City of St. Paul v. Vaughn

• Decision Date: 12 December 1975
• Docket Number: No. 45960,45960
• Citation: 306 Minn. 337,237 N.W.2d 365
• Parties: CITY OF ST. PAUL, Appellant, v. Dennis K. VAUGHN, Respondent.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

Page 365

237 N.W.2d 365

306 Minn. 337

CITY OF ST. PAUL, Appellant, v. Dennis K. VAUGHN, Respondent.

No. 45960.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Dec. 12, 1975.

Syllabus by the Court

1. The police acted reasonably and not in violation of the constitutional rights of defendant in attempting to stop the automobile he was driving where they did so on the basis of information that the driver's license of the person they mistakenly believed to be operating the automobile was suspended.

2. The police were warranted in continuing to pursue a defendant who, rather than making himself subject to identification, quickly exited the automobile and entered a drycleaning establishment, open to the public, carrying in his possession an article the police believed to be a .45-caliber pistol, and then attempted to hide it inside the establishment.

3. The hiding of the article, which turned out to be an eyeglass case containing illegal articles, constituted abandonment by defendant under the facts of this case, entitling the police to locate it, open it, and inspect the contents and to use the illegal articles as evidence in prosecuting defendant.

Warren Spannaus, Atty. Gen., St. Paul, Pierre N. Regnier, City Atty., Thomas R. Hughes and Daniel H. Mabley, Asst. City Attys., St. Paul, for appellant.

Michael F. Fetsch, Neighborhood Justice Center, St. Paul, for respondent.

Heard before SHERAN, C.J., and OTIS and YETKA, JJ., and considered and decided by the court en banc.

YETKA, Justice.

This is an appeal by the city of St. Paul pursuant to Minn.St. 632.11 subd. 1(3), challenging an order of the Ramsey County Municipal Court suppressing certain items of evidence. The defendant is charged with possession of a hypodermic syringe in violation of § 280.03 of the St. Paul Legislative Code. ¹ A Rasmussen hearing was held March 26, 1975, before Judge George O. Petersen to determine the admissibility of an eyeglass case and its contents--two hypodermic syringes, a McDonald stir spoon, a cotton swab, a cap or 'cooker,' and some burnt matches. Defendant's motion to suppress was granted May 12, 1975. We reverse.

On the morning of November 29, 1974, St. Paul Police Officers Charles A. Zajac and Robert R. Patsy were on routine patrol in the Selby-Dale area of St. Paul. As they were proceeding west on Selby Avenue between St. Albans and Grotto, the defendant, driving east on Selby, passed them. The officers mistakenly believed the defendant to be his brother, Frederick Vaughn, whom they knew, on the basis of information a month or more old, ² to be under a driver's license suspension.

Officers Zajac and Patsy made a U-turn on Selby and pursued the defendant with the squad car's emergency light on. ³ Before they could overtake the defendant, he pulled over to the curb and stopped in front of a drycleaner's establishment at 636 Selby Avenue, approximately a block and a half from the point at which the officers had made their U-turn.

As the officers pulled their squad car up behind the defendant's car, they observed him slide over to the passenger's side of the vehicle, quickly exit, and run into the cleaning establishment. The officers then realized that the defendant was not Frederick Vaughn. ⁴ Officer Zajac, observing what he believed to be the butt end of a .45-caliber automatic pistol in the hand of defendant, followed defendant into the cleaner's. As Officer Zajac entered the room, he observed defendant tuck something underneath the counter. Zajac retrieved the item, an eyeglass case, and without any suspicion of what its contents might reveal, opened it. Inside the case he discovered the syringes and the other paraphernalia. Defendant was then placed under arrest.

The trial court based its order suppressing the eyeglass case and its contents on two grounds: 'First, he ruled that when Officers Zajac and Patsy learned that defendant was not Frederick Vaughn they no longer had probable cause for further investigation of defendant. Secondly, assuming a reasonable basis from Officer Zajac's observation of what he believed to be an automatic pistol, when he discovered it was an eyeglass case, he had no basis for continuing with a search of the case. The trial court rejected the prosecution's contention that the eyeglass case had been abandoned and that defendant therefore lacked standing to complain about the search.

The issues raised on this appeal are:

(1) Were the police reasonably warranted in making an investigatory stop of defendant's automobile based on information, a month or more old, that the driver's license of the person they mistakenly believed to be operating the automobile was suspended?

