USA v. Minfee

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WO
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA
United States of America,
Plaintiff,
v.
Arjon Peirre Booker Minfee,
Defendant.
No. CR-25-04834-TUC-JCH (EJM)
REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION
Pending before the Court is the defendant’s Motion to Suppress Evidence obtained
and derived from the unconstitutional stop of his vehicle. (Doc. 48.) For the reasons
discussed below, it is recommended that the District Court deny the motion.
I. PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
On November 25, 2025, a federal grand jury sitting in Tucson, Arizona, returned a
three-count indictment against the defendant. (Doc. 30.) Count One charges the defendant
with Conspiracy to Transport Illegal Aliens for Profit, in violation of 8 U.S.C. §§
1324(a)(1)(A)(v)(I), (a)(1)(A)(ii), & (a)(1)(B)(i); Counts Two and Three charge the
defendant with Transportation of Illegal Aliens for Profit, in violation of 8 U.S.C. §§
1324(a)(1)(A)(ii) & (a)(1)(B)(i). (Id.)
On February 12, 2026, the defendant filed his suppression motion arguing that the
Border Patrol agent did not have reasonable suspicion to stop his vehicle; as a result,
evidence obtained and derived from the unconstitutional stop should be suppressed as fruit
of the poisonous tree. (Doc. 48 at 1, 8.) The defendant further argues that the Border Patrol
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agent stopped his vehicle based on a hunch and improperly used generalizations that “cast
suspicion on large segments of the law-abiding population” to justify the stop. (Id. at 4–
6.) Finally, the defendant asserts that his race improperly factored into the agent’s decision
to conduct the traffic stop. (Id. at 6–8.) The government counters that reasonable suspicion
for the stop was based on the totality of the circumstances and there is no evidence that
race played any role in the agent’s decision to conduct the stop. (Doc. 52 at 4.)
On March 9, 2026, the Court held an evidentiary hearing. (ME 3/9/2026, Doc. 56)
II. FACTUAL BACKGROUND
At the evidentiary hearing, Border Patrol Agent Paulo Ramirez was the only
witness. His testimony is summarized below.
Paulo Ramirez has been a Border Patrol agent for two years. (Hr’g Tr. 3/9/2026 at
5, Doc. 59.) He is assigned to the Sonoita station, which is located approximately 20 miles
from the international border. (Id. at 4.) One of his main assignments is doing roving
patrols on State Route (“SR”) 82 which is a known alien smuggling route. (Id. at 5.) SR
82 is a two-lane road that runs east and west. (Id. at 9.) SR 82 connects with Interstate 19,
as well as SR 83 and SR 90, which connect with Interstate 20. (Id. at 6.). Alien smugglers
use SR 82 because there is a Border Patrol checkpoint situated on Interstate 19 that is
staffed 24 hours every day of the week. (Id.) Because the checkpoints on SR 83 and SR
90 have not been in operation, smugglers avoid Interstate 19 and instead use SR 82, SR 83
and SR 90 to get to Interstate 10. (Id.)
On October 31, 2025, Agent Ramirez parked his patrol vehicle facing eastbound on
SR 82 so he could see vehicles traveling from the Nogales area. (Id. at 20.) He first saw
the defendant’s vehicle around mile marker 23 traveling eastbound; the defendant was
driving well below the 55 mile per hour speed limit at “an unusually slower [speed] than
the rest of the traffic[—][t]here was a line of vehicles behind it that were trying to [pass]
it.” (Id. at 7–8, 15.) Vehicles traveling on that section of SR 82 “usually tend to go faster”
than the speed limit. (Id. at 9.)
When the defendant’s vehicle was driving by Agent Ramirez, he saw the driver
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exhibit “distinct patterns of nervous behavior”: the defendant had a rigid posture, was
tightly gripping the steering wheel, and looked straight ahead and did not glance at Agent
Ramirez’s vehicle. (Id. at 9, 23.) It is common for people involved in smuggling to exhibit
this type of nervous behavior because they are anxious or highly stressed. (Id. at 9.) Agent
Ramirez could not see whether there were any passengers in the vehicle because he was
focused on the driver’s behavior. (Id. at 29–30, 38.)
