localmatters
At the Junction of State and Federal Law, I-91 Checkpoint Becomes Site of Legal Collision b y M A R k D Av i S
18 LOCAL MATTERS
SEVEN DAYS
02.05.14-02.12.14
SEVENDAYSVt.com
U
.S. Senator Patrick Leahy, the local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and highwaydriving Vermonters shared a victory last week. The Department of Homeland Security has dropped plans to operate a permanent “internal checkpoint” in Vermont. The Border Patrol claims a right to stop and search travelers without reasonable suspicion or a warrant within 100 miles of an international border. More than 90 percent of Vermonters live within that zone. U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy has long questioned the department’s habit of commandeering a rest stop off Interstate 91 in Hartford — 97 miles south of the Canadian border — where federal officers have the authority to inquire about destination and nationality and detain motorists for additional questioning. The senator even launched a formal inquiry. Concern about the possibility of a permanent checkpoint was heightened last year when the Vermont chapter of the ACLU released documents showing that DHS had conducted detailed studies of dozens of locations in Vermont for potential sites. Privacy advocates warned the temporary one in Hartford had already infringed on the rights of innocent people, while turning up nothing more than minor drug infractions in the name of national security. “The wide latitude in current law for setting up checkpoints far from our borders has led to maximum hassles of law-abiding local residents, with minimal value to border enforcement,” Leahy said recently. “This is an intrusive practice for local residents, subjecting Vermonters to needless and pointless delays and questioning. It simply is not a productive use of border enforcement dollars.” Last week, DHS changed its tune — sort of. In response to Leahy’s inquiry, it informed his office in a letter that it had “completed a thorough review and
decision, the Vermont Supreme Court ruled on his long searchand-seizure saga. In upholding Rennis’ conviction for transporting two pounds of marijuana in his car, the state’s highest court found that Vermont police officers acting alone may have lacked the authority to conduct the search — because they would not have had probable cause to stop him in the first place. But because the search was initiated after federal
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doesn’t help law enforcement dorren rennis. analysis of operations at the I-91 temporary checkpoint and does not have any plans to construct a permanent checkpoint in Vermont.” But it wasn’t a total surrender. Sporadic checkpoint operations may continue. “A key objective of the Border Patrol’s strategic plan is to identify risk as threats along the border continue to evolve,” the agency wrote. “Checkpoint operations on the Northern Border serve an important function as part of that strategy to deter and prevent the unimpeded exploitation of U.S. roadways by those who take part in illicit cross-border activity.”
‘Nothing More than Marijuana’
The change comes too late for Dorren Rennis, a 48-year-old Massachusetts resident who faces criminal charges and a threat of deportation to his native Jamaica as a result of being stopped in Hartford six and a half years ago. Just a week before the Department of Homeland Security’s
agents stopped Rennis’ car — along with every other vehicle traveling south on Interstate 91 at the Hartford checkpoint that day — the justices affirmed a lower court ruling that the federal government’s need to secure American borders trumps Vermont privacy protections. Thus, the drugs confiscated from a backpack stashed in Rennis’ trunk could be used as evidence against him. For civil libertarians, the January 17 ruling provided a fresh reminder of the threat they say is posed by internal checkpoints. “That gives federal officers greater authority to operate in our state than others. It’s the genesis of this case. This could not have happened in Nebraska,” said Vermont ACLU executive director Allen Gilbert. “Many of these police activities done in the name of national security end up having nothing to do with national security and terrorism, and this is a good example of that. This is a case involving nothing more than marijuana.” Documents filed with various
Vermont courts tell the story of how Border Patrol agent Brett Overton pulled over Rennis’ southbound 2004 Toyota Corolla shortly before 7 a.m. on November 9, 2007. As he did with every vehicle, Overton asked the driver about his citizenship. Rennis told him he was a U.S. citizen, later clarifying that he was born in Jamaica but, as of seven months before, had permanent legal residence in the United States. That would ordinarily be the end of the generally brief interaction between an agent and a motorist at the Hartford checkpoint. But Overton said later he smelled burnt marijuana in the car and asked Rennis if he had been smoking it. Rennis said, “No.” Suspicious, Overton ordered Rennis to pull to the side, where an agent with a drug-sniffing dog awaited. The dog walked around the car but did not indicate any drugs were present. Rennis got out of the car — it is unclear if he was ordered, or did so voluntarily — and the dog still did not react. Not that long after, Rennis conceded to the agent that he had indeed smoked marijuana in the car. Overton asked Rennis if he could search the car, and the driver agreed. Inside the trunk, Overton found a backpack. He asked Rennis to open it. Inside were two freezer bags filled with marijuana. Agents on scene contacted federal prosecutors, who declined to charge Rennis — a decision court documents fail to explain. So the agents called Vermont State Police. Four days later, state prosecutors levied a felony drug possession charge against Rennis. It was not his first. Rennis has previously been convicted of possession of marijuana in Virginia and possession with intent to distribute marijuana in Massachusetts. In the weeks that followed, defense lawyers for Rennis focused on the expanded search-and-seizure procedures officers employed in an effort to get the evidence — the bags of marijuana — thrown out. Their argument: The internal checkpoint, while “ostensibly” to protect the country from aliens, terrorists and weapons of mass destruction, was in reality built for “general crime deterrence,” which they claimed is illegal. Their argument persuaded a Vermont judge — but only to a point.