People v. Rahming, 90SA114

• Decision Date: 10 September 1990
• Docket Number: No. 90SA114,90SA114
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Garland A. RAHMING, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

Page 1338

795 P.2d 1338

The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Garland A. RAHMING, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 90SA114.

Supreme Court of Colorado,

En Banc.

Sept. 10, 1990.

James C. Sell, Chief Deputy Dist. Atty., Robert R. Gallagher, Jr., Dist. Atty., Philip M. Smith, Deputy Dist. Atty., Englewood, for plaintiff-appellant.

David F. Vela, Colorado State Public Defender, Steven R. Gayle, Deputy State Public Defender, Englewood, for defendant-appellee.

Justice VOLLACK delivered the Opinion of the Court.

In this interlocutory appeal ¹ the People challenge the order of the Arapahoe County District Court suppressing evidence discovered by an officer of the Aurora Police Department (the officer) in a search of the automobile driven by the defendant, Garland Rahming. The officer conducted the search of the automobile during an investigative detention of the defendant and two other occupants of the car the defendant was driving. The district court held that the facts of this case did not give the officer a reasonable suspicion that the occupants of the car were involved in criminal activity. We affirm.

I.

On January 11, 1990, the People charged defendant Garland Rahming by felony complaint with one count of second degree burglary, § 18-4-203, 8B C.R.S. (1986), and one count of theft, § 18-4-401, 8B C.R.S. (1986 & 1989 Supp.). Prior to trial the defendant moved to suppress the fruits of any search of the vehicle he was driving when he was stopped by the officer. The district court held a hearing on the defendant's motion to suppress. The officer's testimony at the pretrial hearing disclosed the following.

The officer had been a police officer with the Aurora Police Department for three and one-half years. He had not been formally trained in gang activities, but he had watched videotapes prepared by the Gang Intervention Unit of the Aurora Police Department, and he had some knowledge of gang activities based on his experience as an Aurora police officer. He testified that the chosen attire of Crips street gang members includes a blue coat, a blue-checkered coat, or a black Los Angeles Raiders team jacket. According to the officer, members of the Crips wear blue or black hats with either a Los Angeles Raiders insignia or "something with a C," and wear their pants so that they hang loosely on their hips, "halfway down their buttock[s]."

On January 6, 1990, the officer was in his marked police car patrolling the parking lot of an apartment complex from which he routinely received about one call a night. The officer was travelling north through the parking lot with his lights off when he noticed three young black males walking towards a car in the apartment complex parking lot. The individuals were outside of an 18-unit apartment building which is the home of the "MCGs," who are leaders of the Bloods street gang, the rival of the Crips gang. The previous week the officer had arrested residents of the building in connection with a drive-by shooting and an assault on a member of the Crips gang.

The defendant was wearing tennis shoes, dark pants, and, in the officer's words, "a gray and white--gray and white and blue checkered coat, a padded quilted type lumberjack coat." One of the other two individuals was wearing a blue hat, a black Los Angeles Raiders coat, black jeans, and white BK, or, in the officer's words, "Blood Killer," tennis shoes with black strings in them. The remaining individual was wearing a sweater with a blue torso, white arms, and a yellow stripe. The officer could not remember what else that individual was wearing, and agreed with defense counsel that the sweater was a "typical sports sweater for a young person to wear." There were not any bulges in the clothing of the individuals, or any other indication that any of them were carrying weapons.

The three individuals noticed the officer's car in the parking lot. Two of them turned and ran to the entrance of the apartment building. The defendant remained where he was, and stood by a tree watching the officer drive by. The officer continued down the street and parked his patrol car in an alley, where another tree concealed his location. The defendant and the two other individuals then proceeded to their car at a fast pace. The defendant drove the car down the street and turned onto Colfax Avenue.

The officer followed the car down Colfax. The defendant did not commit any traffic infractions. The defendant pulled into a 7-Eleven parking lot, and the officer followed the car into the parking lot and activated the lights on his vehicle. The officer radioed for assistance. After another officer arrived, the officer notified the police dispatcher of the license plate number of the car. The dispatcher determined that the car belonged to another individual who had given the defendant permission to borrow the car.

