Just say you gave the cop the right password but the dipshit fat fingered it and typed the wipe password, which was similar.
No way to prove otherwise.
this post was submitted on 27 Jul 2026
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Exactly what a duress code is for, watch this charge shrivel like a dick in the cold when they try to identify exactly what “evidence” was deleted.
That's not how the law works. In fact, that's intentionally not how the law works specifically because of what you said. They don't have to "identify the evidence" that was deleted; they need to show that records were destroyed knowingly and intentionally which the government intended to and had the lawful authority to seize – namely and quite broadly the contents of his phone, which he obviously, knowingly did. In fact, this is so not-how-the-law-works by design that the US legal system uses the common law concept of adverse inference for cases when evidence is withheld or destroyed.
If the federal government shows up to search my house and I burn my house down, the point isn't "well show me what evidence I destroyed lol". This is borderline SovCit pseudolegal logic.
Here's the statute he was charged under.
As I noted in another comment, it's likely the "lawful authority" of the government to have performed the search in the first place will be challenged, which is what the statute requires in part (a). It'll be up to the government to show they had this authority – which it seems like they didn't, and I hope it gets thrown out, but regardless, your interpretation of this is abject nonsense.
TL;DR: They do not need to know a single byte of information that was on his phone for this charge provided they can show they had lawful authority to seize it.
In this particular case, there are also 5th amendment issues with the Miranda warnings.
The CBP officers repeatedly ignored the defendant's requests for a lawyer, and they continued to question him anyway. Then, the defendant allegedly told them the "unlock" / duress code.
There's existing case law in the US that phone unlock codes are "testimony" within the 5th amendment's right to remain silent, so a search warrant cannot compel someone to divulge them. (This is different from a phone unlock fingerprint, which can be compelled with a warrant).
I halfway expect the government to argue somewhat against this case law, but who knows? DOJ is now scraping the very bottom of the barrel to find lawyers, so sometimes it's hard to tell if they have any kind of coherent plan at all.
The phone owner is either outside of the US, where they don’t have jurisdiction, or inside the US where should be protected from this level of invasion of privacy
Well, yeah, I agree: hence I hope these charges are dismissed.
I'm going to call out nonsensical reasoning even if it arrives at a conclusion I agree with (maybe even especially if it arrives at a conclusion I agree with).
I saw this same comment in the comments on the article and it just doesn’t make any sense. The owner of the phone didn’t burn anything down, the feds did. They were the ones with the device, they were the ones that typed in the code.
This would be like the federal government showing up to search your house, you saying “no”, they say “give us a key” (not the key to unlock, but a key) and you give them one set on fire and they light the house on fire themselves. You didn’t do anything except give them what they asked for, it’s their fault they didn’t realize what it would do. I believe if the defendant argues it properly in court there’s gonna be nothing the Feds can do, because he didn’t interfere with anything.
Maybe if the feds had asked for the passcode that let them into the phone so they could search it then that’s one thing. But I seriously doubt they did.
edit: in addition what he's being charged of is destruction of property to prevent seizure. The government still has the phone, they were not prevented from taking property under their control. This statute doesn't match in any sense of the word.
for the purpose of preventing or impairing the Government’s lawful authority to take such property into its custody or control or to continue holding such property under its lawful custody and control
They were the ones with the device, they were the ones that typed in the code. [...] and you give them one set on fire and they light the house on fire themselves.
I have no idea how some people can believe the words they say. Literally the entire point of a duress code is that the attacker doesn't know that it's a duress code – that it looks indistinguishable from a normal password. In your example, the key is physically on fire. A duress code is "oops, I gave you the key that activates a hidden mechanism to burn my house down. Guess you're the ones who destroyed it lol."
To say "well your honor, I intentionally tricked someone into destroying the evidence for me" would not hold up in court is an understatement.
I'm not trying to be condescending, genuinely making sure because your analogy is so far-off: you are familiar with what a duress password is, right?
I’m not trying to be condescending, genuinely making sure because your analogy is so far-off: you are familiar with what a duress password is, right?
yes... and you do understand that if you are a federal agent who is questioning someone, you probably shouldn't be trusting anything they say right? You do understand that these are 'special agents' who should (and do!) have training on different operating systems and how to get into them right? The FBI is known for buying tools to get them into iOS even, the CBP breaks into phones daily!
I have no idea how some people can believe the words they say.
Right back at you. Let's do a different analogy. If I give someone a gun and they murder someone with that, I'm not culpable. Unless they tell me they are going to murder someone with it before I give it to them. And then you're an accomplice to murder, but not a murderer. If the CBP told him they were going to unlock the phone with the code then sure, he's an accomplice to the actual crime which is "Destruction or removal of property to prevent seizure". Which would require trying the CBP agent for that same crime. Do you think the CBP agent is going to be tried for it?
In any case, my analogy isn't off at all, either of them. An CBP agent knows better, and if they don't they're incompetent and should be fired.