Hotel Checkout Ends Fourth Amendment Privacy: No Objectively Reasonable Expectation Five Hours After Checkout Absent Late-Checkout Arrangement

1. Introduction

In United States v. Ryan Mendoza (3d Cir. Jan. 8, 2026), the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit addressed a recurring Fourth Amendment suppression issue: whether a hotel guest retains a legitimate expectation of privacy in a hotel room after the hotel’s stated checkout time when the guest has not affirmatively checked out. The appellant, Ryan Mendoza, sought suppression of drug evidence discovered when police entered and searched his hotel room without a warrant roughly five hours after the hotel’s noon checkout time. The Government opposed suppression, contending Mendoza no longer had an objectively reasonable expectation of privacy because the room had reverted to the hotel’s control and the hotel manager consented to police entry.

The core issue was not whether the search was “reasonable” under a warrant exception in the first instance, but whether Mendoza could invoke the Fourth Amendment at all—i.e., whether he had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the room at the time of the search.

2. Summary of the Opinion

The Third Circuit affirmed the denial of Mendoza’s suppression motion. It held that any expectation of privacy Mendoza had in the room five hours after checkout time was not objectively reasonable, and therefore he failed to establish the threshold privacy interest necessary to seek Fourth Amendment suppression. The Court aligned itself with the “unanimous” view of other circuits that a guest’s objectively reasonable expectation of privacy in a hotel room generally lapses after checkout time, even absent an affirmative checkout.

The Court explicitly left open whether there might be close cases involving a possible “grace period,” hotel practices, or guest-specific communications, but found no ambiguity on the record: there were no late-checkout arrangements and the search occurred well after the noon cutoff.

3. Analysis

3.1. Precedents Cited

A. Foundational Fourth Amendment “Expectation of Privacy” Framework

• United States v. Montalvo-Flores, 81 F.4th 339 (3d Cir. 2023): Supplied the Third Circuit’s contemporary articulation of the “legitimate expectation of privacy” inquiry and burden allocation. The Mendoza panel relied on it for (i) the subjective/objective two-prong test, and (ii) the principle that the defendant bears the burden of proving both prongs.
• Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128 (1978): The source for the formulation that Fourth Amendment protections attach only where the defendant had “a legitimate expectation of privacy in the invaded place.” The panel used Rakas as the conceptual gatekeeper to suppression.
• Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967) (Harlan, J., concurring): The origin of the subjective expectation and objective reasonableness framework. Mendoza turns on the objective prong.

B. Third Circuit Standard of Review on Suppression Appeals

• United States v. Dyer, 54 F.4th 155 (3d Cir. 2022): Provided the mixed standard—clear error for facts, plenary review for legal conclusions— and the instruction to view facts in the Government’s favor when suppression was denied.
• United States v. Garner, 961 F.3d 264 (3d Cir. 2020): Quoted via Dyer for the “view the facts in the light most favorable to the Government” principle.

C. Hotel-Room Privacy and Its Termination

• Stoner v. California, 376 U.S. 483 (1964): Reinforced the baseline that a hotel guest’s privacy interest in a room is akin to a tenant’s in a rented home. Mendoza accepts this starting point, making the dispute about when that interest ends.
• Abel v. United States, 362 U.S. 217 (1960): Critical to the panel’s endpoint analysis. Abel supplies the proposition that the privacy interest “dissipates when the guest vacates the room,” and that thereafter “the hotel then ha[s] the exclusive right to its possession,” enabling hotel management to consent. Mendoza extends that dissipation concept to the post-checkout context as a matter of objective reasonableness.
• United States v. Jeffers, 342 U.S. 48 (1951): Used to clarify that staff’s limited right to enter during a stay (e.g., housekeeping/maintenance) does not negate a guest’s expectation of privacy against police intrusion. The panel distinguished that limited access from the broader discretion staff acquire after checkout.

D. Circuit Authority on Post-Checkout Expectations of Privacy

Because the Third Circuit acknowledged no prior precedential decision in-circuit on post-checkout privacy where the guest had not affirmatively checked out, it surveyed other circuits and found unanimity that the expectation lapses after checkout:

• United States v. Parizo, 514 F.2d 52 (2d Cir. 1975)
• United States v. Jackson, 585 F.2d 653 (4th Cir. 1978)
• United States v. Ramirez, 810 F.2d 1338 (5th Cir. 1987)
• United States v. Lanier, 636 F.3d 228 (6th Cir. 2011)
• United States v. Akin, 562 F.2d 459 (7th Cir. 1977)
• United States v. Larson, 760 F.2d 852 (8th Cir. 1985)
• United States v. Dorais, 241 F.3d 1124 (9th Cir. 2001)
• United States v. Croft, 429 F.2d 884 (10th Cir. 1970)
• United States v. Ross, 964 F.3d 1034 (11th Cir. 2020)

The Court used these cases less as a granular doctrinal split and more as confirmation that checkout time functions as a broadly recognized and administrable line. Notably, it cited Ross for the proposition that after checkout, staff have “complete discretion” to enter and may ignore a “Do Not Disturb” hanger, underscoring the diminished privacy expectations once the room’s possession reverts to the hotel.

