In United States v. Fowler, --- F.4th ---, No. 21-30172 (9th Cir. 2022), the Court affirmed the district court’s denial of Eric Fowler’s motion to suppress evidence discovered as a result of a traffic stop made by a Montana state trooper while Fowler, a member of an Indian tribe, was driving on a highway that runs through the Fort Peck Indian Reservation.
This case focuses on the cross-deputization agreement between the State of Montana and the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation. The Court held that the agreement was valid and thus so was the stop.
In United States v. Montoya, --- F.4th ---, No. 21-50129 (9th Cir. 2022), the Court affirmed Montoya's conviction and sentence for importing cocaine and methamphetamine.
Montoya entered a plea agreement under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(c)(1)(B). On appeal, she argued that the district court erred by not allowing her to withdraw her guilty plea because it supposedly treated her plea agreement as a binding plea agreement under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(c)(1)(C).
The Court rejected this argument and a host of others. It also reiterated that the district court need not orally pronounce conditions of supervised release that are mandatory under 18 U.S.C. § 3583(d) or recommended by the Guidelines as “standard, boilerplate conditions of supervised release.”
