to enter the apartment when the defendant answered the door. He stepped in only two feet, but that’s still an entry. Corey v. State, 2013 Ga. App. LEXIS 185 (March 13, 2013).

Defendant relied on United States v. Smith, 263 F.3d 571 (6th Cir. 2001), to have standing to challenge the search of the rental car he was driving; defendant had no standing here because he had no DL and his relation to the renter was tenuous and not a family relationship. United States v. Akinola, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 35952 (D. N.J. March 15, 2013).

Defendant’s consent is voluntary. While he speaks Spanish, the recording of his interview shows he understands English. United States v. Monarrez-Mendoza, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 35584 (N.D. Tex. March 6, 2013).*

Does the exclusionary rule apply in pure civil forfeiture? Not sure. Let's assume it does. Here, defendant orally consented to the search of his tractor trailer. He wrote "under protest" on the consent form. United States v. $304,980 in United States Currency, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 650 (S.D. Ill. January 3, 2013):

One issue not briefed by the parties but bearing mention is the preliminary question of whether a Fourth Amendment-based suppression motion is proper in an in rem civil forfeiture proceeding like the case at bar. The federal courts have not answered this question uniformly. Some Courts of Appeal have held that since civil forfeiture proceedings are quasi-criminal in nature, the exclusionary rule applies, and suppression motions may be filed. See, e.g., U.S. v. $291,828.00 in U.S. Currency, 536 F.3d 1234, 1236-38 (11th Cir. 2008) ("The Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule applies to civil forfeiture actions."); U.S. v. $493,850.00 in U.S. Currency, 518 F.3d 1159, 1164 (9th Cir. 2008) ("The exclusionary rule applies in civil forfeiture cases.... It bars the admission of evidence obtained in violation of the U.S. Constitution, as well as 'fruits of the poisonous tree.'"). Other courts have voiced uncertainty about the use of suppression motions in civil forfeiture actions. A 2009 Seventh Circuit case furnishes an example.

In United States v. Marrocco, 578 F.3d 627, 631 n.5 (7th Cir. 2009), the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit sidestepped the potential obstacle, because the Government had not argued that the remedy of suppression is unavailable in forfeiture proceedings under 21 U.S.C. 881. However, in his concurring opinion, Judge Easterbrook expressed concern with the assumption that suppression motions are appropriate in civil forfeitures:

All parties assume that the exclusionary rule applies to forfeiture, so that the res must be returned if it was improperly seized. Yet the Supreme Court has twice held that the exclusionary rule is not used in civil proceedings. See INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. 1032 ... (1984) (deportation); United States v. Janis, 428 U.S. 433 ... (1976) (taxation). See also Pennsylvania Board of Probation & Parole v. Scott, 524 U.S. 357 ... (1998) (rule inapplicable to probation revocation). Although One 1958 Plymouth Sedan v. Pennsylvania, 380 U.S. 693, 85 S.Ct. 1246, 14 L.Ed.2d 170 (1965), suppressed evidence in a forfeiture, Janis stated that this was because that forfeiture was intended as a criminal punishment. 428 U.S. at 447 n. 17.... The forfeiture in our case is civil. It is farther from a criminal prosecution than is a probation-revocation proceeding.

Suppressing the res in a civil proceeding, even though the property is subject to forfeiture, would be like dismissing the indictment in a criminal proceeding whenever the defendant was arrested without probable cause. The Supreme Court has been unwilling to use the exclusionary rule to "suppress" the body of an improperly arrested defendant.... Why then would it be sensible to suppress the res?

Marrocco, 578 F.3d at 642 (emphasis added).

Officers placing photographic equipment on a grow operation in open fields was not a Fourth Amendment issue–there was no reasonable expectation of privacy there. United States v. Mendoza, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 154750 (E.D. Wis. October 9, 2012). Update: CNET: Court OKs warrantless use of hidden surveillance cameras by Declan McCullagh; ArsTechnica here; Government Technology here.

Defendant stopped at the gate to Fort Campbell to provide ID before entering the base, and the officer on duty at the gate could smell the “pungent odor of alcohol.” That, according to an unpublished Kentucky case, at least, was reasonable suspicion for a stop. United States v. Riley, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 154672 (W.D. Ky. October 29, 2012).

