Fingerprints taken on illegal arrest should be suppressed only when arrest was for purpose of obtaining fingerprints without warrant or probable cause

EVIDENCE United States v. Olivares-Rangel, No. 04-2194, ___ F.3d ___ (10th Cir. Aug. 11, 2006)(New Mexico). Government appeal of district court order granting defendant’s motion to suppress all identity evidence taken from defendant (i.e., statements and fingerprints), as well suppressing all immigration and criminal records located by using that identity evidence. HELD: (1) Supreme Court’s decision in INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. 1032 (1984), holding that “body” or identity of defendant is never itself suppressible as fruit of an unlawful arrest, refers only to jurisdictional challenges and does not foreclose suppression of all identity-related evidence. Specifically, Lopez-Mendoza does not apply to challenge to admissibility of evidence obtained as result of illegal arrest raised in criminal proceeding as evidentiary issue. (2) Absent evidence that illegal arrest was purposefully exploited for investigatory objectives, fingerprints taken as part of routine booking procedure are not fruit of poisonous tree. Fingerprints administratively taken in conjunction with arrest for purpose of simply determining or confirming identity of person arrested and routinely determining criminal history and outstanding warrants of person arrested are sufficiently unrelated to unlawful arrest that they are not suppressible. Government always has right and obligation to know who it is that they hold in custody regardless of whether arrest is later determined to be illegal. However, if illegal arrest was purposefully exploited for objective of obtaining fingerprints, then the fingerprint evidence must be suppressed. Fingerprint evidence taken incident to arrest should be suppressed under exclusionary rule when illegal arrest was for purpose of obtaining fingerprints without warrant or probable cause. Read the opinion here.