Munafo v. State

DAVIS, Judge. This is an appeal from a bench trial held in the Circuit Court for Wicomico County, in which appellant Neil Marshall Munafo was convicted of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute and possession of marijuana. Prior to trial, appellant moved to suppress certain physical evidence as the product of an illegal stop. The court denied the motion and admitted the evidence at trial.

Appellant was convicted of both charges and was sentenced to seven years incarceration for possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. The sentence for possession of marijuana was merged. Appellant presents the following question for our review: Did the trial court err in denying appellant’s motion to suppress? FACTS On March 10, 1994, at 9:40 p.m., Deputy Michael Houck of the Wicomico County Sheriffs Office was on routine patrol duty.

At that time, he observed a white Nissan Maxima cut a street corner, almost colliding with the front end of his police cruiser. Deputy Houck applied his brakes hard to avoid a collision, then made a u-turn and pursued the Maxima. After pacing the car at 49 miles per hour in a 30 mile-per-hour zone, Deputy Houck activated his emergency equipment and stopped the car for exceeding the posted speed limit. Appellant was the operator and sole occupant of the Maxi-ma.

After parking several feet behind the car, Deputy Houck approached and asked for appellant’s license and registration. In lieu of the registration, appellant produced the automobile’s rental agreement. The two men recognized each other from ⁶⁶⁷ an incident the preceding summer, 1 and small talk ensued. Deputy Houck then asked whether appellant had any weapons or drugs in the car, and if he could search the car.

Appellant replied that he had no weapons or drugs and did not consent to a search. Deputy Houck returned to his police vehicle and waited for the results of a license and registration check. As was Deputy Houck’s habit for safety reasons, he radioed for assistance from his road supervisor, Sergeant Michael Elliott. Shortly thereafter, the dispatcher informed Deputy Houck that the license and rental agreement checked out.

Despite receiving that information, Deputy Houck did not immediately issue a ticket or warning for the speeding offense. Deputy Houck testified that he wrote appellant a warning, but could not remember whether he -wrote the warning before Sergeant Elliott arrived or after appellant was arrested. The time written on the warning was 2100 hours, approximately forty minutes prior to the traffic stop. At some point after stopping the Maxima, Deputy Houck formulated a hunch that appellant had drugs in the car.

The primary basis for that hunch was the fact that appellant previously had been arrested for charges relating to cocaine and marijuana. 2 When Sergeant Elliott arrived, two to three minutes after being summoned, Deputy Houck stepped out of his vehicle, and the two officers conferred for one to one and one-half minutes at the rear of appellant’s car. Deputy Houck told Sergeant Elliott about his hunch, and asked Sergeant Elliott to walk down the passenger side of the car because he believed that appellant was hiding something with his right arm. Deputy Houck then approached appellant, who remained seated in the Maxima. As the deputy engaged appellant in a ⁶⁶⁸ short conversation, appellant became “nervous” and “flighty” and began to stutter.

Although Deputy Houck was carrying appellant’s license and the rental agreement, the deputy could not recall whether he returned the documents to appellant at that time. Meanwhile, Sergeant Elliott walked up to the passenger side of the car. According to Deputy Houck, Sergeant Elliott leaned over the front of the car and shined his flashlight inside. Sergeant Elliott testified that he approached the Maxima from the rear and shined his light in each window as he worked his way to the front.

As he moved up to the front passenger’s door, Sergeant Elliott observed a clear plastic “baggie” containing a dark-colored “substance” on the console between the seats. Appellant was trying to cover the baggie with his arm. Sergeant Elliott explained what happened next: ... I heard the defendant say something about, why are you doing this to me?

Don’t do this to me____ At that point in time, he raised his arm up, and that’s when my flashlight hit the bag, which the bag was not sealed, and then I could actually see what was in the bag ... which I felt was suspected marijuana. At that point, Sergeant Elliott could see that the baggie contained a “green substance.” After noticing the “suspected marijuana,” he asked appellant two or three times, “what is in the baggie?” Appellant replied: “There is nothing here. What baggie? What are you talking about?” Sergeant Elliott looked at Deputy Houck and said “dope or something to that effect.” Deputy Houck asked appellant to step out of the car and began to advise him of his rights in accord with Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 , 86 S.Ct. 1602 , 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966).

Sergeant Elliott then reached into the car and removed the baggie. When he pulled it out, “a bag of suspected crack cocaine came out also.” The two baggies contained, respectively, marijuana and thirteen pieces of crack cocaine. Appellant was immediately arrested. Approximately ten minutes had passed from the initial stop of appellant’s car to the moment of his arrest. ⁶⁶⁹ Appellant testified briefly on his own behalf, and stated that Deputy Houck did not return the license and rental agreement until after appellant had been arrested and was taken to a police station.

The trial court concluded that the traffic stop was based on reasonable suspicion and denied appellant’s motion to suppress. The case proceeded to a bench trial with an agreed statement of facts, and the trial judge found appellant guilty on the charges set forth above. This appeal followed. LEGAL ANALYSIS I When reviewing a trial court’s denial of a motion to suppress, an appellate court may consider only the record of the suppression hearing.

