Holt v. US

• Decision Date: 18 April 1996
• Docket Number: No. 95-CF-17.,95-CF-17.
• Citation: 675 A.2d 474
• Parties: Andrew C. HOLT, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES, Appellee.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

675 A.2d 474

Andrew C. HOLT, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES, Appellee.

No. 95-CF-17.

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued March 7, 1996.

Decided April 18, 1996.

Robert C. Bonsib, Gaithersburg, for appellant.

Magdalena A. Bell, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom Eric H. Holder, Jr., United States Attorney, and John R. Fisher, Roy W. McLeese, III, and Eileen F. Sheehan, Assistant United States Attorneys, were on the brief, for appellee.

Before FERREN, TERRY, and RUIZ, Associate Judges.

FERREN, Associate Judge:

A jury convicted appellant Holt of assaulting a police officer with a dangerous weapon, D.C.Code § 22-505(b) (1989 Repl. & 1995 Supp.), and possession of a firearm during a crime of violence or dangerous crime (PFCV), id. § 22-3204(b). On appeal, Holt contends the trial court erred in (1) admitting in evidence clothing seized from Holt while he was receiving emergency medical treatment at Washington Hospital Center, (2) admitting in evidence a "showup" identification of Holt conducted at the hospital, (3) permitting the prosecutor to impeach Holt with a prior conviction for possession of marijuana, (4) refusing to allow a requested jury instruction concerning the charge of assault on a police officer with a dangerous weapon, and (5) refusing to dismiss one of the two charged PFCV counts. We affirm.

I.

On the night of December 17, 1993, Kevin Morris, an off-duty Metropolitan Police officer working as a security guard at 601 Edgewood Terrace, N.E., heard rapid gunfire outside the apartment complex. Officer Morris then witnessed two armed males chasing a small group of persons west on the 600 block of Edgewood Terrace. After observing the two men for twenty to thirty seconds from the rear of the apartment complex, Officer Morris went outside to watch the men, who were now running back in his direction. When both men were "three car lengths" away, Officer Morris identified himself as a police officer. One of the men turned and pointed his gun directly at Morris, who opened fire and pursued both men on foot until he lost sight of them.

After returning to 601 Edgewood Terrace, Officer Morris discovered Darnell Parker, one of the individuals who had been chased by the two gunmen, on the ground with multiple gunshot wounds. Using his police radio, Officer Morris requested an ambulance and broadcast a lookout for two black males of slender build between five feet ten inches and six feet tall, wearing dark hats, dark coats, dark pants, and dark shoes. Minutes later, Parker was taken by ambulance to Washington Hospital Center's Med-Star Unit, and two Metropolitan Police detectives who regularly patrolled the area, Gerald Rich and Macklay Lucas, arrived at the scene of the shooting.

Fifteen to twenty minutes after the Edgewood Terrace shooting, Andrew Holt admitted himself into Washington Hospital Center's emergency room with a gunshot wound to the leg. Pursuant to the practice of area hospitals, Washington Hospital Center informed the police of Holt's admission. A police dispatcher informed Detective Rich, who was investigating the scene of the shooting with Officer Morris, that a possible suspect had arrived at Washington Hospital Center. Detective Rich, in turn, contacted Detective Willie Wade, who had been assigned to monitor the condition of Darnell Parker at Washington Hospital Center, to investigate whether the suspect had received his injuries as a result of the Edgewood Terrace shooting.

Detective Wade and Officer Delacey, a police officer dispatched earlier to Washington Hospital Center, located Holt and identified themselves. At that time, Holt already had received medical treatment and was lying on a hospital gurney in the emergency room. Detective Wade, who had only limited knowledge of the circumstances surrounding the earlier shooting, asked Holt how he had been shot. When Holt replied that he had been shot at the Edgewood Terrace plaza as he was going to use a public telephone, Detective Wade instructed Officer Delacey to inspect a visible, unsealed plastic bag under Holt's gurney in which hospital personnel had stored Holt's clothing before treating him. Inside the bag, the detective discovered a black jacket, black trousers, black shoes, and other articles of clothing consistent with Officer Morris's lookout description. Wade contacted Detective Rich by police radio and advised him to bring Officer Morris to the hospital in order to view Holt.

