TERRON D. JOHNSON v. COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY
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RENDERED:
June 17, 2005; 2:00 p.m.
ORDERED PUBLISHED BY KENTUCKY SUPREME COURT
DECEMBER 14, 2005
(2005-SC-0547-D)
Commonwealth Of Kentucky
Court of Appeals
NO. 2004-CA-001375-MR
TERRON D. JOHNSON
v.
APPELLANT
APPEAL FROM HENDERSON CIRCUIT COURT
HONORABLE STEPHEN A. HAYDEN, JUDGE
ACTION NO. 04-CR-00027
COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY
APPELLEE
OPINION
AFFIRMING
** ** ** ** **
BEFORE:
COMBS, CHIEF JUDGE; HENRY AND TACKETT, JUDGES.
COMBS, CHIEF JUDGE:
Terron Johnson appeals from an order of the
Henderson Circuit Court following his conditional plea of guilty
to one count each of first-degree possession of a controlled
substance (cocaine) and possession of marijuana.
Prior to
pleading guilty, Johnson unsuccessfully filed a motion to
suppress the introduction of evidence discovered during a police
search of his automobile.
He now appeals the order that denied
his motion to suppress.
After our review of the record, we
affirm both the order denying the motion to suppress and the
judgment entered upon the guilty plea.
At the suppression hearing conducted by the trial
court, Officer Chris Roush of the Henderson City Police
Department testified that he was driving routine patrol in the
vicinity of Cherry Street on the evening of November 8, 2003.
The police had recently increased their protection of that area
at the request of residents.
Shortly after midnight, Officer
Roush observed an occupied automobile parked in front of an
apartment building on Cherry Street.
Because several of the
apartments in the building had been confirmed as high drugtraffic areas, Roush became suspicious.
Roush circled the city
block and observed the car pull away from the curb as he
approached.
In less than two minutes, Roush saw the driver make a
right-turn without giving a proper signal and noticed that the
vehicle’s license plate was not properly illuminated.
Officer
Roush activated his lights and initiated a routine traffic stop.
Roush also noticed that the vehicle’s registration appeared to
have expired.
He radioed dispatch for more information.
Dispatch confirmed that the registration had indeed expired.
Roush then radioed for a canine unit.
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Roush exited his patrol car and approached the stopped
car.
He advised the driver, Terron Johnson, of his reason for
the stop.
At Roush’s request, Johnson provided a valid driver’s
license and registration but refused to consent to a search of
his car.
Roush returned immediately to his patrol car to
prepare a citation for the expired registration.
Before Roush
completed the paperwork, the requested canine unit arrived at
the scene.
Roush again exited his patrol car and asked Johnson
to step out of his car for his own safety.
Between five and
seven minutes had elapsed since Roush had initiated the traffic
stop.
Argo, the drug-sniffer dog, alerted immediately and
aggressively to the driver’s side door.
Once inside the car, he
alerted aggressively to the cushion of a child’s safety seat.
Roush discovered cocaine and marijuana hidden in the child’s
safety seat.
jail.
Johnson was arrested and transported to the county
According to Roush, the entire incident lasted
approximately fifteen minutes.
On January 6, 2004, Johnson was indicted on charges of
first-degree possession of a controlled substance, possession of
marijuana, and expired registration plates.
On March 17, 2004,
he filed a motion to suppress the evidence seized from the
search of his automobile.
As a basis for the motion, Johnson
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argued that the canine sweep constituted an unlawful search
lacking probable cause and that the detention was otherwise
unduly long and intrusive in light of the nature of the stop.
After considering the evidence presented, the trial
court concluded that the traffic stop was properly supported by
probable cause and that it was valid.
The trial court also
addressed the time involved in the officer’s interaction with
Johnson to determine whether the stop had been prolonged beyond
the time reasonably required to investigate, prepare, and issue
a citation based on the traffic violation.
The court rejected
Johnson’s contention that Officer Roush had improperly extended
the duration of the stop to enable the dog sniff to occur.
Additionally, “[t]he brief delay while the dog sniffed the
exterior of the car did not make the length of the stop
unreasonable.”
Opinion at 4.
We find no error in the trial
court’s denial of the motion to suppress.
It is well settled that an investigative stop of an
automobile is constitutional as long as law enforcement
officials have a reasonable suspicion -- supported by specific
and articulable facts -- that the occupant of the vehicle has
committed, is committing, or is about to commit an offense.
Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 59 L.Ed.2d 660
(1979); Collins v. Commonwealth, 142 S.W.3d 113 (Ky. 2004).
addition to the requirement that the stop be justified at its
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In
inception, the police officer’s subsequent actions must be
reasonably related in scope to the circumstances that gave
credence to the initial stop.
Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88
S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968).
“[A]n investigative
detention 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, 238 (1983).
Johnson concedes that the initial traffic stop was
justified based upon his violation of traffic laws.