Based on the defendant’s driving behavior and signs of nervousness, Agent Ramirez
decided to follow the defendant’s vehicle. (Id. at 7.) After Agent Ramirez passed the other
vehicles, he positioned his vehicle about a car’s length behind the defendant’s vehicle. (Id.
at 25–26.) He could not see if there were passengers because of the dark window tinting.
(Id. at 39.) Agent Ramirez “noticed that the [defendant’s] vehicle was heavily laden,”
which means that the vehicle likely had more than one occupant. (Id. at 9–10.) The vehicle
“would bottom out” when it went over “slight deviations in the road.” (Id. at 30.)
Agent Ramirez also noticed slight but “consistent swerving within the fog lines[.]”
(Id. at 14, 17.) In Agent Ramirez’s experience, that driving behavior is suspicious because
it shows that the driver is “hyperfixated” on the law enforcement vehicle behind them
rather than concentrating on the road in front of them. (Id. at 14.)
The defendant was driving an “older model vehicle.” (Id. at 10.) Agent Ramirez
explained that alien smugglers commonly use older vehicles with temporary plates because
they want to minimize financial loss if a vehicle is seized by law enforcement. (Id. at 10–
11.) For example, the value of the defendant’s vehicle is approximately $1,800 and it costs
approximately $5,000 for a person to be able to “retrieve [a seized] vehicle.” (Id. at 11.)
The defendant’s vehicle also had a temporary license plate. (Id. at 10.) Alien
smugglers use temporary license plates because it is harder for agents to identify facts about
the registered owner. (Id. at 12.) When the license plate is run through Border Patrol’s
“communication system, the only thing that’s going to come out is basically the name of
the new registered owner”; no address or birthdate for the owner is provided. (Id.) Agent
Ramirez has had cases where smugglers use “ghost dealers,” which means that “people
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basically forge temporary plates in order to conceal the identity of the people that are
smuggling humans.” (Id.)
Prior to making the traffic stop, Agent Ramirez learned that the vehicle was
registered to Arjon Peirre Booker Minfee and “was registered out of Avondale, Arizona,”
which is in the Phoenix area about 150 to 200 miles from where the traffic stop occurred.
(Id. at 13.) Because of the large population in the Phoenix area, alien smuggling
“coordinators usually tend to recruit people from Phoenix and the surrounding cities to
come all the way down to Sonoita, Arizona to pick up illegal aliens.” (Id.) Agent Ramirez
performed a traffic stop of the defendant’s vehicle between mile marker 28 and 29 on SR
82. (Id. at 7.)
Agent Ramirez did not stop the defendant’s vehicle based on any one suspicion; his
stop was based on the totality of the suspicious behaviors that he observed. (Id. at 16–17.)
Agent Ramirez was able to see the driver’s race; however, race played no role in his
decision to stop the vehicle. (Id. at 14.) Agent Ramirez has implicit bias training once a
year with the Border Patrol, as well as while in the Marine Corps. (Id. at 24.)
Agent Ramirez has stopped vehicles “many times” where his investigation reveals
that no criminal activity was occurring. (Id. at 33.) He does not keep statistics for stops
that do not reveal criminal activity. (Id. at 33–34.) However, he believes that those
statistics must be kept by someone within Border Patrol because he reports all traffic stops,
regardless of whether an arrest is made. (Id at 34, 39–40.)
III. DISCUSSION
When determining if there was reasonable suspicion for a vehicle stop, a court must
consider the “totality of the circumstances of each case to see whether the detaining officer
has a particularized and objective basis for suspecting legal wrongdoing.” United States v.
Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 273 (2002). The Supreme Court has recognized that “[a]ny number
of factors may be taken into account in deciding whether there is reasonable suspicion to
stop a car in the border area.” United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873, 884–85
(1975). The factors an officer may consider include: (1) the characteristics of the area in
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which they encounter the vehicle; (2) the proximity to the border; (3) the usual traffic
patterns on the particular road; (4) previous experience with alien traffic; (5) information
regarding recent illegal border crossings in the area; (6) driving behavior, such as erratic
driving or obvious attempts to evade officers; (7) the behavior and appearance of the driver;
and (8) aspects of the vehicle itself. Id. at 884–85 (citations omitted). This list is non-
exhaustive. “Not all of these factors must be present or highly probative in every case to
justify reasonable suspicion.” United States v. Valdes-Vega, 738 F.3d 1074, 1079 (9th Cir.
