A federal judge in Atlanta is weighing whether to throw out the evidence in what appears to be the first US prosecution of a traveler over a phone's built-in "duress password" - a privacy feature that erases a device when the wrong code is entered.
Samuel Tunick, an Atlanta resident and US citizen, was charged under 18 U.S.C. ยง 2232(a), which makes it a crime to destroy or damage property to prevent the government from seizing it. The offense carries up to five years. He has pleaded not guilty and is seeking to suppress the government's evidence, arguing the search and seizure that produced it were unlawful. A ruling is not expected before the end of October.
Tunick was returning from vacation on January 24, 2025, when Customs and Border Protection pulled him into secondary inspection at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. According to his motion to suppress, agents demanded access to his phone on the stated suspicion that it contained child exploitation imagery, without offering evidence to support that suspicion. They told him they did not need a warrant because he had not yet crossed into the country - the government's long-standing position that arriving travelers are not on US soil until admitted.
His lawyers say he asked for an attorney repeatedly and was refused, and that he was never advised of his rights.
Tunick provided a passcode. An officer entered it. The screen went dark, flashed repeatedly, and the device restarted with its contents gone. Agents seized the phone anyway and told him he was free to enter the country.
The indictment, returned
