United States of America v. Celestino Madrid

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
CELESTINO MADRID,
Defendant - Appellant.
No. 13-50049
D.C. No. 3:11-cr-00673-H-2
MEMORANDUM*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of California
Marilyn L. Huff, District Judge, Presiding
Submitted July 9, 2014 **
Pasadena, California
Before: BERZON and CLIFTON, Circuit Judges, and ROSENTHAL, District
Judge.***
FILED
JUL 11 2014
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
*** The Honorable Lee H. Rosenthal, District Judge for the U.S. District
Court for the Southern District of Texas, sitting by designation.

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Celestino Madrid appeals the district court’s denial of his motion to suppress
evidence of methamphetamine found in his car following a stop by a California
Highway Patrol (“CHP”) officer. Because it was not clear error for the district
court to find probable cause for the stop, we affirm.
The district court did not err in applying the collective knowledge doctrine
to impute the DEA task force’s knowledge to the CHP officer. Madrid does not
dispute that the DEA investigators who observed him receive drugs from an
undercover informant had probable cause to arrest. What Madrid contests is
whether there was sufficient evidence of communication between the officers to
impute the DEA investigators’ knowledge of the underlying facts to the arresting
CHP officer.
While the collective knowledge doctrine assumes some “communication”
between agents occurs, this Court made clear in United States v. Ramirez, 473 F.3d
1026, 1033 (9th Cir. 2007) that the doctrine applies so long as the officer with
probable cause identifies the target and “directs or requests” another officer to
conduct a stop. Id. at 1036 (“[W]here one officer directs another to take some
action, there is necessarily a ‘communication’ between those officers, and they are
necessarily functioning as a team.”). Ramirez rejected defendants’ argument that
the “information conveyed . . . must relate in some meaningful way to suspected
criminal activity.” Id.

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Madrid nonetheless argues that direct evidence about the communication
between the DEA investigators and CHP officer is necessary to establish that “the
communication had the effect of making the arresting officer part of the team.” If
the contention is that evidence of the content of the communication matters, it runs
squarely against our holding in Ramirez that the collective knowledge doctrine
“includes no requirement regarding the content of the communication that one
officer must make to another.” Id. at 1036-37; see also id. at 1032-33.
The contention fares no better if it is that the evidence of any communication
between the DEA and the CHP officer was insufficient. There was sufficient
circumstantial evidence to support the district court’s finding that some
communication between the DEA and CHP officer occurred that prompted the
CHP officer to make the stop: The DEA had plans to contact law enforcement
officers in a marked car to make the stop; Officer Pena testified that he heard a call
made over the radio for a marked unit to stop the car; a marked unit shortly
thereafter did stop the car that was described. Madrid’s reliance on United States
v. Villasenor, 608 F.3d 467 (9th Cir. 2010), is unconvincing. Villasenor did not
apply the collective knowledge doctrine because “the record [was] devoid of any
communication between [the arresting and investigating officers].” 608 F.3d at
475-76 (emphasis added).
AFFIRMED.

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