Alberta family mystified at passport border seizure

A family from Taber, Alta. is still waiting for their passports after the documents were confiscated by Canadian border officials at Coutts on their return from a U.S. vacation.

Justin Cunningham is angry about being searched at the border, where he says officials repeatedly asked him and his travelling companions if they did drugs. He alleges officials took their passports without any explanation.

Cunningham, his wife, his brother and a friend were driving back from a trip to Disneyland in Los Angeles when they stopped at the Canada-U.S. border crossing at Coutts, about 300 kilometres south of Calgary, on Aug. 25.

An officer asked them several times if they did drugs.

"Everyone said no, and then he told us, come on you guys did drugs, when was the last time?  They just wouldn't take no for an answer," Cunningham told CBC News on Thursday.

According to Cunningham, the officer then asked how someone with a factory job could afford the black BMW he was driving. Cunningham said he saved up to buy the car.

'Anyone or thing could be referred for secondary inspection, and this should not be misconstrued as targeting particular groups or individuals.' —Lisa White, Canadian Border Services Agency

Border officials then searched the car and trunk for the next 45 minutes. But Cunningham said they didn't notice their passports were missing until they got home.

"There was four of us on a trip for two weeks, so it was completely full of stuff," he said. "We had our passports sitting right [on the console] and they must have taken them sometime during the search. We're not sure when."

Cunningham's father, Peter, called the border crossing to find out what happened.

"I asked the gentleman there what reason he would have to confiscate the passports. They said they were not confiscated. It was simply a mistake," said Peter Cunningham.

The Canadian Border Services Agency said the passports were held, but not seized.

In deciding to search people and their vehicles, CBSA officers use "risk-based indicators" including "compliance history (i.e.: previous seizures), specific information in the form of lookouts, and behaviour of the traveller," said agency spokeswoman Lisa White in an email.

"Anyone or thing could be referred for secondary inspection, and this should not be misconstrued as targeting particular groups or individuals. CBSA does not racial profile."

Peter Cunningham isn't convinced.

"I'm still not happy with it," he said. "I'm sure it's happened to other people before and probably is going to continue to happen."

A month after the incident, the Cunninghams have now been told their passports are in the mail.

Passport Canada did not return calls from CBC News.