>Amendment 4:
He was charged for destroying evidence, not refusing a search
>Amendment 5:
Destroying evidence isn't testimony. Moreover he would have been in the clear if he just kept his mouth shut.
He was charged for destroying evidence, not refusing a search
>Amendment 5:
Destroying evidence isn't testimony. Moreover he would have been in the clear if he just kept his mouth shut.
Evidence with regard to which investigation?
They can take it for a "reasonable amount of time" (inconvenience you for a few hours and make you miss your connecting flight) while they copy an encrypted image. They then must return it to you.
"to conduct such an intrusive and nonroutine search under the border search exception (that is, without a warrant), the Government must have individualized suspicion of an offense that bears some nexus to the border search exception’s purposes of protecting national security, collecting duties, blocking the entry of unwanted persons, or disrupting efforts to export or import contraband. See also United States v. Ramsey, 431 U.S. 606, 620 (1977) (“The border-search exception is grounded in the recognized right of the sovereign to control, subject to substantive limitations imposed by the Constitution, who and what may enter the country.”). If a nonroutine search becomes too “attenuated” from these historic rationales, it “no longer [will] fall under” the exception"
-- US v. RAYMOND IDEMUDIA AIGBEKAEN (https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca4/17...)
Of course whether border agents know or care about this is a different story and by the time you are quoting precedent, you're probably beyond any of this being helpful.
They can say anything they want. They hold all the power. This will never change until enough people take matters into their own hands, as the system has been compromised.
we should always be asking: is this the only way you can prove the accusation? just because it would make LEO life easier - that's not justification for violating the constitution.
an consider what this case teaches us: clean up your devices before you cross a border. how does that even help the goal of law enforcement?
This is 100% untrue. You can be guilty of destroying evidence that includes no criminal activity whatsoever.
In theory. In practice, this is a hopelessly outdated supposition.
Although then you get a possible delay of undefined duration, additional questioning and seizure of your device.
I'm interested to know about specific examples. Aside from extraordinary cases where the gov't is pretty sure they're dealing with a bona fide terrorist, my expectation is that CBP mostly isn't really that interested in detaining people indefinitely just for the lulz. They're probably just going to say "okay, fine, we're taking the phone, here's your receipt for it, get lost" and let you go on your way.
But no respectable judge would ever have issued a search warrant on the basis of "we want to rifle through his messages/contacts so we can hopefully accuse him of something".
Protesters against this exact same thing were mis-prosecuted under "domestic terrorism" and "racketeering" charges before (got dismissed in 2025).
>"He" (by which I mean, technically the agents)
Under the same logic you could mail a bomb to anyone and say you didn't kill anyone, they did. It was just rigged to blow when they opened the box.
To put it in protective, just opening a web browser or some other app can delete/alter more data than was deleted in this case.
I don’t think a judge would care about splitting that hair.
This is important because this is a feature of some crypto systems like LUKS. You can have your header on another physically septate device. If this is ruled on in an insufficiently nuanced way it could have very significant implications for carrying encrypted data without the key.
Image he took a blow-torch to a safe and the door welded shut. The contents are still there but the door is broken.
This analogue isn't perfect, but it isn't relevant anyway: the laws in question criminalize acts based on their intent.
The blowtorch wasn't intended to destroy the contents of the safe (a la deletion of a key), but even still: if the intent was to impede or delay the investigation by welding the safe shut, it would be equally criminal.