Keenom v. State
| Decision Date | 20 June 2002 |
| Docket Number | No. CR 01-673.,CR 01-673. |
| Citation | 80 S.W.3d 743,349 Ark. 381 |
| Parties | James Patrick KEENOM v. STATE of Arkansas. |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
Taylor Law Firm, by: W.H. Taylor and John Mikesch, Fayetteville, for appellant.
Mark Pryor, Att'y Gen., by: Valerie L. Kelly, Ass't Att'y Gen., Little Rock, for appellee.
At approximately 7:30 p.m. on March 7, 2001, Detective David Jones, of the 19th Judicial District Drug Task Force was off-duty and conducting personal business at the Wal-Mart Supercenter in Bentonville, when he saw a man he considered to appear suspicious, because of his long hair and beard, and because he was pushing a cart containing chemicals that might be used in the manufacture of methamphetamine, including two cans of acetone, several bottles of rubbing alcohol, and several packages of coffee filters.
Detective Jones followed the suspicious customer, appellant James Patrick Keenom, to the parking lot and took his license plate number, which he later checked through the ACIC to determine the man's identity and address. He watched appellant return to the store and talk to another man the detective considered to look suspicious because he had long hair and was holding "Heet" brand fuel cleanser and camping fuel. Detective Jones then watched appellant leave the store and drive away.
Detective Jones called Detective Tony Noblin, also of the 19th Judicial District Drug Task Force, and told him what he had seen. The two decided to go to appellant's residence and perform a "knock and talk" to see if they could acquire consent to search and to see if they could catch him in the act of manufacturing. Detective Noblin testified that they knew they could not obtain a warrant for a nighttime search based on the information they had, and the only way to get on appellant's property was to do a "knock and talk." The officers drove to the Decatur Police Department to get directions to the address. The officers and detectives arrived at the main residence on the property located on a rural, dirt road about six miles outside Decatur and saw appellant enter a house. They did not smell methamphetamine cooking, so they left and went back to the Decatur Police Department to get the officers to come with them. They also decided that because they were shabbily dressed in plain clothes, they should be accompanied by members of the Decatur Police. At the suppression hearing, the detectives testified that they wanted officers with them who could appear in uniforms so as not to unduly frighten the residents when the detectives came to the door. They also admitted that they wanted the, officers with them because it was nighttime, there was a greater likelihood of someone getting hurt, and there were issues of "officer safety."
At 11:30 p.m., the officers and detectives caravanned to the house they believed to be appellant's residence. They knocked on the door of the house and were met by appellant's mother, Frances Keenom. They asked for her son, and she explained that he lived in a trailer house further into the property, approximately 700 feet east of her home. She did not give consent to the police to proceed further into her property, and made no further comment. The police proceeded further into the property to reach appellant's trailer house, passing several chicken houses and other structures, and passing "no trespassing" signs that they stated they did not see.
The facts concerning exactly what transpired after the police arrived at appellant's trailer are disputed. When the officers arrived at appellant's trailer, all agree that he met them outside before they could knock on the door. Appellant testified that their headlights awakened him, and that he only had time to put on a pair of jeans before stepping outside to meet them. The officers stood by their cars with their lights shining on appellant's front door, while the detectives approached appellant, coming within ten feet of him. Appellant was barefoot and wearing only his britches when asked by Detective Jones for permission to search the trailer. All agree that appellant refused to consent. He suggested to the police that they leave and come back in ten minutes, but they responded that they could not do that. The officers remained and continued to question appellant. Appellant testified that during this questioning, he requested to go inside because it was storming and cold and that the police refused to let him return to his trailer and threatened to take all of his belongings if he tried to go inside. Appellant also testified that they did allow him to go to his car to get a jacket, and this testimony was not challenged. After an unspecified amount of questioning, appellant admitted that he had a quarter of a gram of methamphetamine inside the trailer, and at that point Detective Jones testified that Detective Noblin apprised him of his Miranda rights because he had begun to implicate himself in criminal activity. Appellant denied that he was read his Miranda rights. Detective Jones continued to question him and asked appellant if he had some kind of lab operation in his trailer. Appellant responded that he had accepted payment from his friends on previous occasions to allow them to manufacture methamphetamine in his trailer. At that, point, after anywhere from twenty to forty-five minutes of questioning, the detectives arrested him for conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine. The detectives denied that they ever took him into custody before that point. The detectives did not deny that they refused to allow him to go back inside his trailer, but they denied that they threatened appellant.
