Lee v. State

ON MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION SONNER, Judge. Kai Ruchell Lee appeals his conviction for possession with the intent to distribute a controlled dangerous substance, and alleges, as a basis for reversal, that the warranted search of his home by police without knocking and announcing violated his constitutional guarantee to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. Lee principally relies upon Richards v. Wisconsin, 520 U.S. 385 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 , 137 L.Ed.2d 615 (1997), the case in which the United States Supreme Court held that the “knock and announce” provision of the common law is a part of the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement. The Supreme Court there ruled that the failure to knock and announce, -without justification, before entering with a valid warrant, is unreasonable and requires the application of the exclusionary rule to the evidence seized.

We agree Richards is applicable here, and reverse the Circuit Court for Harford County and rule that the court should have suppressed the evidence seized from Lee’s home. Background Early on a weekday morning late in September 1998, a large combined task force of law enforcement officers from the Baltimore County Police Department, the Harford County Sheriffs Office, the Harford County Police Department, and the Maryland State Police, assembled in front of a single-family, colonial-style home in a residential area of Harford County. The task force, which arrived in several cars and trucks, surrounded the home, while eight Harford County deputy sheriffs, wearing black hoods and fatigue-style uniforms, battered down the door of Lee’s home with a two-handled “ram,” which is essentially a pipe filled with concrete. ⁸² Once inside, the task force “secured the premises” by dispersing throughout the house. Task force officers handcuffed two adults found upstairs in the master bedroom, gathered three small children from other bedrooms, and then herded all five members of the household together in the downstairs family room.

The task force leader, a Maryland State Police trooper, and the Harford County deputy sheriffs then summonsed the remaining task force officers to enter and search the entire house. One of the task force officers discovered in the top drawer of an upstairs bedroom chest twenty-six grams, less than an ounce, of what later proved to be cocaine. When questioned by one of the officers, Lee admitted that the cocaine was his. The officers arrested and charged Lee with possession with the intent to distribute a controlled dangerous substance.

The task force assembled that September morning resulted from narcotics officers of the Baltimore County Police Department obtaining a search warrant from a judge of the District Court of Maryland in Baltimore County to search a home in neighboring Harford County, after an informant engaged in two controlled purchases of cocaine from Lee. Armed with the search warrant, the Baltimore County Police sought assistance from the Harford County Police, requesting the organization of the multi-unit task force to carry out the early morning raid on Lee’s home. Other than the Baltimore County officers, no member of the task force previously participated in the investigation of Lee. The task force leader learned from the Baltimore County officers only that they had a warrant from a District Court judge in Baltimore County, that they had observed Lee at the address, and that the Baltimore County officers believed Lee kept narcotics in his home.

The task force leader testified that his decision on the manner of entry, that is, using a battering ram without warning, was influenced by the advice of an assistant state’s attorney in Harford County. The assistant state’s attorney told the task force leader that he ⁸³ need never knock and announce when he has a belief that doing so would lead to the destruction of narcotics. It is clear that at no time did the task force, even momentarily, consider knocking and announcing before battering down the door of Lee’s home. Moreover, it does not appear that the Baltimore County officers ever considered requesting permission from the issuing District Court judge to enter without warning. 1 The only certain information known to the task force leader about the individual suspect and the specified premises was that Lee lived there and it was very likely he was home that morning because his car was parked in front of the residence.

Prior to trial, Lee moved to suppress the fruits of the search by alleging that the failure of the police to knock and announce or, alternatively, to demonstrate that the police had a reasonable suspicion to believe exigent circumstances justified their failure to do so, rendered the search and seizure unconstitutional. Lee argued that the application of the exclusionary rule to direct physical evidence unreasonably seized required suppression. See Ott v. State, 325 Md. 206, 225 , 600 A.2d 111 (1992). After admitting evidence and hearing argument, the circuit court ruled orally that the police bypassed knocking and announcing, not because they feared for their safety, but, instead, based upon the testimony of the experienced task force leader, because there was a possibility someone inside the home might destroy evidence in a case alleging possession of cocaine.

