U.S. v. Campa

• Decision Date: 07 November 2000
• Docket Number: No. 00-1104,00-1104
• Citation: 234 F.3d 733
• Parties: (1st Cir. 2000) UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Appellee, v. ANDRES CAMPA, Defendant, Appellant. Heard
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

Page 733

234 F.3d 733 (1st Cir. 2000)

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Appellee, v. ANDRES CAMPA, Defendant, Appellant.

No. 00-1104

United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit

Heard November 7, 2000

Decided December 12, 2000

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS [Hon. Richard G. Stearns, U.S. District Judge] [Copyrighted Material Omitted] Owen S. Walker, Federal Public Defender, with whom Stephanie A. Jirard, Federal Defender's Office, was on brief for appellant.

Nadine Pellegrini, Assistant U.S. Attorney, with whom Donald K. Stern, United States Attorney, was on brief for appellee.

Before Selya, Circuit Judge, Coffin and Bownes, Senior Circuit Judges.

COFFIN, Senior Circuit Judge.

Appellant Andres Campa was arrested when he went to retrieve a package of counterfeit alien work permits ("green cards") at an apartment targeted by law enforcement authorities because a series of suspicious packages had been delivered there. He entered a conditional plea of guilty to charges relating to the counterfeiting and fraudulent use of various identification documents, reserving his right to appeal the district court's denial of his motion to suppress all evidence and statements obtained by authorities after his arrest. See 18 U.S.C. 1028(a)(1), (a)(5), 1546(a); 42 U.S.C. 408(a)(7)(c). Campa now brings that appeal, claiming that the district court erred in failing to find that he was unlawfully detained and searched upon entering the apartment. Our review of the record and relevant case law persuades us that the only Fourth Amendment violation that occurred -- an improper frisk -- was unrelated to appellant's arrest and did not give the government access to the incriminating evidence. We therefore affirm the denial of appellant's suppression motion.

I. Factual Background

For nearly a year before March 1999, the United States Postal Inspection Service had been investigating suspicious Express Mail packages addressed to 74 Thornton Street in Revere, Massachusetts. On March 19, Inspector Michael McCarran posed as a mailman and delivered the latest such package. Three other law enforcement officers accompanied him, but initially remained in the postal truck.¹

A man later identified as Jose Bullon came to the door, stated that he was the addressee, "Francisco Valencia," and signed the name "Francis Palencia" on the delivery mail receipt. McCarran then summoned the other officers. Bullon agreed to speak with them and consented to the package being opened. Inside were forty blank green cards. Bullon admitted that Valencia was a fictitious name and that he was accepting the package for a man he knew as "Gorrito." He described Gorrito as a Hispanic male in his early twenties who usually wore a baseball cap. Bullon reported that Gorrito paid him $50 per package and that he previously had accepted about ten packages. Bullon stated that Gorrito manufactured the fraudulent documents in a nearby apartment on Highland Street. Expressing fear of retaliation if Gorrito learned of his cooperation, Bullon nonetheless disclosed that Gorrito was due at the Thornton Street apartment at about 2 p.m. that day, and he agreed to go with one of the officers to point out the Highland Street apartment.

At about 2:30 p.m., shortly after Bullon returned to the Thornton Street location, Bullon and McCarran saw two Hispanic males walking down the street toward the apartment. Bullon identified one of the men, who was wearing a baseball cap, as Gorrito. He later was identified as appellant Campa. Appellant and the other man, Enrique Lara-Valirde, entered the apartment without knocking and were confronted just inside the door by three officers, who identified themselves, ordered the men to face the hallway wall, and then conducted a pat-down search. During the frisk of appellant, Trooper Marron took keys, a beeper and a wallet from his pockets, dropping the items to the floor as they were removed. Appellant and Lara-Valirde then were escorted to the kitchen, where they sat down at a table. McCarran gathered the items removed during the frisk and placed them on the table.

At this point, the officers asked for identification. Lara-Valirde admitted that he had no identification and was in the United States illegally. Marron, a non-Spanish speaker, attempted to communicate with appellant by saying the word "identificacion" two or three times. In response, Campa took a New Jersey driver's license from his wallet and handed it to the officer.² Marron recognized the license as a counterfeit and placed Campa under arrest. About one minute had elapsed since the men entered the kitchen.

