U.S. v. Osborn, 96-2376

• Decision Date: 09 July 1997
• Docket Number: No. 96-2376,96-2376
• Citation: 120 F.3d 59
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Lamont D. OSBORN, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 59

120 F.3d 59

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Lamont D. OSBORN, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 96-2376.

United States Court of Appeals Seventh Circuit.

Argued Feb. 27, 1997.

Decided July 9, 1997.

Thomas Edward Leggans (argued), Office of the United States Attorney, Criminal Division, Fairview Heights, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Patrick W. Fitzgerald (argued), Alton, IL, for Defendant-Appellant.

Before BAUER, WOOD, JR., and ROVNER, Circuit Judges.

ILANA DIAMOND ROVNER, Circuit Judge.

Lamont D. Osborn was convicted by a jury of conspiring to distribute cocaine base in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 846, and the district court sentenced him to an imprisonment term of 240 months. Osborn now challenges that conviction here, contending that the district court should have suppressed the incriminating statements he made after his arrest. Because we believe that Osborn's suppression motion was properly denied, we affirm his conviction.

I.

After he was indicted on drug conspiracy charges, Osborn moved to suppress the incriminating statements he made to authorities after his arrest on June 23, 1994. Osborn admitted after a series of interviews that he had been distributing crack cocaine along with Carl Blackmon and Cornelius Glenn. Yet in his suppression motion, Osborn argued that this confession was the fruit of an unlawful arrest because the authorities did not have probable cause to believe that Osborn had committed any crime. The district court conducted an extensive evidentiary hearing before denying Osborn's motion. That hearing revealed the following facts.

In June 1994, Deputy United States Marshal Richard Knight was notified by federal marshals in Jackson, Tennessee that a fugitive by the name of Carl Blackmon may be in Carbondale, Illinois. Knight was told that a warrant for Blackmon's arrest had issued in the Western District of Tennessee after Blackmon had failed to appear for a sentencing in that district. The Tennessee authorities believed that Blackmon may be staying with an aunt who lived in a Carbondale housing complex, and they told Knight that Blackmon would be driving a dark blue or green Buick with Tennessee license plates. They also provided Knight with a photograph of Blackmon and told him that Blackmon had a gang symbol (a six-pointed star) tattooed on his chest and on one arm.

With help from the Carbondale Police Department, Knight arranged for surveillance of the housing complex where Blackmon's aunt lived. At approximately 6:30 p.m. on June 23, 1994, while watching a group of men in front of the housing complex, Knight observed a man with a six-pointed star on his shirt get into an automobile with two other men. While Knight then watched, the vehicle pulled away. Suspecting that the man he had seen was Blackmon, Knight instructed Carbondale police officers to effect a traffic stop of the vehicle. When they did so, Knight was informed over the radio that like Blackmon, the suspect with the star on his shirt had a scar under his eye.

After receiving instructions from Knight, the officers separated the vehicle's three passengers and asked their names. The man they believed to be Blackmon did not have any identification but said that his name was Destin Lestin Osburn, spelling his last name with a "u." The man later identified as Cornelius Glenn said that his name was Patrick Deshun Williamson and that he was from Jackson, Tennessee. The car's driver gave his name as Lamont Osborn, spelling his last name with an "o". Blackmon indicated that he was Osborn's brother, but at the same time, Osborn said that he had met Blackmon/Osburn only recently and that the two were not related. Knight knew, however, that Blackmon and Osborn were cousins because he had learned that Blackmon's aunt was Osborn's mother. In light of that knowledge and the discrepancies in the information provided by Blackmon and Osborn, Knight instructed the officers to bring Blackmon to a gas station a short distance away where Knight was waiting. When questioned by Knight at the gas station, Blackmon repeated that his name was Osburn and that he was the brother of the automobile's driver (Osborn). Knight was able to observe during their conversation, however, that the man's appearance matched that of Blackmon in the photograph; specifically, Knight noted that the man had tattoos on his body and a scar under his eye. Knight therefore arrested Blackmon, advised him of his Miranda rights, and told him that he would be taken to the Carbondale police station.