2013).
The Supreme Court has held that courts should not engage in a “divide-and-conquer
analysis” when reviewing the factors considered by law enforcement. Arvizu, 534 U.S. at
274. Stated another way, it is inappropriate to view factors in isolation and to give no
weight to factors which may have an innocent explanation. Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273–275.
The Supreme Court has held that “even when factors considered in isolation from each
other are susceptible to an innocent explanation, they may collectively amount to a
reasonable suspicion.” United States v. Berber-Tinoco, 510 F.3d 1083, 1087 (9th Cir.
2007) (citing Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 274). Therefore, what may seem to be innocuous conduct
when viewed in isolation may be appropriately considered when analyzing the totality of
the circumstances. Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273–75; see also Cotterman, 709 F.3d at 970 (“It
is not our province to nitpick the factors in isolation but instead to view them in the totality
of the circumstances.”).
Although an “an officer’s experience may furnish the background against which the
relevant facts are to be assessed[,] … ‘experience’ does not in itself serve as an independent
factor in the reasonable suspicion analysis.” Montero-Camargo, 208 F.3d at 1131. That
said, when looking at the “totality of the circumstances” the court “allows officers to draw
on their own experience and specialized training to make inferences from and deductions
about the cumulative information available to them that ‘might well elude an untrained
person.’” Id. (quoting United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 418 (1981)). “In other words,
an officer's experience may furnish the background against which the relevant facts are to
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be assessed, as long as the inferences he draws are objectively reasonable.” United States
v. Montero-Camargo, 208 F.3d, 1122, 1131 (2000). As a result, “the facts supporting
reasonable suspicion must be filtered through the lens of the [law enforcement officer’s]
training and experience” and a court must give “due weight” to factual inferences drawn
by officers. United States v. Valdes-Vega, 738 F.3d 1074, 1079 (9th Cir. 2013).
A. Characteristics of the area in which law enforcement encountered the
vehicle and the proximity to the border.
The stop of the defendant’s vehicle was made on a road commonly used by alien
smugglers. Agent Ramirez testified that there are no operational Border Patrol checkpoints
on SR 82, SR 83, or SR 90. For that reason, smugglers use these roads to get to Interstate
10 to avoid the permanent Border Patrol checkpoint on Interstate 19. The defendant was
traveling from the Nogales, Arizona area, which abuts the international border. Agent
Ramirez first saw the defendant’s vehicle about 23 miles from the international border and
he performed his traffic stop about 28 miles from the border. Thus, both Agent Ramirez’s
initial encounter with the defendant and the stop occurred in close proximity to the
international border.
B. The defendant’s driving behavior and the usual traffic patterns on the
particular road.
Agent Ramirez found it suspicious that the defendant’s vehicle was traveling at an
unusually slow speed. The defendant was driving so slowly that there was a line of cars
behind him. Agent Ramirez found that driving behavior suspicious because vehicles
travelling on this section of SR 82 usually drive above the speed limit. Additionally, when
Agent Ramirez was following the defendant’s vehicle, he observed the defendant
“swerving within the fog lines,” which was significant to Agent Ramirez because it was
indicative of the defendant being fixated on him rather than concentrating on the road
ahead.
C. The behavior and appearance of the driver.
The defendant demonstrated nervous driving behavior when he passed Agent
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Ramirez’s patrol vehicle. Agent Ramirez testified that the defendant had a rigid posture,
was tightly gripping the steering wheel, and was looking straight ahead and did not even
glance at Agent Ramirez’s patrol vehicle. In Agent Ramirez experience, it is common for
people involved in smuggling to exhibit this type of nervous behavior because they are
anxious or highly stressed.
D. Aspects of the vehicle.
The defendant’s vehicle appeared heavily laden. Agent Ramirez described how the
vehicle would “bottom out” when going over slight deviations in the road. As a result,
Agent Ramirez suspected that there were more occupants in the vehicle than just the driver.
Because of the dark window tinting, Agent Ramirez could not confirm if the vehicle
appeared heavily laden because of the number of occupants or a mechanical issue (e.g., an
issue with the vehicle’s suspension).
