United States v. Franco, 632 F. App'x 961

In June 2013 a Chaves County deputy stopped Carlos Franco’s girlfriend’s car parked on a residential street in Roswell, NM, and discovered a firearm during a vehicle search.
Officer testified he saw the vehicle stopped in the middle of the street with lights off, then reverse into a dirt area; he believed this violated N.M. Stat. § 66-7-349 (stopping/parking outside business or residence districts).
Franco moved to suppress the firearm, arguing lack of reasonable suspicion, invalidity of search incident to arrest, plain-view issues, and illegal impoundment. The district court denied the motion.
On appeal Franco argued only that the stop lacked reasonable suspicion because the officer’s interpretation of § 66-7-349 was an unreasonable mistake of law (post-Heien theory).
The Tenth Circuit held Franco waived that statutory mistake-of-law argument because it was not raised in the district court or at the suppression hearing, and Franco failed to show the narrow good-cause exception to preserve the claim.
The court affirmed denial of the suppression motion and declined to review the new argument even under plain-error principles due to Rule 12(c)(3) / Burke precedent.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the traffic stop was supported by reasonable suspicion given officer’s alleged mistake of law about § 66-7-349	Officer’s interpretation was an unreasonable mistake of law; stop lacked reasonable suspicion (Franco)	Officer reasonably believed § 66-7-349 applied based on observed stopping/parking behavior	Waived on appeal; court refused to consider because argument was not raised below
Whether an appellate court may review a suppression argument not presented in district court	Franco urged review under Heien (reasonable-mistake-of-law rule)	Government argued waiver under Rule 12(c)(3) and precedent forecloses new arguments on appeal	Waiver applies; no plain-error review permitted under Burke and related Tenth Circuit precedent
Whether “good cause” excuses failure to raise the argument pretrial	Franco contended Heien’s timing and legal developments justify excusal	Government said pre-Heien law already recognized mistake-of-law limits and no good cause existed	No good cause shown; exception is narrow and not met
Whether attorney’s failure at suppression hearing suffices to preserve argument	Franco implicitly relied on counsel’s options on appeal	Government relied on counsel’s failure as waiver; Tenth Circuit treats such failures as waiver	Attorney’s failure to raise the statutory argument does not excuse waiver

Heien v. North Carolina, 135 S. Ct. 530 (2014) (reasonable mistakes of law can sometimes justify stops)
United States v. Burke, 633 F.3d 984 (10th Cir. 2011) (Rule 12(c)(3) bars new suppression arguments on appeal; discusses narrow good-cause exception)
Schrock v. Wyeth, Inc., 727 F.3d 1273 (10th Cir. 2013) (arguments not raised below are waived on appeal)
United States v. Nicholson, 721 F.3d 1236 (10th Cir. 2013) (officer’s mistake of law cannot justify reasonable-suspicion determination)
United States v. Augustine, 742 F.3d 1258 (10th Cir. 2014) (attorney’s failure to raise suppression argument does not qualify as good cause)