Crayton v. State
| Decision Date | 15 July 2020 |
| Docket Number | No. 2789,2789 |
| Parties | ALIEU THOMAS CRAYTON v. STATE OF MARYLAND |
| Court | Court of Special Appeals of Maryland |
Circuit Court for Montgomery County
Case No: 133489C
UNREPORTED
Graeff, Beachley, Alpert, Paul E. (Senior Judge, Specially Assigned), JJ.
Opinion by Graeff, J.
*This is an unreported opinion, and it may not be cited in any paper, brief, motion, or other document filed in this Court or any other Maryland Court as either precedent within the rule of stare decisis or as persuasive authority. Md. Rule 1-104.
Alieu Thomas Crayton, appellant, was charged in the Circuit Court for Montgomery County with multiple firearms offenses. Following a jury trial, he was convicted of possession of a regulated firearm while under age 21 and possession of a regulated firearm while disqualified. The court sentenced appellant to five years' imprisonment, all but six months suspended, for the illegal possession while disqualified conviction, to be followed by five years' supervised probation upon release. The other count merged.
On appeal, appellant presents the following questions for this Court's review, which we have rephrased slightly, as follows:
For the reasons set forth below, we shall affirm the circuit court.
On November 14, 2017, at approximately 4:20 p.m., the Montgomery County Police received an anonymous complaint that several African-American males, between 17 and 18 years old, were smoking controlled dangerous substances ("CDS") in the basement laundry room of an apartment building located at 3770 Bel Pre Road, Silver Spring, Maryland. This area was considered to be a high crime area. MontgomeryCounty Police Officer Josue Zelaya and Officer Luke Hess responded to the scene with several other police officers.
When the officers approached, they saw four individuals inside the foyer of the building through the glass entranceway. Officers Zelaya and Hess were wearing their police uniforms, and after seeing the officers, two of the individuals, one wearing a black face mask, ran down the stairs toward the basement of the building. The officers followed. Officer Zelaya turned his body camera on while pursuing the individuals down the stairs.
At the basement level of the building, Officer Zelaya opened a door located at the foot of the stairs to the laundry area, and he saw the two individuals crouched down near an interior door leading to a locked storage area room, stuffing something underneath the door. The officers placed the two individuals, one of whom was appellant, in handcuffs. Officer Zelaya then took a pocketknife and opened the locked storage room door. On the other side of the door, he found a black handgun, a small bag of marijuana, and a bag with crack cocaine. The officers arrested appellant and the other individual and took them to the police station.
At a hearing on appellant's motion to suppress, Officer Zelaya testified that he was a member of the County District Community Action Team assigned to "high crime areas" involving "drug activity," and he had responded to the area near 3770 Bel Pre Road on multiple prior occasions. He testified that the area, comprised of several residential apartment buildings, was considered a "high spot" for "drug-related activity." He hadresponded once before to that same apartment building for a drug complaint that residents in the apartment building were "smoking [controlled dangerous substances]."
On November 14, 2017, Officer Zelaya and other officers responded to 3770 Bel Pre Road within five minutes after receiving an anonymous complaint that several African-American males were smoking CDS in the basement of the building. Officer Zelaya testified that, when he arrived in his patrol vehicle with Officer Hess, both of whom were wearing their police uniforms, he approached the apartment building and saw four individuals inside the front foyer of the building, visible through the glass entranceway. The four individuals, who matched the description provided in the call, fled, with two of them running down the stairs, toward the basement laundry room, the area described in the complaint.
Officer Zelaya pursued the two individuals that fled down the stairs. He explained the reason that he "gave chase" as follows:
The nature of the call of the CDS that was given. One of the males that was observed running down the stairs was observed wearing a black ski mask covering his face. So, the nature of the call, knowing that it's a high crime area and we get several calls for individuals smoking CDS in the buildings I believe that they were trying to discard said CDS.
Officer Zelaya was wearing a body camera, and recorded footage from that encounter was admitted into evidence. The video showed the officer pursue the individuals down the stairs from the front foyer level to the basement level of the apartment building. Appellant was wearing a black ski mask, partially obscuring his face, during the foot pursuit.
Officer Zelaya then opened the door to the laundry area and saw these individuals crouched down near an interior door leading to a locked storage area in the room. They "were stuffing some unknown items underneath the door[.]"
Officer Zelaya and Officer Hess placed appellant and the other individual in handcuffs and detained them. He explained that they handcuffed the individuals because they matched the description of the individuals believed to have been smoking CDS in the building, to detain them from further flight, and to investigate "what they put under the door which [he] suspected was CDS based on the original call."1
Immediately after detaining them, Officer Zelaya took a pocketknife and opened the locked storage door. Inside that door, he found a "black handgun, a small bag of . . . a leafy green substance that [he] identified as marijuana, and a separate bag with a white, rock-like substance that [he] identified as crack cocaine." Officer Zelaya testified that he believed that appellant and the other individual had "in fact, tried to dispose of the drugs that were located and the handgun."
On cross-examination, Officer Zelaya agreed that, when he arrived, he did not see any drug activity nor any smoke. He also did not recall "smelling anything" during the encounter.
After hearing argument, the court denied the motion to suppress. The court found that the officer's testimony that the area was known as a "high crime" area was credible and based on "numerous drug complaints." After receiving the anonymous call of sevenAfrican-American males, aged 17 to 18 years of age, smoking CDS in the basement of the building, Officer Zelaya and Officer Hess responded in full uniform and approached the building. The officers saw, through the glass front doors of the building, four African-American males of the approximate age given in the description provided. As the officers approached the glass-enclosed front entrance, two of the men fled into the building and down the stairs. The court noted that the officer's body camera video footage showed that one of the two men who fled was "wearing a full ski mask inside a building as he flees from these two police officers who are approaching in uniform."
The court then found that Officer Zelaya ran down the stairs, opened the door to the landing area located on the basement level, "and as he does that he is then able to see these two individuals who are crouched at the front door to a common utility room in the building and he continues to hurry down." The individuals were then detained and placed in handcuffs by the two officers. The court then ruled as follows:
Officer Zelaya testified similarly at trial. After responding to the location in response to an anonymous 911 call about "suspicious activity" in the area, Officer Zelaya observed four individuals seated on the stairs. When two of those individuals ran "down the interior steps of the building," Officer Zelaya chased them. At the bottom of the stairs, on the basement level, Officer Zelaya opened a gray door leading to the laundry room. Inside that room, he saw appellant, wearing a black ski mask over his face, and the other individual "crouched down" in front of a locked door leading to an interior common storage area and "sliding items under the door." When Officer Zelaya opened the locked storage door, he found a loaded black handgun was on the floor, just inside the door to the common storage area.2
The police then searched ap...
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