No Squeezin’

 By Lance M. Hester; July 2000

     Busses, trains, airplanes, cars.  The United States Supreme Court seems to have ruled that the expectation of privacy is slightly different for each of the above modes of transportation.

     In Bond v. United States, No. 98-9349 (April 2000) the Court protected the privacy of the methamphetamine-carrying bus passenger.  The passenger had placed a brick of methamphetamine in a bag.  He brought the bag with him on the bus, and he placed it in an overhead bin.

     Unfortunately for the meth man, a federal agent boarded the Greyhound bus.  The agent’s purpose was to check the passengers’ immigration status.  However, the agent also chose to squeeze all the bags in the overhead bins on his way off the bus.  He squeezed Mr. Bond’s canvas bag, felt chunks of drugs, and arrested Mr. Bond.  Mr. Bond was convicted; he was sentenced to 57 months in prison.

     The Court’s recent decision reversed Mr. Bond’s conviction.  Chief Justice Rehnquist wrote that people prefer to keep personal items close at hand.  In doing so, they may expect a certain amount of movement from other passengers, but in no way expect they will be squeezed and searched by the authorities.

     It is expected that this ruling will extend only to similar modes of transportation.  For example, train travel seems to have many similarities to bus travel.  Carry-on luggage is handled in roughly the same manner.  And security is not approached as seriously as in airports.  Therefore, under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the Bond decision will likely apply to similar experiences on rail.

     Whether the Bond decision applies to carry-on luggage on airplanes is an interesting question.  Because Justice Rehnquist hung his hat on the public’s general expectation of privacy, the decision likely does not apply to airline travel.  People have a much lower expectation of privacy when flying.  They expect  their luggage to be viewed through x-ray machines.  They expect the possibility of having to open their bags for inspection by authorities.  And, they expect to see drug-sniffing dogs in international terminals.  Of course, this does not address whether airport or federal agents may squeeze one’s luggage.  However, given the above indicators that people do not expect pure privacy in their carry-on luggage, the Bond case likely does not apply to airline travel.

     As most readers are well aware, automobiles are a whole different story.  The issue with automobiles tends to start with whether probable cause exists for a stop.  The second issue is typically whether officers conducted a subsequent search with proper legal authority.  Generally, the issues are whether certain items were in plain view or whether officer safety was an issue.  However, the Bond decision might make for an interesting argument for a zipped up, but not locked, suitcase searched incident to arrest which is located inside of an automobile.  Interestingly, the Bond decision is the second decision this year in which the U.S. Supreme Court used the Fourth Amendment to overturn a conviction.  In the last issue of Just News, the first of those decisions was covered.  That case involved an anonymous tip which the Court ruled was not enough “reliable evidence” to justify stopping and frisking a particular person who fit the anonymous tipster’s description.