S.D.N.Y.: No REP in car obtained by fraud

There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in a car obtained by identify theft. United States v. Ilori, 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104338 (S.D.N.Y. June 10, 2022):

Second, the Defendants did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a car they obtained by means of identity theft. Because the Defendants obtained the Car through fraud, they were in possession of it illegally and had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the Car. It is well settled that “a person present in a stolen automobile at the time of the search may [not] object to the lawfulness of the search of the automobile.” Byrd v. United States, 138 S. Ct. 1518, 1529, 200 L. Ed. 2d 805 (2018). The Court finds persuasive the Tenth Circuit’s opinion in United States v. Johnson, 584 F.3d 995 (10th Cir. 2009). In that case, the Court affirmed the denial of a motion to suppress evidence found during the search of a storage unit that the defendant’s girlfriend had rented under a stolen identity. Id. at 996-98. The Court in Johnson reasoned that the defendant did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy under those circumstances because the innocent third party has a right to access the property, meaning the defendant could not have exercised the right to exclude. Id. at 1003-04. Moreover, the court concluded that to decide the defendant had a reasonable expectation of privacy in a storage unit he used with the knowledge that it was fraudulently acquired would make the court “a party to th[e] fraud,” which outcome it was unwilling to reach. Id. at 1004. Similar to the circumstances in Johnson, the Defendants here leased the Car using a stolen identity. (Recamier Tr. 17:1-19:22; see also Gov’t Opp’n Ex. A at 9, 22-24, 32, 44-45). They therefore did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a car that they did not own and that was obtained by means of fraud.