Lawson v. State

• Citation: 345 So.3d 1243
• Decision Date: 12 March 2021
• Docket Number: CR-19-0471
• Parties: Jerold Jerone LAWSON v. STATE of Alabama
• Court: Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals

345 So.3d 1243

Jerold Jerone LAWSON

v.STATE of Alabama

CR-19-0471

Court of Criminal Appeals of Alabama.

March 12, 2021

Rehearing Denied May 21, 2021

Certiorari Denied July 9, 2021

Alabama Supreme Court 1200617

Aylia McKee, chief public defender, and Glenn A. Langner II, asst. public defender, Office of the Public Defender for the 15th Judicial Circuit, Montgomery, for appellant.

Steve Marshall, att'y gen., and J. Thomas Leverette, asst. att'y gen., for appellee.

McCOOL, Judge.

Jerold Jerone Lawson appeals his guilty-plea conviction for unlawful possession of a controlled substance. See § 13A-12-212, Ala. Code 1975. Pursuant to the terms of the plea agreement, the circuit court sentenced Lawson to 60 months’ imprisonment and split the sentence, ordering Lawson to serve 15 months in a community-corrections program, to be followed by 6 months of unsupervised probation.

Facts and Procedural History

On August 2, 2019, a Montgomery County grand jury indicted Lawson for unlawful possession of a controlled substance after cocaine was discovered during a warrantless search of Lawson's vehicle following a traffic stop. Lawson subsequently filed a motion to suppress the cocaine as the fruit of an illegal search. The circuit court held a hearing on Lawson's motion, and the evidence presented at the hearing tended to establish the following facts.

In February 2019, Deputy N. Knapp¹ of the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office initiated a traffic stop of Lawson's vehicle after observing that the vehicle "appeared to run [a] red light" and to be "speeding at approximately 70 miles per hour in a 55 mile per hour zone." (R. 5.) Dep. Knapp testified that, upon approaching Lawson's vehicle, she "noticed a [digital] scale and some baggies in the back" and that, when she "made contact with [Lawson], he seemed out of it." (R. 5.) Following those observations, Dep. Knapp "[ran] a warrant check on [Lawson]," which "showed positive that [Lawson] had a failure to appear for a traffic violation." (R. 6.) Dep. Knapp then arrested Lawson, who was the only person in the vehicle. Dep. Knapp testified that, when a person is arrested following a traffic stop and he or she is the only person in the vehicle, the policy of the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office is to "inventory everything inside of the vehicle." (R. 7.) According to Dep. Knapp, such inventory searches exist "so the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office is not held liable for any damages or lost items" and consist of a "full inventory of the vehicle from front to back, ... including trunks, passenger spaces, anywhere within a driver's reach." (R. 7.) Thus, after arresting Lawson, Dep. Knapp searched Lawson's vehicle to inventory its contents, and Dep. Knapp testified that, "[w]hile searching the front cabin portion of [Lawson's] vehicle, [she] checked the sunglass visor and found a clear, white, plastic baggy containing suspected narcotics" (R. 7) -- specifically, a "powdery substance believed to be crack cocaine." (R. 10.)

Regarding the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office's policy for conducting inventory searches, Dep. Knapp testified that the policy is located "in Chapter 7 of our policies and procedures of the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office." (R. 15.) However, the State did not present the written policy at the hearing but, rather, elicited testimony from Dep. Knapp regarding the policy. According to Dep. Knapp, once an inventory search is completed, the inventoried items are listed on a "tow form" that "goes both to the driver and then also to the tow truck company and then also to the sheriff's office." (R. 7.) At the hearing, Dep. Knapp identified a "property evidence receipt" (R. 7), which was admitted into evidence, that she had created following the search of Lawson's vehicle. That exhibit is not included in the record on appeal, but, according to Dep. Knapp, the "property evidence receipt" reflected "the items that [she] located in the vehicle, ... including the sandwich baggies, ... nitrile-exam gloves, [a] digital scale, and the suspect narcotics." (R. 9.) In addition, Dep. Knapp testified that she "took pictures of the suspect narcotics as well as the location of the scale in the back passenger seat with the gloves next to it and the sandwich baggies that were in the back passenger pouch." (R. 10.) On cross-examination, Dep. Knapp testified that she also discovered other items during the search of Lawson's vehicle, including "articles of clothing" (R. 15) and "a lot of change[, i.e., currency]." (R. 15-16.) It is unclear from Dep. Knapp's testimony whether those items were listed on the "property evidence receipt," but Dep. Knapp did testify that those items were listed on the "tow form" (R. 16), which was not admitted into evidence because Dep. Knapp did not have it with her at the suppression hearing.

