United States v. Campos

105 F. App'x 184

Opinion

MEMORANDUM **

Under Atwater v. City of Lago Vista,1 an otherwise lawful arrest for driving without a license would not violate the Fourth Amendment. But in this case, unlike in Atwater, Campos’s arrest violated state law.² Our opinion in United States v. Mota holds that if state law prohibits arrest for the offense, then a search incident to the arrest is not a search incident to a lawful arrest, and any evidence obtained from the search must be suppressed.³ Under Mota, therefore, the search of Campos’s car that turned up the cocaine was not a search incident to a lawful arrest for driving without a license. According to Bingham v. City of Manhattan Beach, Mota survives Atwater.4 Appellee correctly points out that the Supreme Court of California, in People v. McKay, found Mota unpersuasive.⁵ But we are not at liberty to reject controlling circuit precedent because of that disagreement. REVERSED AND REMANDED

Footnotes

**

This disposition is not appropriate for publication and may not be cited to or by the courts of this circuit except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.

1

. Atwater v. City of Lago Vista, 532 U.S. 318, 121 S.Ct. 1536, 149 L.Ed.2d 549 (2001).

2

. See Cal. Veh.Code § 12801.5(e).

3

. United States v. Mota, 982 F.2d 1384, 1389 (9th Cir. 1993).

4

. Bingham v. City of Manhattan Beach, 341 F.3d 939, 950 (9th Cir.2003).

5

. People v. McKay, 27 Cal.4th 601, 117 Cal. Rptr.2d 236, 41 P.3d 59, 70-71 (2002).