The officer directed the defendant out of the car and conducted a pat-down search of the defendant for weapons. The search did not reveal any weapons. The defendant then consented to a search of the trunk of the car, and the other individuals consented to searches of their clothing. These searches uncovered a black-and-white Magnavox television set and several items of gold jewelry. The officer then learned from the police dispatcher that the car may have been involved in a burglary which had occurred earlier that evening in south Aurora, which is approximately 30 to 40 blocks from the location where the officer stopped the defendant. The officer subsequently determined that the jewelry and the black-and-white television had been taken in the south Aurora burglary.

The People charged the defendant with second degree burglary and theft. After conducting a suppression hearing, the district court ruled that the officer did not have a reasonable suspicion that the defendant was involved in criminal activity. The district court granted the defendant's motion to suppress.

II.

A.

Under narrowly defined circumstances a police officer may make a limited intrusion into an individual's personal security on less than probable cause. People v. Savage, 698 P.2d 1330, 1334 (Colo.1985); see also Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 27, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1883, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968); Stone v. People, 174 Colo. 504, 509-10, 485 P.2d 495, 497 (1971). The circumstances under which an officer may detain an individual are limited because the individual interest at stake " 'is far from insignificant: it is the right of every person to enjoy the use of public streets, buildings, parks and other conveniences without unwarranted interference or harassment by agents of the law.' " People v. Aldridge, 35 Cal.3d 473, 478, 198 Cal.Rptr. 538, 541, 674 P.2d 240, 243 (1984) (quoting In re Tony C., 21 Cal.3d 888, 893, 148 Cal.Rptr. 366, 368, 582 P.2d 957, 959 (1978)). Three conditions must exist before an individual may be subjected to an investigative stop and limited search of his person: (1) there must be an articulable and specific basis in fact for suspecting that criminal activity has taken place, is in progress, or is about to occur; (2) the purpose of the intrusion must be reasonable; and (3) the scope and character of the intrusion must be reasonably related to its purpose. People v. Wilson, 784 P.2d 325, 327 (Colo.1989); People v. Mascarenas, 726 P.2d 644, 645 (Colo.1986); Savage, 698 P.2d at 1334.

"The existence of these conditions must be judged against an objective standard that takes into consideration the facts and circumstances known to the officer at the time of the intrusion and evaluates the purpose, scope, and character of the intrusion in light of those facts." Id. at 1334-35. " 'In determining whether this objective standard has been met the critical focus necessarily centers upon the facts known to the officers immediately prior to the intrusion. Facts uncovered after a chase begins do not enter into the constitutional equation for reasonable suspicion.' " Wilson, 784 P.2d at 327 (quoting People v. Thomas, 660 P.2d 1272, 1275 (Colo.1983)). In evaluating the factors upon which the People rely to justify the investigative detention, we defer to the trial court's findings of historical fact, which we will not overturn if supported by competent evidence in the record. People v. Quezada, 731 P.2d 730, 732 (Colo.1987). "An ultimate conclusion of constitutional law that is inconsistent with or unsupported by evidentiary findings, however, is subject to correction by a reviewing court, as is a court's application of an erroneous legal standard to the facts of the case." Id. at 732-33.

B.

This case concerns the first of the three conditions which must be satisfied to justify an investigative detention: whether there were specific and articulable facts known to the officer which, taken together with rational inferences from these facts, created a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity which justified the intrusion into the defendant's personal security at the time of the stop. Mascarenas, 726 P.2d at 645; see also United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 109 S.Ct. 1581, 1585, 104 L.Ed.2d 1 (1989). "The concept of reasonable suspicion, like probable cause, is not 'readily, or even usefully, reduced to a neat set of legal rules.' " Id. (quoting Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 232, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 2329, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983)). " 'The process does not deal with hard certainties, but with probabilities.' " Id. (quoting United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 418, 101 S.Ct. 690, 695, 66 L.Ed.2d 621 (1981)). Factors which are not by themselves proof of illegal conduct may give a police officer reasonable suspicion, and "there could, of course, be circumstances in which wholly lawful conduct might justify the suspicion that criminal activity is afoot." Sokolow, 109 S.Ct. at 1586. However, an officer who conducts an investigative detention must do so on the basis of more than an " 'inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or "hunch." ' "...