Detective Rich informed Officer Morris on the way to Washington Hospital Center that he would be viewing a possible suspect in the shooting. According to the testimony of Detective Rich and Officer Morris, however, Rich did not inform Morris that the suspect's appearance and clothes matched Morris's earlier radio lookout. When Officer Morris arrived at the hospital, Detective Rich and Lucas accompanied him to the room where Holt was located. Morris then went in alone to the area where Holt was lying on a gurney in his hospital smock. Officer Morris returned and told Detective Rich that Holt was the individual who earlier had pointed a gun at him. Morris then viewed Holt a second time in order to confirm the identification. After this second viewing, which lasted twenty to thirty seconds, Morris became "a hundred percent certain" that Holt was the individual who had pointed the gun at him, because Holt's facial expression matched the "puzzled" expression Morris had seen on the gunman earlier.

Based upon Officer Morris's identification and the clothes contained in the plastic bag, Detective Rich placed Holt under arrest at the hospital. Immediately thereafter, Detective Rich obtained the bag of clothing underneath Holt's gurney from hospital personnel. At the police station, Officer Morris identified the clothes in that bag as the clothes worn by the person he had chased earlier in the evening.

On March 9, 1994, a grand jury brought a four-count indictment against Holt charging him with assault with intent to kill while armed for the shooting that took place outside 601 Edgewood Terrace, D.C.Code §§ 22-501, -3202; assaulting, resisting or interfering with a police officer with a dangerous weapon for aiming a gun at Officer Morris, id. § 22-505(b); and two counts of PFCV predicated on each of the first two offenses, id. § 22-3204(b).

Before the jury trial began on April 14, 1994, the trial court held a hearing to resolve various pretrial motions. Holt had moved to suppress the bag of clothing seized at the hospital, to suppress Officer Morris's "show-up" identification of Holt, and to dismiss the fourth count of the indictment charging Holt with PFCV based upon the assault charge. The trial court denied each motion.

At trial, the government sought to establish that Holt had fired shots outside 601 Edgewood Terrace and had pointed a gun at Officer Morris. The government's evidence included, in addition to Morris's "showup" identification and the clothes seized by the police, the testimonies of Officer Morris, of Detectives Rich, Wade, and Lucas, and of Darnell Parker. According to the defense theory, Holt innocently had been at the scene when the shooting occurred, had been wounded as he attempted to flee, and never had aimed a gun at Officer Morris. Holt, who was impeached by prior convictions for possession of marijuana and unauthorized use of a vehicle, testified on his own behalf.

On April 27, 1994, the jury found Holt guilty of assault on a police officer with a dangerous weapon and PFCV but acquitted him of the charges attributable to the shooting that took place outside 601 Edgewood Terrace. Holt was sentenced to a term of forty months to ten years in prison for the assault and to a term of five to fifteen years for PFCV, to run concurrently with his sentence for the assault. Holt filed a timely notice of appeal.

II.

A.

Holt contends the trial court erred in admitting in evidence the clothing seized by the police at Washington Hospital Center. Our standard of review for a trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress tangible evidence requires that "the facts and all reasonable inferences therefrom must be viewed in favor of sustaining the trial court's ruling." Peay v. United States, 597 A.2d 1318, 1320 (D.C.1991) (en banc); accord Powell v. United States, 649 A.2d 1082, 1093 (D.C.1994). Factual findings will not be disturbed if supported by substantial evidence, see United States v. Alexander, 428 A.2d 42, 50 (D.C. 1981), and conclusions of law are reviewed de novo. See Patton v. United States, 633 A.2d 800, 814 (D.C.1993).

Holt argues, primarily, that the seizure of his bag of clothing was the "fruit of a poisonous tree," Nardone v. United States, 308 U.S. 338, 341, 60 S.Ct. 266, 268, 84 L.Ed. 307 (1939), because the initial inspection of his clothing was an unlawful search. Holt's argument relies on the proposition that, but for that initial inspection, he would not have been identified and arrested at the hospital, and thus the police would not have been able to seize his clothing before he left the hospital.¹ The pivotal issue, therefore, is whether the inspection of Holt's clothing was an unconstitutional search requiring exclusion of the clothing from the trial under the "tainted fruits" doctrine. See United States v. Ceccolini, 435 U.S. 268, 273-79, 98 S.Ct. 1054, 1058-62, 55 L.Ed.2d 268 (1978); United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 354, 94 S.Ct. 613, 622-23, 38 L.Ed.2d 561 (1974); Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 484-87, 83 S.Ct. 407, 415-17, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963); Nardone, 308 U.S. at 341, 60 S.Ct. at 267-68; Patton, 633 A.2d at 816.

Holt argues, more particularly, that the inspection of his clothing was not justified under any exception to the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement. As a threshold matter, we must decide whether the inspection amounted to a "search" implicating Holt's Fourth Amendment rights. See U.S. CONST. amend. IV. It has long been the case that invocation of the Fourth...