Background

• Henderson was arrested on April 22, 2009, and his wallet and other items were seized from his vehicle; the district court declined to suppress and denied the suppression motion.
• Police conducted a search of Henderson’s vehicle incident to arrest and an inventory search, arguing the searches were lawful under established exceptions to the warrant requirement.
• The district court relied on Detective Keane’s testimony that identity theft offenses involve mobility and may yield evidence in the vehicle even for offenses months old.
• Henderson challenged both searches as improper and argued the evidence was insufficient to convict on aggravated identity theft and access device fraud.
• The Stipulation admitted that Henderson used means of identification of real individuals and employed access devices tied to real accounts, forming the basis for conviction on all counts.

Issues

Key Cases Cited

• United States v. Rodriguez, 356 F.3d 254 (2d Cir. 2004) (standard for reviewing suppression rulings (clear error; de novo law))
• Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332 (U.S. 2009) (car search incident to arrest requires proximity to passenger compartment or reasonable belief of evidence)
• Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (U.S. 1996) (probable cause not required for traffic stop? (context of searches cited))
• Colorado v. Bertine, 479 U.S. 367 (U.S. 1987) (inventory searches to safeguard property and ensure officer safety)
• Flores-Figueroa v. United States, 129 S. Ct. 1886 (U.S. 2009) (requires knowledge that means of identification belongs to another person for aggravated identity theft)
• United States v. Yannotti, 541 F.3d 112 (2d Cir. 2008) (de novo review of sufficiency of evidence; defer to reasonable inferences)
• Flores-Figueroa v. United States, 129 S. Ct. 1886 (U.S. 2009) ((as above))
• United States v. Morrison, 153 F.3d 34 (2d Cir. 1998) (standard for sufficiency review)