E. The Unresolved “Grace Period / Hotel Practice” Debate

The panel flagged—but declined to resolve—a circuit disagreement on whether some post-checkout expectations can remain reasonable based on hotel practices or communications:

• On the “possible exception” side: United States v. Kitchens, 114 F.3d 29 (4th Cir. 1997); Lanier, 636 F.3d 228; Dorais, 241 F.3d 1124; United States v. Owens, 782 F.2d 146 (10th Cir. 1986). These authorities contemplate that a pattern or practice of permitting late departures (or guest-specific arrangements) may preserve objective reasonableness for some period.
• On the “clear rule” side: Ross, 964 F.3d at 1043 n.6, which rejects such an exception to favor administrable Fourth Amendment lines.

Mendoza situates the Third Circuit within the mainstream “checkout ends privacy” approach while explicitly reserving the hardest edge cases for later.

3.2. Legal Reasoning

1. Threshold inquiry: privacy interest first. The Court treated the motion as turning on whether Mendoza could clear the initial “legitimate expectation of privacy” hurdle. Without objective reasonableness, there is no Fourth Amendment claim and thus nothing to suppress, regardless of Mendoza’s subjective belief.
2. Checkout time as the objective boundary of possession. The Court reasoned that checkout time marks the end of the guest’s right to exclude others and the resumption of the hotel’s possessory control. Operational realities drive this: staff must enter to clean and ready rooms; hotels may remove leftover items; keycards may be deactivated; charges may be posted automatically.
3. No affirmative checkout requirement. Because this hotel allowed “walk-out” checkout, guests can lose privacy interests without the formality of returning keys or visiting the desk. The objective inquiry looks to social norms and the hotel’s communicated rules, not a ritual act of checkout.
4. Rejection of Mendoza’s “48-hour” theory. Mendoza relied on testimony that some guests mistakenly think they have the room “for 24 hours.” The Court held that such misunderstandings do not establish objective reasonableness—especially where signage stated noon checkout and Mendoza’s receipt listed a February 25 departure date. In short: society’s baseline expectation is a fixed checkout time, not a rolling 24-hour rental keyed to the moment of check-in.
5. Five hours late, no ambiguity. The Court emphasized the time gap (five hours) and absence of any late-checkout communications or “potentially ambiguous circumstances.” That factual posture allowed the Court to announce a clear holding without resolving the “grace period” debate.

3.3. Impact

• New Third Circuit precedent on post-checkout privacy. The decision establishes (at minimum) that, in the Third Circuit, a hotel guest lacks an objectively reasonable expectation of privacy in a room five hours after checkout time where there is no late-checkout agreement and no ambiguity about hotel policy. This makes suppression significantly harder in similar post-checkout searches because defendants will often fail at the threshold privacy-interest stage.
• Administrability for law enforcement and hotels. By treating checkout time as the key marker, the opinion encourages clear coordination between hotels and police: if the hotel has regained possession (per policy and practice), management consent can be sufficient without needing a warrant—so long as the guest’s objective privacy expectation has lapsed.
• Litigation shifts to “exception” facts. The Court’s reservation of the “grace period” issue signals that future suppression litigation will turn on: (i) hotel-specific patterns (routinely tolerated late departures), (ii) explicit or implicit late-checkout communications, (iii) how the hotel treated the room in practice (e.g., whether it re-keyed, re-rented, cleaned, or otherwise repossessed), and (iv) the precise timeline.
• Defense strategy implications. Defendants will likely focus on proving objective reasonableness through hotel customs, staff representations, payment extensions, key reactivation, or policies that create a recognized grace period— because subjective belief alone is insufficient under the Court’s framing.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• “Legitimate expectation of privacy” (often mislabeled “Fourth Amendment standing”): Before a defendant can suppress evidence, they must show the search invaded a place where they had a privacy interest the Fourth Amendment recognizes. The Court noted (via United States v. Montalvo-Flores) that this is not Article III standing; it is a merits-based threshold requirement in Fourth Amendment doctrine.
• Subjective vs. objective expectation: A defendant may genuinely think they had privacy (subjective), but courts also ask whether society would view that expectation as reasonable (objective). Mendoza lost on the objective prong.
• Why checkout time matters legally: Privacy in Fourth Amendment terms is closely tied to lawful control and the right to exclude. After checkout, the hotel’s right to enter and retake the room expands dramatically; that change undermines the “reasonableness” of any continued guest privacy claim.
• Hotel consent after the guest’s rights end: Once the guest’s possessory interest ends, hotel management can generally consent to entry/search of areas under the hotel’s control. The key is whether the guest still had a recognized privacy interest at the time police entered.

5. Conclusion

United States v. Ryan Mendoza establishes a clear Third Circuit benchmark: absent a late-checkout arrangement or meaningful ambiguity, a hotel guest does not retain an objectively reasonable expectation of privacy in a room well after the posted checkout time—here, five hours later. The opinion synthesizes foundational expectation-of-privacy doctrine (Rakas v. Illinois, Katz v. United States) with hotel-room principles (Stoner v. California, Abel v. United States) and aligns the Circuit with the prevailing national approach reflected in multiple circuits. While the Court leaves open harder “grace period” scenarios, Mendoza’s practical significance is immediate: in straightforward post-checkout cases, suppression challenges may fail at the threshold because the defendant cannot establish the objective reasonableness of any continuing privacy expectation.