NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS SEP 22 2021
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, No. 19-30273
Plaintiff-Appellee, D.C. No.
1:18-cr-02005-SAB-1
v.
MARIA ANDREA GONZALEZ, MEMORANDUM*
Defendant-Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Washington
Stanley A. Bastian, Chief District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted September 1, 2021
Seattle, Washington
Before: HAWKINS, TASHIMA, and McKEOWN, Circuit Judges.
Defendant Maria Andrea Gonzalez (“Gonzalez”), convicted following a jury
trial of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine and heroin, possession
of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime, and felon in possession of a
firearm, appeals the district court’s ruling on two pretrial motions, in which she
sought to have the case dismissed with prejudice under the Speedy Trial Act and
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
Sixth Amendment and to suppress evidence found in her purse when she was
arrested. We affirm.
I.
There was no violation of the Speedy Trial Act. All time when pretrial
motions were pending was automatically excluded under 18 U.S.C. § 3161
(h)(1)(D). Delays for the “ends of justice” are also excluded if the court sets forth
“its reasons for finding that the ends of justice served by the granting of [a]
continuance outweigh the best interests of the public and the defendant in a speedy
trial.” Id. § 3161(h)(7)(A).
There were four total motions to continue, all made by defense
counsel. Gonzalez does not challenge the propriety of the first continuance, made
by her original counsel. With respect to the second and third continuances, her
newly appointed counsel articulated legitimate reasons for needing additional time
to prepare the defense, including the need to review recently provided discovery,
prepare pretrial motions, and, when Gonzalez was charged with another federal
crime while in custody, the need to coordinate with her other defense counsel and to
deal with additional sentencing considerations. There was no clear error in
determining that the ends of justice served by these continuances outweighed society
and defendant’s interest in a speedy trial, United States v. Medina, 524 F.3d 974,
982 (9th Cir. 2008), and the court sufficiently articulated its reasons for granting the
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exclusions. United States v. McCarns, 900 F.3d 1141, 1145 (9th Cir. 2018). These
two ends of justice exclusions, coupled with the automatic exclusions for pending
motions, bring the trial well within the Speedy Trial Act’s 70-day window.1
Likewise, there was no error in determining that the case should not be
dismissed with prejudice for violating Gonzalez’s Sixth Amendment right to a
speedy trial. See Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S 514, 530‒34 (1972) (discussing factors
to be weighed). The district court acknowledged that the delay was over a year total,
but balanced this against the cause of the delay, which included continuances
requested by defense counsel in order better to represent the defendant at trial. In
addition, some of the delay was caused by Gonzalez being charged with an
additional crime while in pretrial custody for this offense. Nor did Gonzalez suffer
actual prejudice from the delay, such as loss of evidence or unavailability of
witnesses.
II.
Gonzalez also sought to suppress the evidence found in her purse, contending
it was not a valid search incident to arrest because at the time of the search she had
been handcuffed, transferred to the custody of another officer, and placed in the back
1
This is the case even accepting Gonzalez’s argument that the Motion in
Limine/Motion to Sever was only pending until May 24, 2018. See United States v.
Clymer, 25 F.3d 824, 830‒31 (9th Cir. 1994). For this reason, we need not address
the fourth ends of justice exclusion.
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of a patrol car about twenty feet away from the purse. See Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S.
332, 343‒44 (2009). However, “we need not decide whether the initial search was
lawful,” because we agree with the district court that the evidence would have been
admissible under the inevitable discovery doctrine during “a routine inventory
search.” United States v. Andrade, 784 F.2d 1431, 1433 (9th Cir. 1986).
Gonzalez is correct that under Washington law, if she had been arrested only
on the outstanding warrant, she could have theoretically posted bail and avoided the
booking and inventory search process altogether. United States v. Peterson, 902
F.3d 1016, 1020 (9th Cir. 2018). However, this is not the end of the inquiry because
here, as in Peterson, there was a significant struggle with the officer as he attempted
to arrest Gonzalez, including pulling her hand out of the officer’s grasp and reaching
for her purse. At the evidentiary hearing, the officer testified that had he not
searched the purse and discovered the drugs and weapons, he would have cited
Gonzalez for resisting arrest. As we explained in a similar situation in Peterson:
Peterson’s ability to post bail on the [outstanding] warrants, however,
has no bearing on whether his backpack would have been subject to
an inventory search had he been booked on charges of obstructing
law enforcement officers or resisting arrest because bail had not yet
been set on those charges at the time Peterson was booked. . . .
Because the officers would have booked Peterson on obstruction or
resisting arrest charges absent discovery of the gun, and because bail
had not yet been set on those charges, Peterson would have been
taken into custody upon booking.
Id.
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Although in his testimony the officer here used the word “cited” rather than
“arrested” when discussing the hypothetical resisting arrest charge, in the larger
context of the questioning as a whole it was not unreasonable for the district court
to infer that the officer meant that if he had not discovered the additional evidence
of felony charges, he would have instead booked Gonzalez on a resisting arrest
charge, no bail would have yet been set for this charge, and therefore there would
have been an inventory search of the purse pursuant to that arrest. Thus, the
evidence in Gonzalez’s purse would inevitably have been discovered. Id.
AFFIRMED.
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