Lapace v. State

• Decision Date: 17 October 2018
• Docket Number: Case No. 2D17-1493
• Citation: 257 So.3d 588
• Parties: Michael Frank LAPACE, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

257 So.3d 588

Michael Frank LAPACE, Appellant,

v.STATE of Florida, Appellee.

Case No. 2D17-1493

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Second District.

Opinion filed October 17, 2018.

Howard L. Dimmig, II, Public Defender, and Karen M. Kinney, Assistant Public Defender, Bartow, for Appellant.

Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Tallahassee; and David Campbell, Assistant Attorney General, Tampa, for Appellee.

CRENSHAW, Judge.

Michael Lapace appeals his convictions and sentences after pleading nolo contendere to a number of drug related charges. Mr. Lapace entered his pleas after the trial court denied his motion to suppress evidence obtained as a result of a warrantless search of a residence, reserving the right to appeal the adverse ruling. We reverse the trial court's denial of Mr. Lapace's motion to suppress because the evidence presented did not support the trial court's finding that the deputies reasonably believed that exigent circumstances existed that justified immediate entry into the residence without a warrant.

The testimony at the suppression hearing revealed that on September 4, 2016, two Manatee County Sheriff's deputies were responding to an unknown law enforcement problem call. The person who called 911 did not know her exact address and was giving the dispatcher landmarks around her location. At some point, the caller hung up but answered when the dispatcher called back and continued to try and relay the address, which was eventually determined by the cell phone satellite ping. No testimony was elicited at the hearing regarding who had called 911 or what crime or problem the caller had been reporting.

When the deputies arrived at the address provided by dispatch, they saw a woman parked in a car in an empty lot across from the address provided. The deputies approached the woman and asked if she knew why they had been dispatched to that location. The woman responded that she had no idea. As the deputies continued toward the house, and as the woman was pulling away to leave, she yelled out the window that her ex-boyfriend was inside the house and that he had a warrant out for his arrest and she stated his first name. At the hearing, the deputy testified that he could not remember what name she had given but remembered that it started with an "M" and thought it was either Michael or Matthew. The deputies did not know the name of this woman until after they had Mr. Lapace in custody.

The deputies proceeded to knock on the door of the house. Heather Lawson answered the deputies' knock but refused to open the door, stating that she had just been beaten up by an unknown woman. The deputies advised Ms. Lawson that the other woman was no longer there and that it was safe to come out. Ms. Lawson opened the door and appeared to be nervous and hesitant to speak to the deputies. She told them that a woman she did not know had knocked on her door and that they got into a physical altercation. Ms. Lawson had a cut on her foot and a red mark on her leg, where Ms. Lawson indicated that the unknown woman had bitten her.

The deputies asked Ms. Lawson if anyone else was inside the house. Ms. Lawson hesitated, looked back into the house, and stated, "No, and you can't come inside." The deputy testifying stated that he did not believe Ms. Lawson because the woman in the car had told them that there was a male inside and because Ms. Lawson seemed reluctant to answer any questions. At that point, the deputy testified that he believed there was a possible domestic dispute of some sort and believed that he needed to check on the welfare of anyone who may have been inside the house. The deputy acknowledged that based on the injuries observed on Ms. Lawson, any domestic battery would have been a first-degree misdemeanor.

Ms. Lawson was instructed to get her identification, and when she turned to go into the house, the deputies followed her inside. When Ms. Lawson realized they were trying to follow her inside, she again told them that they could not come in and continued to protest while the deputies proceeded to search the house.

Only one of the deputies testified at the hearing. The deputy testified that prior to knocking on the door, he did not hear any yelling or anything else coming from inside the house. There were no trails of blood or anything that would lead one to believe that someone was injured inside. Ms. Lawson had explained that her injuries were the result of a physical altercation with another woman. Once they entered the house, the deputy did not hear anyone crying, did not observe any blood, and did not hear anyone asking for assistance.

The deputy found Mr. Lapace hiding behind the door to a bedroom. Mr. Lapace was not in distress, he did not appear to need any medical attention, and the deputy did not observe any injuries on Mr. Lapace.