The task force leader testified that the ⁸⁴ only conditions that would prompt him to knock and announce would be knowledge that nobody was home, or that the quantity of cocaine inside was so large as to make it impossible to destroy it quickly. 2 Discussion When we review a denial of a motion to suppress under Maryland Rule 4-252, we examine only the record of the suppression hearing and not that of the trial. Wynn v. State, 117 Md.App. 133, 165 , 699 A.2d 512 (1997), rev’d on other grounds, 351 Md. 307 , 718 A.2d 588 (1998). This Court will accept the facts as determined by the hearing judge, unless those facts are clearly erroneous. Id. “But, as to the ultimate, conclusionary fact of whether a search was valid, we must make our own independent constitutional appraisal by reviewing the law and applying it to the facts of the case.” Id.

We begin our analysis by reaffirming a fundamental principle of constitutional review that states: “The preservation of the rights guaranteed by the Constitution is of greater moment than the detection of any crime or the punishment of any single offender.” Glodowski v. State, 196 Wis. 265 , 220 N.W. 227, 229 (1928). The United States Supreme Court stated long ago, in Miller v. United States, 357 U.S. 301 , 78 S.Ct. 1190 , 2 L.Ed.2d 1332 (1958), the basis for the knock and announce requirement and held that the trial court should have suppressed the seized narcotics evidence. Writing for the majority, Justice Brennan explained: The requirement of prior notice of authority and purpose before forcing entry into a home is deeply rooted in our heritage and should not be given grudging application____ Every householder, the good and the bad, the guilty and the ⁸⁵ innocent, is entitled to the protection designed to secure the common interest against unlawful invasion of the house. Miller, 357 U.S. at 313 , 78 S.Ct. 1190 .

Ten years later, in the case of Sabbath v. United States, 391 U.S. 585 , 88 S.Ct. 1755 , 20 L.Ed.2d 828 (1968), the Supreme Court again overturned the conviction of a drug dealer after federal officers failed to knock and announce their presence before entering an unlocked apartment and seizing cocaine and drug packaging materials. In doing so, the Court did not clearly rely upon the United States Constitution, but, instead, applied 18 U.S.C. § 3109 , the federal statute that mandated the common law knock and announce requirement. Finally, in 1995, the Supreme Court clarified the Fourth Amendment basis for the knock and announce requirement. In Wilson v. Arkansas, 514 U.S. 927 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 , 131 L.Ed.2d 976 (1995), a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Thomas, the Court vacated a state conviction because the police had failed to knock and announce before entering the defendant’s home.

The Arkansas Supreme Court had affirmed the conviction and framed the issue for the Supreme Court, by holding that the knock-and-announce principle was not constitutionally required. The United States Supreme Court disagreed and ruled unambiguously that knocking and announcing was indeed required because it was so deeply embedded in Anglo American law, and the original framers of the Fourth Amendment must have included the no-knock component. Wilson, 514 U.S. at 934 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 . The Supreme Court recounted the history of the rule, traced the origins of the requirement to at least Semayne’s Case, 5 Co. Rep. 91a, 91b, 77 Eng.

Rep. 194, 195 (K.B.1603), and concluded that the principle became part of the fabric of colonial law. Wilson, 514 U.S. at 931-933 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 . Because of the “longstanding common-law endorsement of the practice of announcement,” the Court held that the method of entry into a dwelling was a factor in determining the reasonableness, and therefore the constitutionality, of searches and seizures. 3 Id. at 934 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 . ⁸⁶ The Wilson Court did not, however, go so far as to condemn all unannounced entries into a home as per se unreasonable. The Court said that “[t]he Fourth Amendment’s flexible requirement of reasonableness should not be read to mandate a rigid rule of announcement that ignores countervailing law enforcement interests.” Id. at 934 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 .

