People v. Rivers

• Decision Date: 03 April 1987
• Citation: 514 N.Y.S.2d 292,129 A.D.2d 983
• Parties: PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Robert RIVERS, Appellant.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

Page 292

514 N.Y.S.2d 292

129 A.D.2d 983

PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Robert RIVERS, Appellant.

Supreme Court, Appellate Division,

Fourth Department.

April 3, 1987.

Gerald T. Barth by Edward McQuat, Syracuse, for appellant.

Richard Hennessy by John Cirando, Syracuse, for respondent.

Before DILLON, P.J., and BOOMER, GREEN, BALIO and LAWTON, JJ.

MEMORANDUM:

Defendant pleaded guilty to burglary in the second degree following denial of his motion to suppress. Defendant contends on appeal that the motion should have been granted because the police lacked legal justification to stop the vehicle in which defendant was riding. We agree.

Police officers, responding to a report concerning two suspicious males at a restaurant in a shopping plaza, observed from the parking lot two men matching the dispatcher's description and later identified as codefendants Fort and Wright. The officers did not observe any suspicious behavior by either man. The officers also observed defendant and a woman (Hall) in a jewelry store talking to the owner. The officers had the dispatcher contact the owner, who stated that defendant and Hall were trying to sell silverware contained in a brown suitcase. The police then observed Fort, Wright, defendant and Hall approach a car in the parking lot and then return to a pizza shop in the plaza. About fifteen minutes later Hall left in the car and shortly thereafter the three men left in a taxicab. One of the officers followed the car and, upon discovering that the license plates did not match the vehicle and observing Hall driving in an erratic manner, stopped the car. Hall produced a license in someone else's name and stated that her boyfriend owned the car. At this point the police impounded the car and towed it to the police station and began, but did not finish, issuing traffic tickets to Hall for failure to keep right, no registration and no insurance. The officer observed a brown suitcase in the car.

Another officer, after hearing on the police radio that Hall had been stopped, pulled behind the taxi cab with lights flashing, stopped the cab, and requested identification from Fort, Wright and the defendant. Fort and Wright produced identification cards and defendant wrote his name and social securi number on a piece of paper. The officer then ran a records check and discovered no outstanding warrants on any of the men. Nevertheless, the officer directed the men in the cab to proceed to the police station, ostensibly to await the results of the inventory of the car Hall was driving and to provide Hall transportation home. The three men were detained and interrogated at the police station for more than two hours. Defendant was not formally arrested until their investigation revealed that the silver items in the brown suitcase had been stolen in a burglary.

Although defendant may not have standing to challenge the stop of the taxicab based on a claim of a privacy interest in the vehicle itself (see, Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 99 S.Ct. 421, 58 L.Ed.2d 387; People v. David L., 56 N.Y.2d 698, 451 N.Y.S.2d 722, 436 N.E.2d 1324, revg 81 A.D.2d 893, 439 N.Y.S.2d 152, cert denied 459 U.S. 866, 103 S.Ct. 146, 74 L.Ed.2d 123), he is entitled to challenge the unlawful interference with his person that necessarily resulted from the stop of the cab (see, People v. Gittens, 110 A.D.2d 908, 488 N.Y.S.2d 457; People v. Mejia, 133 Misc.2d 755, 758-760, 507 N.Y.S.2d 957; People v. Baez, 131 Misc.2d 689, 693, 501 N.Y.S.2d 550; People v. Jones, 125 Misc.2d 91, 94-96, 477 N.Y.S.2d 975; People v. Castro, 125 Misc.2d 15, 18-20, 479 N.Y.S.2d 414; see also, 1 LaFave & Israel Criminal Procedure § 9.1, p. 726). When the police forcibly stopped the cab, they seized the occupants riding in it (see, Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 59 L.Ed.2d 660; People v. Sobotker, 43 N.Y.2d 559, 402 N.Y.S.2d 993, 373 N.E.2d 1212). Absent reasonable suspicion that the occupants had been, were then, or were about to be engaged in criminal activity, the stop of the car by the police was an impermissible seizure (see, People v. Ingle, 36 N.Y.2d 413, 418, 369 N.Y.S.2d 67, 330 N.E.2d 39).

The record here is bare of any objective evidence of criminal activity by the defendant at the time the taxicab was stopped. The fact that the car Hall was driving may have been validly stopped in no way justified the stop of defendant or his companions merely because the four people had been seen together earlier in or near the car. Nor did the fact that defendant and Hall were seen in a jewelry store attempting to sell...