Following the hearing, the circuit court denied Lawson's motion to suppress the cocaine found during the search of his vehicle. On January 8, 2020, Lawson pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of a controlled substance. A transcript of the guilty-plea hearing is not included in the record on appeal, but the circuit court's sentencing order indicates that Lawson reserved the "issue of suppression" (C. 38), and Lawson preserved that issue by virtue of his arguments at the suppression hearing. Lawson filed a timely notice of appeal.

Analysis

The sole issue in this case is whether the circuit court erred by denying Lawson's motion to suppress the cocaine found during the warrantless search of his vehicle.

"In State v. Landrum, 18 So. 3d 424 (Ala. Crim. App. 2009), this Court explained:

" ‘ "This Court reviews de novo a circuit court's decision on a motion to suppress evidence when the facts are not in dispute. See State v. Hill, 690 So. 2d 1201, 1203 (Ala. 1996) ; State v. Otwell, 733 So. 2d 950, 952 (Ala. Crim. App. 1999)." State v. Skaggs, 903 So. 2d 180, 181 (Ala. Crim. App. 2004). In State v. Hill, 690 So. 2d 1201 (Ala. 1996), the trial court granted a motion to suppress following a hearing at which it heard only the testimony of one police officer. Regarding the applicable standard of review, the Alabama Supreme Court stated, in pertinent part, as follows:

" ‘ " ‘ Where the evidence before the trial court was undisputed the ore tenus rule is inapplicable, and the Supreme Court will sit in judgment on the evidence de novo, indulging no presumption in favor of the trial court's application of the law to those facts.’ Stiles v. Brown, 380 So. 2d 792, 794 (Ala. 1980) (citations omitted)...."

" ‘ State v. Hill, 690 So. 2d at 1203-04.’

" 18 So. 3d at 426. Because the evidence presented at the suppression hearing is not in dispute, the only issue before this Court is whether the circuit court correctly applied the law to the facts presented at the suppression hearing, and we afford no presumption in favor of the circuit court's ruling."

Benson v. State, 160 So. 3d 55, 57-58 (Ala. Crim. App. 2014).

" ‘The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States bans all unreasonable searches. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S. Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed. 2d 889 (1968).’ " Grantham v. City of Tuscaloosa, 111 So. 3d 174, 178 (Ala. Crim. App. 2012) (quoting Ex parte Tucker, 667 So. 2d 1339, 1343 (Ala. 1995) ).

" ‘ " ‘This court has long held that warrantless searches are per se unreasonable, unless they fall within one of the recognized exceptions to the warrant requirement. See, e.g., Chevere v. State, 607 So. 2d 361, 368 (Ala. Cr. App. 1992). These exceptions are: (1) plain view; (2) consent; (3) incident to a lawful arrest; (4) hot pursuit or emergency; (5) probable cause coupled with exigent circumstances; (6) stop and frisk situations; and (7) inventory searches. Ex parte Hilley, 484 So. 2d 485, 488 (Ala. 1985) ; Chevere, supra, 607 So. 2d at 368.’ "

" ‘ State v. Mitchell, 722 So. 2d 814 (Ala. Cr. App. 1998), quoting Rokitski v. State, 715 So. 2d 859 (Ala. Cr. App. 1997).’

" State v. Otwell, 733 So. 2d 950, 952 (Ala. Crim. App. 1999). Another recognized exception to the warrant requirement is the ‘automobile exception,’ which allows law enforcement to search an automobile based on probable cause alone. Harris v. State, 948 So. 2d 583 (Ala. Crim. App. 2006)."

Hinkle v. State, 86 So. 3d 441, 451 (Ala. Crim. App. 2011).

Relying on Boyd v. State, 542 So. 2d 1276 (Ala. 1989), and Keith v. State, 231 So. 3d 363 (Ala. Crim. App. 2017), Lawson argues that the circuit court erred by denying his motion to suppress because, he says, the State's evidence "failed to establish that the search of Lawson's vehicle was a constitutional inventory search." (Lawson's brief, at 26.) Specifically, Lawson argues that "[t]he State's evidence fails to provide this Court with the necessary record to adequately review law enforcement's policy or that the policy was followed" and that, "in fact, there is evidence that the limited policy information provided was not followed by Dep. Knapp."² (Lawson's brief, at 27.)

The State disputes Lawson's claim that it failed to prove that the warrantless search of Lawson's vehicle was constitutional under the "inventory exception" to the warrant requirement but argues that, even if Lawson is correct, the search was nevertheless constitutional under the "automobile exception." Lawson did not file a reply brief and thus has not provided this Court with a response to the State's argument that the "automobile exception" provides a constitutional basis for the denial of his motion to suppress, even if the "inventory exception" does not.

To dispose of this appeal, we need not determine whether the warrantless search of Lawson's vehicle was constitutional under the "inventory exception" to the warrant requirement because we agree with the State's argument that the search was constitutional under the "automobile exception." Although the State did not raise the "automobile exception" in the circuit court and although there is no indication that the circuit court relied upon that exception in denying...