The defendant was driving an “older model vehicle” which was significant to Agent
Ramierz because alien smugglers routinely use older vehicles to minimize financial loss if
the vehicle is seized by law enforcement. Agent Ramirez explained that the defendant’s
vehicle was valued at $1,800 and the owner must pay $5,000 to retrieve a seized vehicle.
Additionally, the defendant’s vehicle had a temporary license plate, which is another
tactic used by alien smugglers. Agent Ramiez testified that it is harder for agents to obtain
information about the registered owner of a vehicle with a temporary license plate, other
than the owner’s name and the city where the vehicle is registered. Moreover, Agent
Ramirez testified that he has had alien smuggling cases where smugglers forge temporary
plates to conceal their identity.
Finally, the defendant’s vehicle was registered in Avondale, Arizona, which is
located 150-200 miles from Sonoita, Arizona. Agent Ramirez testified that because of the
large population in the Phoenix area, alien smuggling coordinators commonly recruit
people from that area to pick up illegal aliens at or near the international border.
As discussed earlier, although each of the factors discussed above may be
susceptible to an innocent explanation when considered in isolation, they can collectively
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amount to reasonable suspicion. That is the case here. Based on Agent Ramirez’s
experience with how alien smugglers operate and the totality of the circumstances that he
identified as the basis for his stop, the Court concludes there was a reasonable suspicion to
stop the defendant’s vehicle. As a result, the Court recommends that the District Court
deny the instant motion.
E. The Defendant’s Race:
Defense counsel asserts that he “is also concerned that underlying this stop and
arrest is Mr. Minfee’s race and a sense that that he did not belong in Southern Arizona.”
(Doc. at 6.) Counsel argues that “[a]t no point does Agent Ramirez acknowledge that Mr.
Minfee is black and that the individual in the passenger seat was Hispanic, even though he
alleged he looked through the front window of the vehicle clearly enough to note ‘the tight
grip’ on the steering wheel.” (Id.) Defense counsel also points to statistics that reflect that
“black drivers were, on average, stopped more often than white drivers.” (Id. at 7.)
However, counsel is unaware whether the Department of Homeland Security keeps
statistics of “stops by race and their outcomes.” (Id.)
Agent Ramirez made clear that the defendant’s race played no role in his decision
to stop his vehicle. (Id. at 14.) Agent Ramirez has had and continues to have implicit bias
training to ensure that race plays no role in his traffic stops or his job. The Court has no
reason to discredit this testimony.
Although Agent Ramirez testified that he believed that someone within Border
Patrol keeps statistics about traffic stops that do not result in an arrest, he was mistaken.
Defense counsel submitted a Supplemental Brief in which he noted that Border Patrol
personnel advised government counsel that the Border Patrol “does not maintain records
on all vehicle stops made by agents. There are radio logs that are kept for a limited period,
but they would have to be reviewed manually . . . to create a log of stops.” (Doc. 60.) And
the radio logs are unlikely to provide reliable data about race because that information is
not typically requested or conveyed via the radio. (Id.) Moreover, “[r]ace is also not a data
point that Border Patrol tracks in its vehicle stops.” (Id.) Basic biographical data taken
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from arrestees includes their country of citizenship, “but the data does not typically include
race.” (Id.) However, basic biographical data is typically not saved when a person is not
arrested. (Id.)
Given Agent Ramirez’s testimony that race played no role in his stop and the
absence of any records that identify the race of individuals who have encounters with
Border Patrol agents, defense counsel has no support for his argument that race played a
role in the stop of the defendant.
IV. CONCLUSION
The Court concludes that based on the totality of the circumstances discussed above,
Agent Ramirez had a reasonable suspicion to stop the defendant’s vehicle.
V. RECOMMENDATION
For the foregoing reasons, it is recommended that the District Judge deny the
defendant’s Motion to Suppress (Doc. 48.)
Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §636(b) and Rule 59(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Criminal
Procedure, any party may serve and file written objections within fourteen (14) days after
being served with a copy of this Report and Recommendation. No reply shall be filed
unless leave is granted from the District Court. If objections are filed, the parties should
use the following case number: CR-25-04834-TUC-JCH.
Failure to file timely objections to any factual or legal determination of the
Magistrate Judge in accordance with Fed. R. Crim. P. 59 may result in waiver of the right
of review.
Dated this 19th day of March, 2026.
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