Parker v. State

• Decision Date: 06 December 2007
• Docket Number: No. 37, September Term, 2006.,37, September Term, 2006.
• Citation: 936 A.2d 862,402 Md. 372
• Parties: Terrance PARKER v. STATE of Maryland.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

936 A.2d 862

402 Md. 372

Terrance PARKER v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 37, September Term, 2006.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

December 6, 2007.

Allison E. Pierce, Asst. Public Defender (Nancy S. Forster, Public Defender, Baltimore), on brief, for petitioner.

Shannon E. Avery, Asst. Atty. Gen. (J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Atty. Gen. of Maryland, Baltimore), on brief, for respondent.

Argued before BELL, C.J., RAKER,^* WILNER,^* CATHELL, HARRELL, GREENE and JOHN C. ELDRIDGE (Retired, Specially Assigned), JJ.

JOHN C. ELDRIDGE, Judge, Retired, Specially Assigned,

This criminal case concerns the applicability of the exclusionary rule to evidence seized following an alleged violation of the "knock and announce" principle in connection with the execution of a search warrant. In addition, the case presents an issue of whether sufficient evidence supported a conviction for possession of a regulated firearm (a handgun) in violation of Maryland Code (1957, 1996 Repl. Vol, 2001 Supp.), Article 27, § 445(d)(1).¹

The petitioner, Terrance Parker, argues that both the Fourth Amendment and Maryland law require that seized evidence should have been excluded from his trial because police officers did not knock and announce their presence prior to their search of a house at 800 Belnord Avenue in Baltimore City. Furthermore, he contends that the evidence supporting his handgun conviction was insufficient because the State never established that he had an interest in or resided in the house, or that he had ever been in the proximity of the handgun.

In its brief and oral argument, the State's principal contention is that exclusion of the evidence is inappropriate both under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and as a matter of Maryland law. Regarding the handgun conviction, the State maintains that the evidence supported a reasonable inference that Parker exercised dominion or control over the handgun.

I.

The basic facts of this case have been undisputed. The case was tried in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City on an agreed statement of facts, and in this Court the parties have agreed upon the facts.

On December 19, 2002, Baltimore City police officers applied for search warrants, containing so-called "no-knock" provisions, for three residences in Baltimore City. The three residences were near each other; one of them was a two-story, plus a basement, brick row house at 800 Belnord Avenue. One of the police officers, Detective Thomas Jugan, stated, in the affidavit supporting the application, the following concerning the requested "no-knock" provisions:

"[I]t has been the experience of your Affiant and the information supplied from the Confidential Informant that those immersed in the illicit world of illegal narcotics often use firearms. Those weapons are commonly in the form of handguns, rifles, shotguns, Uzi's(sic), etc. and are extensions of their illicit operations. Based on this information and [your] [Affiant's] prior experience, this warrant will be attempted by a no knock forced entry to provide a margin of safety. Furthermore, the area is well known for its high violence, where numerous assaults by shooting and homicides have occurred, and also [is] an area where your Affiant's (sic) have executed search and seizure warrants in the past and have recovered numerous firearms."

The warrant, authorizing the search at 800 Belnord Avenue and purporting to authorize a "no-knock" entry, was issued by a judge of the District Court of Maryland. Neither the application nor the affidavit nor the warrant mentioned Terrance Parker by name. Detective Jugan, later at the suppression hearing, testified that he did not know whether Parker lived at the 800 Belnord Avenue residence.

After the warrant was issued, the police officers, without first knocking and announcing their presence, entered the residence. According to the prosecuting attorney at the suppression hearing, "there was a forced entry." Upon entering the house at 800 Belnord Avenue, the police officers found two people, Evania Wilkens, who did reside in the house, and Terrance Parker. The officers detained the two and then searched the house. The search revealed cocaine and marijuana in various places in the basement and on the first floor. The officers also recovered $2100 from above a ceiling tile in the basement and two nine millimeter live rounds of ammunition from the top of a china closet on the first floor. In addition, they recovered an operable, loaded .357 magnum handgun "[f]rom the second floor hall" and also recovered $1900 from above a ceiling tile in a bedroom. A search of Parker's person produced nine vials of cocaine, three zip lock bags of marijuana, and $77.