(2) Once having learned of their mistaken belief as to the identity of the defendant, were the police reasonably warranted in continuing their pursuit of defendant upon observing him quickly exit the automobile carrying what one officer believed to be a .45-caliber automatic pistol and run into a drycleaning establishment?

(3) Did the defendant 'abandon' the eyeglass case containing narcotics paraphernalia by placing it underneath the counter of the drycleaning establishment into which he had run while being pursued by police?

At the outset, we feel compelled to state that policemen are average citizens and are not endowed with omniscience. They cannot be expected to know every decision of the courts applicable to the situations with which they are confronted. Frequently they are compelled to act quickly, and on instinct, and with common sense.

While the courts should zealously guard the individual rights of all citizens, we should not adopt rules that so restrict the police that, because of fear of reprimand, they will not act in situations where they should act. Therefore, in a case such as this, the essential question is whether, under all of the circumstances, the police acted reasonably and in such a manner as not to violate the basic constitutional rights held by every citizen.

Looking at this case in that light, what did the police do? They observed an automobile driven by a person they believed to be under driver's license suspension. They followed the car. The driver stopped, but did not allow himself to be identified. If, at this point, he had allowed the police to stop and identify him, the matter would have had to end there. Instead, defendant dashed out, holding something in his possession which looked like the butt of a gun, and went into a drycleaning establishment and disposed of that article.

We see nothing in the rule set out in Terry v. Ohio, 392, U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968), which would prohibit the police from following the vehicle in this case; nor have we found any decisions which would prohibit them from picking up the evidence as they did.

In Terry, the Supreme Court said:

'* * * (I)n justifying the particular intrusion the police officer must be able to point to specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion.' 392 U.S. 21, 88 S.Ct. 1880, 20 L.Ed.2d 906 (1968). ⁵

The Supreme Court, in the case of Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 145, 92 S.Ct. 1921, 1923, 32 L.Ed.2d 612, 616 (1971), said:

'In Terry this Court recognized that 'a police officer may in appropriate circumstances and in an appropriate manner approach a person for purposes of investigating possibly criminal behavior even though there is no probable cause to make an arrest.' (392 U.S. 22, 88 S.Ct. 1868.) The Fourth Amendment does not require a policeman who lacks the precise level of information necessary for probable cause to arrest to simply shrug his shoulders and allow a crime to occur or a criminal to escape. On the contrary, Terry recognizes that it may be the essence of good police work to adopt an intermediate response. (392 U.S. 23, 88 S.Ct. 1868.) A brief stop of a suspicious individual, in order to determine his identity or to maintain the status quo momentarily while obtaining more information, may be most reasonable in light of the facts known to the officer at the time. (392 U.S. 21--22, 88 S.Ct. 1868; citations omitted.)'

Officer Zajac testified that he personally had run a license check on defendant's brother, Frederick Vaughn, approximately a month before this incident. Officer Patsy also testified that he had personal knowledge of Frederick Vaughn's suspension. However, it dated back to the preceding summer, a time span of 3 to 5 months.

A driver's license may be revoked for a period of 30 to 90 days for driving while under the influence, Minn.St. 169.121; for 6 months under our implied-consent law, § 169.123; and for longer periods under the general provisions for revocation, § 171.17, and suspension, § 171.18. Given those periods of suspension or revocation, and absent any knowledge on the part of Officers Zajac and Patsy that Vaughn's license had been reinstated, ⁶ the stop here is not unreasonable under the standard set forth in Terry v. Ohio, supra, and applied to automobile stops by this court in State v. McKinley, Minn., 232 N.W.2d 906 (1975). ⁷ The added fact of mistaken identity should not render the stop invalid. The trial court apparently found that the officers acted in good faith, honestly believing that defendant was Frederick Vaughn. ⁸ Determining the identity of a person observed for only a few moments as he passed Officer Zajac's and Patsy's squad car, and determining whether his license was currently suspended, certainly seems to be a legitimate purpose of investigative stops.

The only reasonable inference which can be drawn from the testimony, and which is not rebutted elsewhere in the record, seems to be that the police officers were justified in believing that defendant was attempting to escape their pursuit.

'In Sibron v. New York (392 U.S. 40, 88 S.Ct. 1889, 20 L.Ed.2d 917) (citation omitted) the court points out that '* * * deliberately furtive actions and flight at the approach of strangers...