The Court declined to proclaim a “comprehensive catalog of the relevant countervailing factors,” opting to allow the lower courts to define appropriately when not knocking and announcing would be reasonable. Id. at 936 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 . Then, instead of reversing the conviction outright, the Court remanded the case to the Arkansas Supreme Court and instructed it to determine whether the particular facts of the case, including the defendant’s alleged threatening of a government informant with an automatic weapon, as well as a co-tenant’s prior convictions for arson and firebombing, and the suggestion that the narcotics evidence could be easily destroyed, relieved the police from having to knock and announce. The question that remained after Wilson was whether a search for easily destroyed evidence, such as narcotics, was, without more, justification for a no-knock entry.

The answer came two years later, in Richards v. Wisconsin, 520 U.S. 385 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 , 137 L.Ed.2d 615 (1997), when the Supreme Court, again in a unanimous decision, this time authored by Justice Stevens, applied the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement to a no-knock search that resulted in the seizure of drugs. The Supreme Court reviewed a state judicial rule predating the decision in Wilson , which stated that police need never knock and announce their presence in executing a warrant in the course of a felony drug investigation. Richards, 520 U.S. at 389 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 . The Court noted that the Wisconsin Supreme Court assumed that “all felony drug crimes will involve ‘an extremely high risk of serious if not deadly injury to the police as well as the potential for the disposal of drugs by the occupants prior to entry by the police.’ ” Id. at 390 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 .

The Wisconsin rule had been that felony drug cases always pres ⁸⁷ ent exigent circumstances that relieve the police from knocking and announcing, because of the “convergence in a violent and dangerous form of commerce of weapons and the destruction of drugs.” Id. at 392 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 . In other words, the Wisconsin Court had held that all felony drug searches conducted without knocking and announcing were per se reasonable. The Supreme Court, in rejecting that rationale, stated that the characterization was an over generalization that was too far removed from required judicial review, and, moreover, failed to strike a proper balance between individual privacy interests and the needs of law enforcement. Id. at 393 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 .

The Court further pointed out that such a broad exception for drugs would, with little difficulty, extend to other categories of crimes and make the “knock-and-announce element of the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement ... meaningless.” Id. at 394 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 . The Court then held that each case must be subject to judicial review of the facts and circumstances that the police encounter in executing the search warrant. Id. The Supreme Court, nevertheless, affirmed the Supreme Court of Wisconsin, but, in doing so, specifically disapproved of the blanket exception in drug cases.

The Court approved only the Wisconsin court’s concurring opinion, which held that the no-knock entry in that case was supported by evidence of exigent circumstances. Id. at 395-396 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 . As a result of Wilson and Richards , judges and law enforcement officials have been given some guidance as to when a no-knock entry may comply with the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement. The Wilson Court declined to set out any specifics, but did state, by way of dicta, that entry without knocking and announcing was justified when it would be a “ ‘senseless ceremony’ ... in pursuit of a recently escaped arrestee,” or in cases when the police “have reason to believe that evidence would likely be destroyed.” Wilson, 514 U.S. at 936 , 115 S.Ct. 1914 .

Richards then went further and approved of no-knock entries when lives are in danger or when an “effective investigation of the crime” would be ⁸⁸ thwarted through destruction of the evidence or escape of the suspects. Richards, 520 U.S. at 394 , 117 S.Ct. 1416 . Turning our attention to Maryland case law, we find that since Richards this Court has had only one occasion to review a no-knock entry and seizure. In Wynn v. State, 117 Md.App. 133 , 699 A.2d 512 (1997), rev’d on other grounds, 351 Md. 307 , 718 A.2d 588 (1998), this Court reviewed the history of the no-knock requirement and its exceptions in Maryland.

Judge Thieme, writing for the Court, noted that as early as 1964 the Court of Appeals had concluded a defendant was entitled to raise the failure to knock and announce in executing a search warrant, and quoted Judge Hammond, in Henson v. State, 236 Md. 518 , 204 A.2d 516 (1964), as follows: The claim that the evidence seized was inadmissible because the police officers executing the search warrant did not advise those within that they had such a warrant and demand admittance, but broke in forcibly without