After arresting appellant, the detectives entered and made a sweep of the residence on the grounds that they had seen the curtains moving while they were talking with appellant, and because they thought a lab might be in operation at that moment. Apparently, they did not consider this "sweep" to be a search because Detective Jones testified that they were only in the trailer a minute or two to make sure there would be no explosion from a meth lab left cooking and that no one was inside the trailer. Detective Jones testified that appellant consented to a search after he was arrested, but that the detectives believed it would be appropriate to go get a search warrant at that time. Detective Noblin testified at the suppression hearing that after Detective Jones left the scene with appellant, he did not try to obtain a night-time search warrant, and that when they were out at appellant's trailer, they were doing something "that the magistrate would not have let us do if we had gone to the magistrate."
Detective Noblin stayed at the residence with one of the uniformed officers to secure the area while Jones obtained a search warrant from Judge Schrantz in Rogers. The magistrate required that they not serve the search warrant until daybreak, and so it was served at the residence at 6:05 a.m. the next morning. As a result of the search, the officers reported finding weapons, drug paraphernalia, and lab materials, and appellant was charged with manufacturing methamphetamine and simultaneous possession of drugs and firearms.
Appellant moved for suppression of the evidence obtained from the search on the grounds that they were obtained in violation of his Constitutional rights. That motion was denied after a hearing and appellant changed his plea from "not guilty" to a "conditional guilty plea." He reserved the right to appeal from an adverse judgment of the motion to suppress evidence, ensuring that if he prevailed upon appeal he would be allowed to withdraw his guilty plea. The trial court found appellant guilty and he was sentenced to twenty years' imprisonment in the Arkansas Department of Correction, five years of which was suspended upon certain conditions. We conclude that appellant was denied his rights under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, and we reverse.
We first address appellant's argument that his Fourth Amendment rights were violated by the search and seizure performed by the State. We review the lower court's ruling by making an independent determination based on the totality of the circumstances and viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the State. Griffin v. State, 347 Ark. 788, 67 S.W.3d 582 (2002). This court will reverse only if the trial court's ruling is clearly against the preponderance of the evidence. Burris v. State, 330 Ark. 66, 954 S.W.2d 209 (1997).
In Arkansas, "knock and talk" is a label for a procedure that is defined as follows:
Absent express orders from the person in possession against any possible trespass, there is no rule of private or public conduct which makes it illegal per se, or a condemned invasion of the person's right of privacy, for anyone openly and peaceably, at high noon, to walk up the steps and knock on the front door of any man's "castle" with the honest intent of asking questions of the occupant thereof whether the questioner be a pollster, a salesman, or an officer of the law.
Griffin, supra. (Emphasis added.) (citing Davis v. United States, 327 F.2d 301, 303 (9th Cir.1964)).
Our recent decision in Scott v. State, 347 Ark. 767, 67 S.W.3d 567 (2002), sets out the standard for determining when a "knock and talk" investigation becomes a seizure for purposes of Fourth Amendment analysis. We said:
[a] seizure does not occur simply because a police officer approaches an individual and asks a few questions. Id. A seizure occurs when a reasonable person would not feel "free to leave." Michigan v. Chesternut, 486 U.S. 567 [108 S.Ct. 1975, 100 L.Ed.2d 565] (1988). The "free to leave" analysis, however, is not an accurate measure of the coercive effect of an encounter in situations where a person would have no desire to leave, such as where the person is seated on a bus. Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429 [111...
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