Berry v. State
| Decision Date | 20 September 2019 |
| Docket Number | CR-18-0233 |
| Parties | Frederick Leterrence Berry v. State of Alabama |
| Court | Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals |
Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the advance sheets of Southern Reporter. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Alabama Appellate Courts, 300 Dexter Avenue, Montgomery, Alabama 36104-3741 ((334) 229-0649), of any typographical or other errors, in order that corrections may be made before the opinion is printed in Southern Reporter.
Appeal from Pike Circuit Court
Frederick Leterrence Berry appeals his guilty-plea conviction for possession of a controlled substance, see § 13A-12-212(a)(1), Ala. Code 1975, and his sentence of 24 months in prison. That sentence was suspended and he was ordered to serve 24 months of supervised probation. Before pleading guilty, Berry preserved and reserved his right to appeal the circuit court's denial of his motion to suppress evidence discovered and seized as the result of a warrantless arrest.
On April 6, 2017, a be-on-the-lookout bulletin was issued to officers with the Troy Police Department for a female who had been reported by her family as a missing person. Lt. Matthew Raiti located the missing female's vehicle in a motel parking lot. Lt. Raiti spoke to the motel clerk, who directed him to room 120. Lt. Raiti knocked on the door to Room 120 but received no response. Lt. Raiti knocked again and heard noise coming from inside the motel room. The officer could see through a gap in the curtains a male walking toward the door while a female, who matched the description of the missing female, walked toward the bathroom.
The male opened the door, and Lt. Raiti spoke to him about the missing female. Berry identified himself to Lt. Raiti. Lt. Raiti gave Berry's name to police dispatch and learned that there were two outstanding warrants for Berry's arrest.
Berry was placed under arrest, and Lt. Raiti performed a search incident to arrest. In Berry's right front pocket, Lt. Raiti found 15 Alprazolam pills; 3 blue oval pills, which he could not identify; and cash. After confirming that the female in the motel room was the missing female, Lt. Raiti took Berry to the police station for processing. There Berry was given copies of the outstanding warrants for his arrest.
Berry argues on appeal, as he did below, that his arrest was illegal because Lt. Raiti did not have possession of the arrest warrants at the time Berry was placed under arrest. Thus, Berry asserts, that his arrest was illegal and that the drug evidence was due to be suppressed as the product of an illegal arrest.
Here, Lt. Raiti was the only witness and the facts are not in dispute. Therefore, this Court will review de novo the circuit court's denial of Berry's motion to suppress. See State v. Otwell, 733 So. 2d 950, 952 (Ala. Crim. App. 1999) (citing State v. Hill, 690 So. 2d 1201 (Ala. 1996); Barnes v. State, 704 So. 2d 487 (Ala. Crim. App. 1997)).
Berry argues that his arrest did not comply with § 15-10-3(a)(6) because his outstanding arrest warrants were not issued for the "commission of a felony or misdemeanor."Indeed, Lt. Raiti testified that the arrest warrants were issued by the Troy Municipal Court for "possession of marijuana second and ... driving while [his license was] revoked," (R. 12), both of which are misdemeanor offenses. See §§ 13A-12-214(b) and 32-6-19(a)(1), Ala. Code 1975. However, Lt. Raiti later clarified that the warrants were capias warrants. "Capias" is "[a]ny of various types of writs that require an officer to take a named defendant into custody[, and] is often issued when a respondent fails to appear or when an obligor has failed to pay child support." Black's Law Dictionary, 249-50 (10th ed. 2014). Lt. Raiti did not specifically identify the acts or omissions that led to the issuance of Berry's capias warrants, but did explain that capias warrants are typically issued after "they've been in front of a judge and have pled guilty or been found guilty and essentially they owe money to the Court or ... [are] not complying with conditions of their probation." (R. 18.) Lt. Raiti agreed on cross-examination that, despite his earlier testimony, neither capias warrant was a warrant of arrest for second-degree possession of marijuana or driving while his license was revoked.
Ex parte Brownlee, 535 So. 2d 218, 219 (Ala. 1988). It is unclear from the record why the capias warrants were issued for Berry's arrest. Stated differently, the State failed to demonstrate that Lt. Raiti had "actual knowledge that a warrant for [Berry's] arrest for the commission of a felony or misdemeanor" had been issued. § 15-10-3(a)(6) (emphasis added).
In Johnson v. State, 675 So. 2d 512, 513 (Ala. Crim. App. 1995), this Court held that, because the appellant's arrest warrant, which was issued for contempt of court, "was not for the commission of a felony or a misdemeanor, the arresting officer could not legally arrest the appellant without personally possessing the arrest warrant." Here, Lt. Raiti did not possess the arrest warrants and the State failed to carry its burden to demonstrate that Lt. Raiti had actual knowledge that the arrest warrants had been issued for thecommission of a felony or misdemeanor. This Court holds that Berry's arrest, as was the arrest in Johnson, was unlawful.
The State asserts on appeal that, even if Berry's arrest was unlawful under § 15-10-3, the drug evidence was still admissible under the good-faith exception. "The good faith exception provides that evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment by officers acting in objectively reasonable reliance on a warrant issued by a neutral and detached magistrate need not be excluded from the State's case-in-chief even if the warrant is ultimately found to be invalid." Ex parte Morgan, 641 So. 2d 840, 843 (Ala. 1994) (citing United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897 (1984)). Here, though, Lt. Raiti was not relying on the judgment of another. Instead, it was Lt. Raiti's own mistake of law in failing to comply with § 15-10-3(a)(6). Further, the language of § 15-10-3(a)(6) is straightforward and unambiguous. Under the circumstances, Lt. Raiti's mistake of law was unreasonable. See Morgan, 641 So. 2d at 843 (). See also Heien v. North Carolina, 574 U.S. 54 (2014) (). An officer's objectively unreasonable mistake of law cannot justify application of the good-faith exception.
The State failed to carry its burden to show that Berry's arrest was lawful. This Court has recognized that the "Constitution of the United States, as interpreted by the Supreme Court, compels a holding that evidence seized as a result of an unlawful arrest is inadmissible." State v. Phillips, 517 So. 2d 648, 652 (Ala. Crim. App. 1987) (citing Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471 (1963); Lawrence v. Henderson, 478 F.2d 705 (5th Cir. 1973); Ingram v. State, 45 Ala. App. 108, 226 So. 2d 169 (1969)). Therefore, the circuit court erred in denying Berry's motion to suppress the drug evidence found in his possession incident to his arrest.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
The main opinion reverses the circuit court's denial of Frederick Leterrence Berry's motion to suppress drug evidence found in his possession incident to his arrest, concluding that "[t]he State failed to carry its burden to show that Berry's arrest was lawful." ___ So. 3d at ___. Because the main opinion conflicts with cases from this Court, the Alabama Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court of the United States, I respectfully dissent.
As noted in the main opinion, in April 2017 the Troy Police Department was searching for a female who had been reported missing by her family. While looking for her, Lt. Matthew Raiti saw her vehicle in the parking lot of a Motel 6. After speaking with the clerk at the front desk of the motel, Lt. Raiti went to room 120 and knocked...
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