Campa, who spoke little or no English, was read Miranda warnings in Spanish and immediately signed a Spanish-language form waiving his rights. He acknowledged his involvement in counterfeiting and consented to a search of his Highland Street apartment. There, he identified keys to open the front door and a locked closet. In the closet, officers discovered a substantial quantity of counterfeit documents as well as equipment for manufacturing false identification materials. A short time later at police headquarters, Campa made additional incriminating statements after again being advised of his rights.

Appellant subsequently moved to suppress the counterfeiting materials found in the Highland Street apartment and his statements to authorities admitting culpability. He argued that the officers did not have the requisite level of suspicion to justify the stop and pat-down search, that his arrest was unlawful, and that his confessions and all physical evidence seized should be suppressed as "fruit of the poisonous tree," Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 487-88 (1963).

After a two-day evidentiary hearing, the district court concluded that the officers had a sufficient basis to detain Campa briefly for the purpose of exploring his relationship to the counterfeit green cards, but that the accompanying frisk was excessive in scope because the officers removed all items from his pockets without regard to whether they might be weapons. The court nonetheless refused to suppress any of the challenged evidence on the theory that its discovery was inevitable given the authority of the police to determine Campa's identity. The court believed that, even with a more limited frisk, Campa either would have provided the New Jersey license voluntarily, or the officers could and would have searched him to obtain it. On appeal, appellant renews his claim that the officers lacked even the reasonable suspicion necessary to conduct an investigatory stop authorized by Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968), and he maintains that the actions they took constituted a de facto arrest that needed to be supported by the higher standard of probable cause. He asserts that neither the record nor case law supports the district court's inevitable discovery theory.

We review the district court's findings of fact for clear error, but give de novo consideration to its legal conclusions. United States v. Cruz, 156 F.3d 22, 26 (lst Cir. 1998). We will uphold a district court's decision to deny a suppression motion if the decision is supported by any reasonable view of the evidence. United States v. McCarthy, 77 F.3d 522, 529 (lst Cir. 1996).

II. Discussion

This case requires us to examine closely two different interactions, minutes apart, between law enforcement officers and appellant. The first occurred in the hallway of the Thornton Street apartment when officers stopped and frisked appellant and Lara-Valirde immediately after their entry into the apartment. The second occurred in the kitchen when the officers demanded identification, prompting appellant to produce the false New Jersey driver's license. Appellant contends that the officers' conduct during the first encounter was unlawful, and he asserts that the license and all other evidence and statements subsequently obtained were fruits of that illegality. He specifically maintains that the unlawful removal of his wallet from his pocket in the hallway led to his turning over the phony New Jersey license and, consequently, to his arrest. Though we agree that the pat-down was flawed, we disagree that it tainted the second encounter. We begin our analysis by reviewing relevant Fourth Amendment jurisprudence.

A. The Terry Stop-and-Frisk Standards

A warrantless search violates the Fourth Amendment unless it falls within one of the few carefully limited exceptions to that important constitutional protection. Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 372 (1993); United States v. Woodrum, 202 F.3d 1, 6 (lst Cir. 2000). A consensual search is one such exception. Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218, 219 (1973); United States v. Forbes, 181 F.3d 1, 5 (lst Cir. 1999). Another was recognized in Terry, which held that a police officer with reasonable suspicion of criminal activity may detain a suspect briefly for questioning aimed at confirming or dispelling his suspicions. See Dickerson, 508 U.S. at 372-73; Woodrum, 202 F.3d at 6. The officer making the stop must possess "specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion." Terry, 392 U.S. at 21; Woodrum, 202 F.3d at 6.

In addition to the stop for questioning, Terry permits a pat-down search for weapons based on an objectively reasonable belief that the suspicious individual is armed and presently dangerous. Dickerson, 508 U.S. at 373. Such a protective search, designed to allow the officer to conduct his investigation without fear of violence, must be "strictly 'limited to that which is necessary for the discovery of weapons.'" Id. (quoting Terry, 392 U.S. at 26); see also Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 146 (1972). Typically, this will be "a limited patting of the outer clothing of the suspect for concealed objects which might be used as instruments of assault." Sibron v. New York, ...