Upon finding Mr. Lapace, the deputy physically grabbed Mr. Lapace's arms, put him belly down onto the bed, and put him in handcuffs. While Mr. Lapace was belly down on the bed, the deputy took his ID from his back pocket, ran his identification through dispatch, and learned that Mr. Lapace had a felony warrant. After Mr. Lapace had been detained, the deputy saw a laundry basket next to the bed, and on top of the clothes was a pipe commonly used for smoking methamphetamine. The deputy also noticed an open dresser drawer approximately two feet from the bed with narcotics inside. The deputy then searched through a bag and found a plethora of other narcotics. The deputy seized the property and took Mr. Lapace outside.

Mr. Lapace moved to suppress the physical evidence obtained as a result of the search, contending that contrary to the State's position, exigent circumstances did not justify a warrantless entry into the residence. The trial court denied the motion to suppress, finding that the deputies were entitled to enter the house without a warrant under the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement. The trial court noted that a 911 call is a cry to authorities for help and found that the deputies would have been remiss in not entering the residence of an abandoned 911 call. The trial court reasoned that after seeing Ms. Lawson come outside with injuries to her body and noting her nervousness and her hesitance to speak to law enforcement, a common reasonable assumption would be that there was someone in the house that either may have injured this woman or that there may be other injured people inside the home.

The trial court's conclusion that the deputies' entry into the residence was lawful was error. In Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U.S. 398, 126 S.Ct. 1943, 164 L.Ed.2d 650 (2006), the Supreme Court set forth the principles of Fourth Amendment law:

It is a " ‘basic principle of Fourth Amendment law that searches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable.’ " Nevertheless, because the ultimate touchstone of the Fourth Amendment is "reasonableness," the warrant requirement is subject to certain exceptions.... "[W]arrants are generally required to search a person's home or his person unless ‘the exigencies of the situation’ make the needs of law enforcement so compelling that the warrantless search is objectively reasonable under the Fourth Amendment."

One exigency obviating the requirement of a warrant is the need to assist persons who are seriously injured or threatened with such injury. " ‘The need to protect or preserve life or avoid serious injury is justification for what would be otherwise illegal absent an exigency or emergency.’ " Accordingly, law enforcement officers may enter a home without a warrant to render emergency assistance to an injured occupant or to protect an occupant from imminent injury.

Id. at 403 (alteration in original) (citations omitted).

Whether a warrantless search is justified by such an emergency is determined by the totality of the circumstances. See Zeigler v. State, 402 So.2d 365, 371 (Fla. 1981). The "police may enter a residence without a warrant if an objectively reasonable basis exists for the officer to believe that there is an immediate need for police assistance for the protection of life or substantial property interests." Seibert v. State, 923 So.2d 460, 468 (Fla. 2006) (citing Rolling v. State, 695 So.2d 278, 293-94 (Fla. 1997) ). "[T]he burden is on the government to demonstrate exigent circumstances that overcome the presumption of unreasonableness that attaches to all warrantless home entries." Welsh v. Wisconsin, 466 U.S. 740, 750, 104 S.Ct. 2091, 80 L.Ed.2d 732 (1984). In addition, "an entry based on an exigency must be limited in scope to its purpose. Thus, an officer may not continue her search once she has determined that no exigency exists." Rolling, 695 So.2d at 293.

The dispositive question in this case is whether the State met its burden of showing that the deputies reasonably believed that exigent circumstances existed that justified an immediate entry into the home without a warrant. See Dixon v. State, 36 So.3d 920, 924 (Fla. 4th DCA 2010) ; see also Wheeler v. State, 956 So.2d 517, 521 (Fla. 2d DCA 2007) ("Our analysis turns on whether the State was able to demonstrate that the deputies faced a grave emergency that made entry into Wheeler's home imperative."). If the State meets this burden, ordinarily the court must then determine whether the subsequent search of the house exceeded the parameters allowed if the entry was warranted. Seibert, 923 So.2d at 468. However, neither of the parties here have raised any argument related to the scope of the search that was conducted after the deputies entered the house, and as such, any argument related to the scope of the search has been waived and will not be addressed by this court.

Here, the State contends that the deputies were justified in entering the residence because, under the totality of the circumstances, the deputies' suspicion of a medical emergency was based upon reasonable inferences drawn from the available evidence. However, ...