Malcolm v. State, 314 Md. 221 , 231 n. 12, 550 A.2d 670 (1988); Aiken v. State, 101 Md.App. 557, 563 , 647 A.2d 1229 (1994). We give great deference to the trial court’s first-level fact-finding and will accept the trial court’s findings of fact unless clearly erroneous. Riddick v. State, 319 Md. 180, 183 , 571 A.2d 1239 (1990); Aiken, 101 Md.App. at 563 , 647 A.2d 1229 . Moreover, we review the facts and the evidence in the light most favorable to the State as the party prevailing on the motion.

Riddick, 319 Md. at 183 , 571 A.2d 1239 ; Cherry v. State, 86 Md.App. 234, 237 , 586 A.2d 70 (1991). In applying the law to those facts, however, we make an independent constitutional appraisal, and give no deference to the trial court’s legal conclusions. Riddick, 319 Md. at 183 , 571 A.2d 1239 ; Aguilar v. State, 88 Md.App. 276, 282 , 594 A.2d 1167 (1991). Appellant contends that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress the marijuana and crack cocaine because the evidence was seized during an illegal detention.

Although he concedes that the traffic stop effected by Deputy Houck was legal, appellant maintains that there were actually two stops that evening: (1) the initial traffic stop; and (2) a second stop which occurred immediately thereafter. Appellant argues that Deputy Houck was required to issue a ticket ⁶⁷⁰ or a warning promptly after receiving the results of the license and registration check. In appellant’s view, the continued detention of his vehicle after that point was not justified by a reasonable suspicion and was, therefore, illegal. As a general rule, a police officer may stop a suspect “if the officer has reasonable suspicion supported by articulable facts that criminal activity may be afoot.” Derricott v. State, 327 Md. 582, 587 , 611 A.2d 592 (1992).

Similarly, if the articulable facts also support an objectively reasonable suspicion that the person is armed and dangerous, the officer may conduct a carefully limited search of the person’s outer clothing in an attempt to discover weapons that might be used to injure the officer. Id.; Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 30 , 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1884 , 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968). In the context of an automobile stop, a search for weapons may be extended to the passenger compartment of the car. Derricott, 327 Md. at 587 , 611 A.2d 592 (citing Michigan v. Long, 463 U.S. 1032 , 103 S.Ct. 3469 , 77 L.Ed.2d 1201 (1983)).

The Supreme Court has made it clear that the detention of a person “must be temporary and last no longer than is necessary to effectuate the purpose of the stop.” Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 500 , 103 S.Ct. 1319, 1325 , 75 L.Ed.2d 229 (1983). Accordingly, the Court has recognized that the detention of an automobile and its occupant(s) constitutes a “seizure” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, “even though the purpose of the stop is limited and the resulting detention quite brief.” Snow v. State, 84 Md.App. 243, 265 , 578 A.2d 816 (1990) (quoting Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.S. 420, 436-37 , 104 S.Ct. 3138, 3148 , 82 L.Ed.2d 317 (1984)). In Snow, 84 Md.App. at 248 , 578 A.2d 816 , we concluded that the purpose of a traffic stop is to issue a citation or warning. Once that purpose has been satisfied, the continued detention of a vehicle and its oecupant(s) constitutes a second stop, and must be independently justified by reasonable suspicion.

The point may be illustrated by juxtaposing the facts of Snow with our subsequent decision in In re Montrail M., 87 ⁶⁷¹ Md.App. 420 , 589 A.2d 1318 (1991), aff'd, 325 Md. 527 , 601 A.2d 1102 (1992). In Snow , a state trooper stopped an automobile for speeding. After the trooper issued a citation, he continued to detain the driver in order to search his car for drugs. Using a trained dog, the officer conducted a scan of the car, and the dog indicated that narcotics were present.

We observed that “the fact that the initial stop for speeding in the instant case was valid, does not necessarily legitimize what occurred afterwards.” Snow, 84 Md.App. at 253-254 , 578 A.2d 816 . Because the purpose of the initial stop had been satisfied, we concluded that the trooper detained Snow and his vehicle twice: once when he stopped Snow for speeding, and again when he continued to hold Snow after issuing a ticket. As in the present case, the total length of the stop was brief, and did not exceed the normal duration for a traffic stop. Id. at 264, 268 , 578 A.2d 816 .

In Montrail M., 87 Md.App. at 437 , 589 A.2d 1318 , by contrast, we held that a single detention took place. In that case, a sheriffs deputy observed a station wagon parked outside a business in an isolated area early in the morning. There were three persons in the car. The deputy called for backup, knowing that the only other unit on duty at the time was a canine unit.

The deputy spoke with the driver, and his suspicions were further aroused by the driver’s explanation of what he was doing in that particular location at 3:30 a.m. 3 The deputy obtained the driver’s license and registration and began to run a check. Before the check was completed, the canine unit arrived, and the deputy conducted a quick scan of the station wagon. After the dog indicated that drugs were present, the deputy searched the car and found both marijuana and crack cocaine. Id. at 428-30 , 589 A.2d 1318 . ⁶⁷² Our analysis of the situation emphasized two points.

First, the canine scan occurred during an otherwise valid stop, which was based on reasonable suspicion. At the time that the scan took place, the deputy was still awaiting the results of the license and registration check. Second, we noted that the scan did not prolong the detention. Because the scan was conducted in a public place and did not inconvenience the car’s occupants, the scan itself did not constitute a search