Coleman v. State
| Citation | 553 P.2d 40 |
| Decision Date | 14 July 1976 |
| Docket Number | No. 2331,2331 |
| Parties | Elijah COLEMAN, Appellant, v. STATE of Alaska, Appellee. |
| Court | Supreme Court of Alaska (US) |
Before BOOCHEVER, C. J., and RABINOWITZ, CONNOR, ERWIN and BURKE, JJ.
Elijah Coleman appeals from a conviction on two counts of rape and one count or robbery. Three issues are presented in this appeal: first, whether the trial court erred in failing to suppress evidence which was utilized in securing Coleman's conviction; second, whether the indictment against Coleman should have been dismissed because of alleged irregularities which occurred during the grand jury proceedings; and third, whether the sentence imposed by the trial court was excessive.
In August, 1973, Mrs. S. was employed as a sales clerk in the Salvation Army Store at Sixth and H Streets in Anchorage, Alaska. Because the family car was being repaired, she normally took a bus to her job and, since she usually got off work after the buses had ceased running for the evening, walked to her home near the Russian Jack Springs area.
On the evening of August 15, Mrs. S. left the downtown area at about 7:45 p.m., carrying with her among other items a blue First National Bank money bag with approximately $18.00 of the Salvation Army's money for safekeeping. As she walked along a wooded ski trail through the Russian Jack Springs area, she was attacked from behind by a man, forced off the trial, pushed to the ground, and raped. Subsequently, the assailant asked Mrs. S. whether she had any money, and she surrendered the blue bank bag. Upon being released, she ran home and immediately reported the incident to the Anchorage Police Department by telephone.
The police dispatcher received her call at 9:30 p.m. and immediately relayed it by radio to Officers Walker and Swensen who were riding together on patrol about three-quarters of a mile from the Russian Jack Springs area. The message reached the officers as a 'Code 4' dispatch (indicating a crime in progress or one that has just occurred) to investigate a 'strongarm' robbery, i.e., a robbery accomplished by force but without weapons, which had just taken place near the Russian Jack Springs Golf Course. The dispatch also contained the following information: that the suspect was a short 1 black man wearing a white T-shirt and levis, carrying a blue bank bag containing stolen cash, who had left the scene of the crime in a northbound direction. The dispatch did not contain any information concerning the suspect's mode of transportation.
Although the officers were dispatched to the victim's house, since it was such a short time after the call Officer Walker decided to swing through the Russian Jack Springs area to see if he could intercept the suspect. The officers proceeded to the turnoff to the Russian Jack Springs Golf Course, north of the scene of the crime, and arrived within 1 to 1 1/2 minutes after the police call. There they observed a yellow Fairlane automobile leaving an infrequently used area 2 east of the driveway headed west. As the two vehicles approached each other from opposite directions, the officers saw that the driver of the automobile, who was operating the car in a legal manner, was black, was wearing a white T-shirt, and 'looked short.' One of the officers noted that the driver's facial expression showed a marked reaction to the officers' observations. The officers then made a U-turn and halted the automobile in the manner of a routine traffic stop. The officers radioed that they had stopped the suspect; it was 9:32 p.m. The officers approached the car and the driver was asked for his driver's license. The suspect exited from his car, whereupon Officer Walker observed a blue bank bag on the front floor of the passenger seat. At that point the suspect, identified as Elijah Coleman, was arrested and the bag was seized as evidence.
The grand jury indicted Coleman for rape, sodomy and robbery. Prior to trial he brought motions to dismiss the indictment and to suppress the evidence of the stolen property. Both were denied. Coleman was tried by a superior court jury in April, 1974, and was convicted on the rape and robbery counts but acquitted of the charge of sodomy. Thereafter, he entered a plea of guilty to another charge of rape involving a different victim. The trial court sentenced him, in essence, to ten years imprisonment; and he now appeals from his conviction and sentence.
It is not disputed that probable cause to arrest Coleman existed once the police knew of the existence of the blue bank bag in the front seat of his vehicle. Coleman contends, however, that the police used constitutionally impermissible procedures in discovering the bank bag; specifically, he asserts that the officers had no right to stop his automobile in the first place. The State, on the other hand, argues that the officers' actions in halting Coleman's car were justified under the 'investigative stop' doctrine and thus the bag, which was in plain view when Coleman exited the vehicle, was properly seized.