However,
Johnson contends that the detention lasted longer than necessary
to effectuate its purpose and that it was improperly prolonged
for the purpose of conducting a drug investigation, thus
rendering it illegal.
Johnson relies in part on the reasoning
of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v.
Dortch, 199 F.3d 193 (5th Cir. 1999).
In Dortch, two highway patrol officers stopped the
defendant, who was driving a rental car too close to a tractortrailer.
Dortch provided his license and the rental car papers,
and one of the officers ran a computer check to search for any
outstanding warrants and to determine whether the car was
stolen.
The officers told Dortch that he would be free to leave
after they completed their warrants check but that they had to
detain his car until they had performed an exterior canine
search of it.
Twenty minutes later, the canine unit arrived and
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completed an exterior dog sniff of the vehicle.
The dog alerted
to the driver’s side door and seat, but a subsequent search of
the car revealed no contraband.
However, the officers then
conducted a pat-down search of Dortch and found drugs on his
person.
Dortch moved to suppress the drug evidence on the
basis that the officers had unlawfully detained him by forcing
him to wait for them to conduct the canine search.
The court
agreed, concluding that the officers lacked a reasonable
suspicion that Dortch was trafficking in drugs and that the
extended detention that followed the computer check exceeded the
scope of the intrusion permitted by Terry.
The use of a well-trained narcotics-detection dog
during a lawful traffic stop generally does not violate
legitimate privacy interests.
See United States v. Place, 462
U.S. 696, 103 S.Ct. 2637, 77 L.Ed.2d 110 (1983).
The Supreme
Court of the United States recently addressed this issue again
in Illinois v. Caballes, 534 U.S. 405, 125 S.Ct. 834, 160
L.Ed.2d 842 (2005), dealing with facts similar to the case
before us.
In Caballes, an Illinois State Trooper stopped the
defendant for speeding.
When the trooper radioed dispatch to
report the stop, a second trooper -- a member of the state
police drug interdiction team -- overheard the transmission and
headed for the scene with his drug-sniffer dog.
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When the second trooper and his dog arrived, the
defendant’s car was parked on the shoulder of the road and the
defendant was seated in the patrol car.
While the first trooper
was writing the defendant a warning ticket, the second trooper
walked his dog around the defendant’s car.
the trunk.
The dog alerted to
Based on the alert, the officers searched the trunk,
discovered marijuana, and arrested the defendant.
The encounter
lasted less than ten minutes.
The defendant’s motion to suppress the evidence
collected from his trunk was denied, and he was convicted of a
narcotics offense at trial.
However, the Illinois Supreme Court
reversed the conviction, holding that since the canine sniff was
performed without any specific and articulable facts to suggest
drug activity, the use of the dog “unjustifiably enlarg[ed] the
scope of a routine traffic stop into a drug investigation.”
Id.
at 837.
The Supreme Court disagreed.
The Court observed that
the initial seizure of the defendant had been based on probable
cause and was lawful and that the seizure had not been prolonged
beyond the time reasonably necessary to prepare the warning
citation.
It concluded that the defendant had not been
unlawfully detained and that the dog sniff had not otherwise
infringed upon any constitutional rights.
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In this appeal, Johnson has acknowledged that the
initial stop of his automobile and a limited portion of the
detention were lawful.
He objects to the scope and duration of
the detention that allowed for the dog sniff.
During the suppression hearing, the Commonwealth gave
a precise accounting for the few minutes that Johnson had been
detained before the canine unit arrived at the scene.
The trial
court was persuaded by the testimony that Officer Roush had not
pretextually or impermissibly stalled the stop in order to allow
for the canine unit to arrive.
The court concluded that the
brief period of detention lasted no longer than was necessary to
achieve the purpose of the stop.
We have examined the record and find nothing to
indicate that the duration of Johnson’s detention was so
prolonged as to be unjustified.
Officer Roush appears to have
pursued his investigation in a diligent and reasonable manner.
He made a radio transmission to dispatch, awaited information,
then contacted the canine unit.
His encounter with Johnson was
focused and immediate, and he set out directly to complete the
paperwork involved in issuing a citation.
The purpose of the
initial stop had not been completed before the canine unit
arrived at the scene, and the dog sniff did not prolong the stop
to any unreasonable extent.
The dog sniff occurred while
Johnson was being lawfully detained by Roush.
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After the dog
alerted to the presence of narcotics, the officers undoubtedly
had probable cause to search the vehicle.
Consequently, the
trial court did not err by denying Johnson’s motion to suppress
the evidence recovered from his car.
The judgment is affirmed.
ALL CONCUR.
BRIEF FOR APPELLANT:
BRIEF FOR APPELLEE:
Kim Brooks Tandy
Covington, Kentucky
Gregory D. Stumbo
Attorney General of Kentucky
Todd D. Ferguson
Assistant Attorney General
Frankfort, Kentucky
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