United States v. Ahmad, No. 19-3490 (7th Cir. 2021)
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A deputy sheriff on drug-interdiction duty in central Illinois observed an RV with a dirty license plate traveling on I-72 and followed it, exiting the freeway and pulling into a truck-stop parking lot. The driver, Ahmad, entered the convenience store with one of his passengers. A store employee informed the deputy that the men were acting strangely. The officer asked to speak with them. They agreed. After a few preliminary questions, the deputy asked for Ahmad’s driver’s license and the vehicle's rental agreement. Ahmad produced the documents. The deputy then asked for consent to search the RV. Ahmad agreed. The deputy did not immediately conduct a search but called for a K-9 unit, which arrived minutes later. Ahmad agreed to a dog sniff of the RV. The dog alerted about 15 minutes into the encounter. The deputy searched the RV, where a large quantity of marijuana was discovered.
Ahmad moved to suppress the drugs, arguing that his consent to search was involuntary because he had already been seized for Fourth Amendment purposes when the deputy retained his driver’s license and the RV rental agreement. The Seventh Circuit affirmed the denial of the motion. The deputy’s brief possession of Ahmad’s license and rental agreement did not transform this otherwise consensual encounter into a seizure. Ahmad voluntarily consented to both the external dog sniff and the search of the RV.
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