In two previous cases involving investigative detention not at first amounting to an arrest, this court recognized the principle that a police officer with a reasonable suspicion that imminent public danger exists or serious harm that has recently occurred was caused by a particular person may stop that person. In Goss v. State, 3 a state police officer on patrol shortly after midnight just outside of Anchorage observed a car drive away from the side of a building where a distributorship business was located and proceed for about half a block without its headlights on. The officer followed the car, and after it had turned around and headed in the opposite direction, stopped it. The court concluded that the officer was in his lawful authority in making the stop:
When the officer stopped the car he was doing nothing more than conducting an investigation in response to circumstances that aroused his suspicions. Considering the lateness of the hour, the fact that the car was seen coming from the side of the building rather than from the parking lot in front, and that it was being driven without its headlights on, we believe the police officer had the right and the duty to make a prompt investigation, which required him as a matter of practical necessity to stop the car and question the occupants. 4
In Maze v. State, 5 a city police officer observed the defendant standing on a window sill and holding onto the top of a metal grillwork on the window of a loan company office. The officer shined his flashlight on the defendant, who alighted and walked toward a nightclub. As the defendant neared the entrance of the club, the officer shouted and ran after him. The defendant had run into the club's outside entrance when the officer grabbed him. The officer asked him what he was doing on the window sill of the loan company, and the defendant said he did not know what the officer was talking about. The officer then noted that the window of the loan company office was broken and arrested the defendant. The court noted that cause existed for the stop and for the arrest, stating:
In Goss v. State we held that police officers have the right to stop and question a person under suspicious circumstances, and if probable cause is then found to exist, the person may be arrested. 6
Subsequent to our decisions in Goss and Maze, the United States Supreme Court in Terry v. Ohio 7 likewise adopted the 'investigative stop' concept. In Terry a Cleveland detective with 39 years of experience watched two men alternatively leave a corner on which the other was stationed, walk up a particular street, peer into the window of either a jewelry store or an airline office, and then return to the corner to converse with the other. This procedure was repeated several times by both men. During this time a third man approached the corner, spoke briefly with the two men, and departed. The two men then left the corner and again met the third man on another street. The detective was apprehensive about their actions and suspected them of planning a robbery or burglary. The detective approached the three men, identified himself, and asked for their names. Receiving only a mumbled response, he 'frisked' the men and discovered fully-loaded weapons on two of them. Both men were convicted of the offense of carrying a concealed weapon.
In upholding Terry's conviction 8 the 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. 9
The court, however, rejected the notion that such an investigatory stop and limited search was not subject to the requirements of the Fourth Amendment. The court stated that the central inquiry under the Fourth Amendment is to 'the reasonableness in all the circumstances of the particular governmental invasion of a citizen's personal security.' 10 Thus the governmental intrusion is subject to the Fourth Amendment, and:
'Search' and 'seizure' are not talismans. We therefore reject the notions that the Fourth Amendment does not come into play at all as a limitation upon police conduct if the officers stop short of something called a 'technical arrest' or 'full-blown search.'
In this case there can be no question, then that Officer McFadden 'seized' petitioner and subjected him to a 'search' when he took hold of him and patted down the outer surfaces of his clothing. 11
The court refused to apply the requirement of 'probable cause' contained in the Fourth Amendment to such police actions. The court limited...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
State v. Price-Williams
...and seizure law under their state constitutions.196 The Alaska courts have departed from Terry in a significant way. The seminal case is Coleman v. State .197 In Coleman , the Alaska Supreme Court held that the Terry rule would apply only "where the police officer has a reasonable suspicion......
-
Hansen v. Chon-Lopez
...Dow Pharms., Inc. , 509 U.S. 579, 113 S.Ct. 2786, 125 L.Ed.2d 469 (1993) ; see also Fed. R. Evid. 702.4 See, e.g. , Coleman v. State , 553 P.2d 40, 49 (Alaska 1976) (disapproving of state's reference at grand jury proceeding to evidence that would have been inadmissible at trial, including ......
-
State v. Dorsey
...cert. denied, 434 U.S. 971, 98 S.Ct. 523, 54 L.Ed.2d 461 (1977); State v. Elliott, 626 P.2d 423 (Utah 1981); see Coleman v. State, 553 P.2d 40, 46 n. 19 (Alaska 1976). 2 In the present case, the facts known to Adair did give rise to an articulable suspicion that the occupants of the truck w......
-
State v. Paulsen
...States v. Riccobene, 451 F.2d 586, 587 (3d Cir. 1971); United States v. Narciso, 446 F.Supp. 252, 296 (E.D.Mich.1977); Coleman v. State, 553 P.2d 40, 47-52 (Alaska 1976); State v. Superior Court, 119 Ariz. 286, 288-89, 580 P.2d 747, 749-50 Measured against these principles, we do not believ......