Abusive Stop at NM Border Patrol Checkpoint, Video

Ah New Mexico.  Now our uncivility to civil rights is featured in the Boing Boing article Encounter with a New Mexico "internal border" checkpoint by the much-admired author Cory Doctorow.  A YouTuber going by the handle hacker95242 has posted video of his entire detention at an international border checkpoint in New Mexico (note: way far geographically from the actual international border) entitled Abusive Border Patrol Agents NM Checkpoint.  The entire encounter, and video, is 28 minutes long: 

Notice how many times he asks if he is free to leave.  (A good man.)  In my appellate litigation of these stops, 28 minutes seems short, even to the defense (some detentions last hours).  But watching this one unfold, with all that demeaning and pressure?  Twenty-eight minutes feels like forever. 

I spent a good chunk of my career in appellate litigation about the lawful scope of these checkpoint stops, starting 15 years ago.  Under the New Mexico state constitution, people have more rights (more protection from government) than under the Fourth Amendment at these stops, even though they are staffed by federal agents, if the person is later prosecuted in state of New Mexico courts.  (If prosecuted in Federal Court, too bad.) In New Mexico, we do not have a good faith exception, or the automobile exception, and we require full-blown reasonable suspicion (not just 'suspicious circumstances') at a border-patrol-related checkpoint.    

(Law geeks: Issue spotting exercise:  Plot each point when the agent exceeds the lawful scope of the stop/detention, and briefly state why.)  


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