Parker was charged in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City with possession of a regulated firearm in violation of former Article 27, § 445(d)(1), possession with intent to distribute a controlled dangerous substance, and various other drug and weapons-related offenses. He moved to suppress the evidence seized as a result of the search. In denying Parker's motion at the conclusion of a suppression hearing, the circuit judge reasoned that there was "sufficient probable cause in the warrant" but was "concerned with . . . the `no knock' issue." The judge found that there was "not a sufficient factual showing. I don't believe that a `no knock' warrant was necessary for the Belnord Avenue residence."² Nonetheless, relying on the Court of Special Appeals' decision in Davis v. State, 144 Md.App. 144, 797 A.2d 84 (2002), which was later reversed by this Court, Davis and Adams v. State, 383 Md. 394, 859 A.2d 1112 (2004), the Circuit Court held that the "good faith exception [to the exclusionary rule] does apply and the officers did act in good faith."

Subsequently, after a not guilty plea and a trial upon an agreed statement of facts, Parker was convicted of one count of possessing a regulated firearm and one count of possession with intent to distribute a controlled dangerous substance. On the firearm conviction, Parker was sentenced to five years imprisonment, without parole, pursuant to former Article 27, § 449(e). He was sentenced to a concurrent twelve-year term of imprisonment for the controlled dangerous substance conviction. Parker appealed to the Court of Special Appeals, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence underlying both convictions, arguing that his motion to suppress should have been granted, and contending that the five-year sentence without the possibility of parole for the firearm conviction was illegal.

II.

At this point, it would be useful to review the legal background and history regarding the "knock and announce" principle, so-called "no-knock" warrants, the exclusionary rule when there is some illegality with respect to a search and a seizure of evidence, and the relationship of such matters to the appellate proceedings in the present case. During the period of time since the search of the residence at 800 Belnord Avenue, there have been significant fluctuations in the United States Supreme Court and Maryland case law concerning these matters. The appellate proceedings in the case at bar have been directly affected by these fluctuations.

A. The "Knock and Announce" Principle and "No-knock" Search Warrants

Chief Judge Bell for this Court extensively reviewed the "knock and announce" principle in State v. Lee, 374 Md. 275, 821 A.2d 922 (2003), tracing its common law origins, pointing out that it is a settled rule of Maryland common law, and discussing the Supreme Court's holding in Wilson v. Arkansas, 514 U.S. 927, 929, 115 S.Ct. 1914, 1915, 131 L.Ed.2d 976, 979 (1995), "that this common-law `knock and announce' principle forms a part of the reasonableness inquiry under the Fourth Amendment."

The State v. Lee opinion, 374 Md. at 284 n. 7, 821 A.2d at 927 n. 7, quoted from Semayne's Case, 5 Coke's Reports 91, 77 Eng. Rep. 194, 195-196 (K.B.1603), the leading English common law decision delineating the "knock and announce" principle when an officer seeks to arrest a person in a residence or to search a residence:

"In all cases where the King is party, the sheriff (if the doors be not open) may break the party's house, either to arrest him or to do other execution of the K[ing]'s process, if otherwise he cannot enter. But before he breaks it he ought to signify the cause of his coming, and to make request to open doors . . ., for the law without a default in the owner abhors the destruction or breaking of any house (which is for the habitation and safety of man) by which great damage and inconvenience might ensue to the party, when no default is in him; for perhaps he did not know of the process, or which, if he had notice, it is to be presumed that he would obey it."

See also, e.g., Wilson v. Arkansas, supra, 514 U.S. at 931-933, 115 S.Ct. at 1916-1917, 131 L.Ed.2d at 980-981 (reviewing other early English cases and treatises, and tracing the origins of the principle to a statute enacted in 1275); Miller v. United States, 357 U.S. 301, 306-308, 78 S.Ct. 1190, 1194-1195, 2 L.Ed.2d 1332, 1337-1338 (1958) (also reviewing the early authorities, including a reported decision during the reign of Edward IV, 1461-1483); Henson v. State, 236 Md. 518, 522, 204 A.2d 516, 519 (1964) (where Judge Hammond for the Court, quoting some of the early decisions, stated that "`the law abhors unnecessary breaking or destruction of any house,'" and that "`the dweller in the house would not know the purpose of the person breaking in, unless he were notified, and would have a right to resist seeming aggression on his private property"); Irma S. Raker, The New "No-Knock" Provision and Its Effect on The Authority of the Police to Break and Enter, 20 Am. U.L.Rev. 467 (1970-1971) (discussing the common law development of the principle and the earlier cases in this country).³

The "knock and announce" principle was recognized as part of federal case and statutory law before the...