Defendant voluntarily consented. She had been Mirandized and had time to think about it on the drive back to her apartment before it happened. United States v. Lizarraras-Chacon, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 154763 (D. Ore. October 29, 2012).*

The exclusionary rule can apply to deportation cases where there is widespread or an egregious violation of the Fourth Amendment. “Lopez-Mendoza sanctions the application of the exclusionary rule in cases where constitutional violations by immigration officers are ‘widespread’ or evidence has been obtained as a result of ‘egregious violations of Fourth Amendment or other liberties that might transgress notions of fundamental fairness and undermine the probative value of the evidence obtained.’ Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. at 1050-51.” Appellant should have been able to prove it. Oliva-Ramos v. Attorney General of the United States, 694 F.3d 259 (3d Cir. 2012):

The BIA rejected Oliva-Ramos's reliance on Lopez-Mendoza because it regarded the "comments from a plurality of the Supreme Court [to be] obiter dictum." The BIA explained that the Court had not yet found circumstances sufficient to apply the exclusionary rule in removal proceedings, and the Board's "own precedents ... recognize no such exception to the inapplicability of the exclusionary rule premised on widespread Fourth Amendment violations." There are several flaws in the BIA's approach.

The BIA leapfrogged over the serious concerns it should have addressed under Lopez-Mendoza about the manner in which the evidence was obtained here. See Almeida-Amaral v. Gonzales, 461 F.3d 231, 234-35 (2d Cir. 2006); United States v. Navarro-Diaz, 420 F.3d 581, 587 (6th Cir. 2005); Orhorhaghe v. INS, 38 F.3d 488, 493 (9th Cir. 1994); cf United States v. Stabile, 633 F.3d 219, 243 (3d Cir. 2011) ("Typically, the exclusionary rule requires that we suppress evidence obtained as a result of an illegal search.").

We must reject the BIA's reading of Lopez-Mendoza that would only permit suppression of evidence based on "fundamentally unfair" circumstances in violation of the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment. The BIA's analysis of Lopez-Mendoza views that opinion only as a plurality. In doing so, the BIA ignored the fact that almost all of the Justices on the Court agreed that the exclusionary rule should apply to some extent in removal hearings. As we explained above, eight of the nine Justices agreed with that proposition. Four would have limited the rule to instances of widespread or egregious violations of law by Government officials, and four others would apply the rule without that condition. See Puc-Ruiz v. Holder, 629 F.3d 771, 778 n.2 (8th Cir. 2010) (citing Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. at 1051-61 (Brennan, White, Marshall, and Stevens, JJ., dissenting)); see also Gonzalez-Rivera v. INS, 22 F.3d 1441, 1448 n.2 (9th Cir. 1994) (same).

Moreover, even if the pronouncement in Lopez-Mendoza was dicta as the BIA labeled it, Supreme Court dicta should not be so cavalierly cast aside. ...

A lengthy explanation of reasonable suspicion and suspected forged paper tags is United States v. Mendoza, 691 F.3d 954 (8th Cir. 2012).* Was it a genuine suspicion or not?

Separation of an agitated parent and her child in an ER for treatment was not a Fourth Amendment violation. Mueller v. Auker, 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 18972 (9th Cir. September 10, 2012) (prior appeal Mueller v. Auker, 576 F.3d 979 (9th Cir. 2009)):

The Fourth Amendment usually requires an officer to have a warrant issued upon probable cause before seizing someone, but "neither probable cause nor a warrant is required when 'special needs, beyond the normal need for law enforcement, make the warrant and probable-cause requirement impracticable.'" Yin v. California, 95 F.3d 864, 869 (9th Cir. 1996) (quoting Vernonia Sch. Dist. v. Acton, 515 U.S. 646, 653, 115 S. Ct. 2386, 132 L. Ed. 2d 564 (1995)). In these "special needs" cases, we "dispense[ ] with the probable cause and warrant requirements and simply appl[y] a balancing test to determine if a search or seizure is reasonable and thus constitutional." Yin, 95 F.3d at 869.