Knight then instructed the local officers to bring Osborn and Glenn to the station as well. Knight indicated that he wanted to talk with both men about their relationship to Blackmon, as he was considering charging them with harboring a federal fugitive. Knight specifically knew at that point that Blackmon and Osborn were cousins and that the aunt with whom Blackmon was staying was Osborn's mother. Osborn, however, had denied knowing Blackmon until recently and had denied that there was any type of familial relationship between them. Osborn later admitted that he had done so in order to conceal his cousin's identity from the authorities.

The local police officers permitted Osborn to drive to the police station himself, and Osborn testified at the suppression hearing that he drove there voluntarily. Upon arrival, Osborn was placed in an interrogation room and advised of his Miranda rights. Although he was told that he was free to leave the station, when he attempted to do so, he learned that the door leading from the area surrounding the interrogation room was locked. Thus, despite what the officers repeatedly told him, Osborn was unable to leave that area or the station itself. Knight testified at the suppression hearing that once Osborn arrived at the station, he was not free to leave.

After arranging to have the FBI confirm Blackmon's identity through a fingerprint analysis, Knight questioned Osborn in the interrogation room. Osborn again maintained that Blackmon/Osburn had been in Carbondale only about one month, that Osborn had just met him, and that the two were not related. Osborn also repeatedly denied any involvement with drugs. Once the FBI confirmed Blackmon's identity, however, Blackmon admitted that he had been dealing drugs in Carbondale along with Osborn and Glenn. When later told of Blackmon's statements, Osborn admitted that Blackmon was his cousin, that he knew Blackmon was a federal fugitive, and that he had distributed drugs with Blackmon and Glenn. ¹

After hearing this evidence, the district court denied Osborn's motion. The court concluded that Osborn had not yet been arrested when he was asked to drive his vehicle to the Carbondale police station, but that he was under arrest by the time he was placed in the interrogation room. At that point, the court determined, Osborn was not free to leave the station. The court found, however, that Knight had by then obtained sufficient information to provide him with probable cause to arrest. Specifically, the court found that there was probable cause to believe that Osborn had violated two federal statutes: 18 U.S.C. § 3, because Osborn had been an accessory after the fact to Blackmon's underlying federal offense; and 18 U.S.C. § 1001, because Osborn had made a material false statement to authorities in order to conceal Blackmon's identity. Yet the court rejected the government's argument that Knight also had probable cause to believe that Osborn had violated 18 U.S.C. § 1071, which makes it a crime to harbor or conceal a fugitive. Finally, the court found probable cause to believe that Osborn had violated an Illinois obstruction statute. See 720 ILCS 5/31-4. Because Osborn's arrest was thus supported by probable cause, the district court found no basis for suppressing Osborn's confession.

II.

We review the district court's probable cause determination de novo. Ornelas v. United States, --- U.S. ----, ----, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 1663, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996); United States v. Washington, 109 F.3d 459, 465 (8th Cir.1997). In conducting our de novo review, however, we accept the district court's findings of historical fact unless they are clearly erroneous and "give due weight to inferences drawn from those facts by resident judges and local law enforcement officers." Ornelas, --- U.S. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 1663. Yet at the same time, Ornelas makes plain that that does not relieve this court of its obligation to independently assess the ultimate issue of probable cause. As the Supreme Court emphasized, only through independent review of that ultimate question can an appellate court "maintain control of" and clarify the controlling legal principle. Id. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 1662. In this case, Osborn does not challenge any of the district court's factual findings. We therefore accept the court's findings and proceed to independently assess whether the facts found by the district court were sufficient to provide probable cause for Osborn's arrest.

An arrest is supported by probable cause if, at the moment it was made, "the facts and circumstances within [the officer's] knowledge and of which [he] had reasonably trustworthy information were sufficient to warrant a prudent [person] in believing that the [suspect] had committed or was committing an offense." Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91, 85 S.Ct. 223, 225, 13 L.Ed.2d 142 (1964); see also Hunter v. Bryant, 502 U.S. 224, 228, 112 S.Ct. 534, 537, 116 L.Ed.2d 589 (1991) (per curiam); Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 175-76, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 1311, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949). A finding of probable cause, we emphasize, may be made on less evidence than would be required to support a conviction, although the finding requires something more than mere suspicion. Brinegar, 338 U.S. at 175, 69 S.Ct. at 1310-11....