State v. Cunningham

• Decision Date: 11 April 2008
• Docket Number: No. 06-024.,06-024.
• Citation: 2008 VT 43,954 A.2d 1290
• Parties: STATE of Vermont v. John A. CUNNINGHAM.
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

954 A.2d 1290

2008 VT 43

STATE of Vermont v. John A. CUNNINGHAM.

No. 06-024.

Supreme Court of Vermont.

April 11, 2008.

William H. Sorrell, Attorney General, and Craig Matanle, Assistant Attorney General, Montpelier, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Matthew F. Valerio, Defender General, Anna Saxman, Deputy Defender General,

and Jon Dodson, Law Clerk (on the Brief), Montpelier, for Defendant-Appellant.

Present: REIBER, C.J., DOOLEY, JOHNSON, SKOGLUND and BURGESS. JJ.

REIBER, C.J.

¶ 1. Defendant John Cunningham appeals from a district court order denying his motion to suppress certain evidence obtained after two traffic stops in May of 2005. He argues that the actions taken by the police on both days violated his state and federal constitutional rights. We conclude that both days' events offend the Vermont Constitution. The district court's order denying the motion to suppress is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with the views expressed herein.

I. Facts

a. May 5, 2005

¶ 2. The facts of the first traffic stop are undisputed. Defendant was driving through Vergennes, Vermont, on the afternoon of May 5, 2005, when Officer Rodney Trudeau saw his vehicle and radioed dispatch to request a registration check. The check revealed that defendant owned the vehicle and that his license was suspended for failure to maintain automobile insurance. See 23 V.S.A. § 802(a).

¶ 3. The officer, who was on foot, approached defendant's vehicle at a stop sign and asked if he was John Cunningham. Defendant replied that he was, and the officer asked him to pull over. This occurred at 3:04 p.m. and the incident was labeled at that time in the police radio log as "drugs." Defendant was asked to produce a driver's license, vehicle registration, proof of insurance, or other form of identification. He produced none of these, in violation of several provisions of Vermont law. See 23 V.S.A. § 611 ("Every licensee shall have his or her operator's license certificate in his immediate possession at all times when operating a motor vehicle."); id. § 676 (operating vehicle after license suspended for failure to maintain insurance is a civil violation); id. § 800 (prohibiting motor-vehicle operation without current automobile liability insurance). These offenses were all civil in nature. When asked, defendant told the officer that he owned the vehicle and gave his true identity. Defendant does not appear to have made any attempt to conceal either his identity or the ownership of the vehicle.

¶ 4. The officer first called a tow truck, and then called dispatch and requested that defendant's name be run through the computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system. The CAD search revealed, according to the officer's affidavit, that defendant had "one prior drug involvement." The officer had also heard "through other sources" that defendant was a cocaine dealer. These sources were wholly anonymous. The officer then asked defendant if he had drugs in his vehicle; defendant said that he did not. Defendant did not consent when the officer asked to search his vehicle. When the officer asked defendant why he, a Middlebury resident, was in Vergennes that day, defendant responded that there was no particular reason. The officer reported that defendant was acting nervous throughout the stop and subsequent conversation, but that there was no sign of drug intoxication.

¶ 5. The officer then requested backup from the Vergennes police. When the other officers arrived, Officer Trudeau requested that a canine unit also respond to the scene. The closest available canine unit was based in Hinesburg; the officer called the canine unit and then began writing the four traffic tickets he planned to issue to defendant. By the time the canine unit arrived, more than forty minutes had elapsed since defendant was pulled over. The canine-unit officer ordered defendant out of the vehicle, expressing concern that the drug dog, "Tiger," might otherwise be aggressive towards him. When defendant exited the vehicle, the officer patted him down "for weapons" and found cocaine residue, drug paraphernalia, and $263 in cash. Defendant attributed the cash to a construction job, but was unable to identify where or for whom he worked. Defendant was handcuffed, and the canine-unit officer led Tiger through an external sniff of the car.¹ Tiger "alerted" to the seams between the front and rear doors on both sides of defendant's vehicle. Forty-six minutes elapsed between the initial stop and Tiger's alert.

¶ 6. Defendant was then detained at the police station in Vergennes while the officers applied for a warrant, which they served on defendant at approximately 9:00 p.m. Upon executing the warrant and searching defendant's clothing and his vehicle, the officers discovered one gram of crack cocaine, some purple pills in an unmarked bottle, various drug paraphernalia, and additional cash.

b. May 17, 2005

¶ 7. The facts of the second traffic stop are also largely undisputed. At approximately 8:00 p.m. on May 17, 2005, Officer Trudeau, who was driving east on South Maple Street in Vergennes, received an anonymous telephone call complaining of suspicious activity at a residence on nearby King Street. The caller reported that "suspicious persons" were carrying packages in and out of the building, that the caller suspected drug activity, and that defendant was leaving the residence in a maroon car and was, like the officer, driving east on South Maple Street. The caller, like the "other sources" from whom the officer had heard before the May 5 stop, was entirely anonymous. The officer followed defendant's vehicle to an intersection, where defendant applied the brakes, revealing a malfunctioning brake light. After stopping the vehicle, Officer Trudeau recognized the driver as defendant and the passenger as someone the officer had heard was involved with cocaine. Defendant again could not provide a driver's license, proof of registration, or proof of insurance.

¶ 8. The officer asked defendant if he had drugs in the vehicle; defendant said that he did not. During the stop, the officer noted that both defendant and his passenger appeared "very nervous" and "very impatient." Two vehicles that the officer had seen earlier at the King Street residence drove by repeatedly during the stop. At 8:10 p.m., the officer requested a canine unit from Burlington and made arrangements for defendant's car to be towed at a later time. The officer began to write the four tickets he intended to issue to defendant. The canine unit — Officer Radford and his dog Stoney — arrived approximately twenty-eight minutes after being summoned, at about 8:38 p.m., by which time Officer Trudeau was writing the third of the four tickets. During the canine sniff of the car, defendant and his passenger were given the option to remain in the vehicle. Defendant chose to remain, while his passenger chose to exit. The passenger was patted down and allowed to leave the scene when nothing incriminating was found on his person. Officer Radford then had Stoney sniff the vehicle, Stoney "alerted" to the vehicle, and defendant was asked to exit the vehicle, which was seized and impounded.

¶ 9. Defendant was placed in custody pending Officer Trudeau's application for a search warrant covering both defendant and his vehicle. Officer Trudeau obtained the warrant and served it on defendant after midnight. The subsequent search of defendant's person revealed nothing, but the search of the vehicle disclosed a total of approximately eighteen grams of cocaine, some of it loose and the rest divided between several individual "paper folds" and a plastic bag.

II. The proceedings below

¶ 10. Defendant was charged with two counts of possession of cocaine, one a misdemeanor and the other a felony, based on evidence obtained on May 5 and 17, 2005. See 18 V.S.A. § 4231(a)(1), (2) (Cum.Supp. 2006). Prior to trial, defendant moved to suppress all of the evidence obtained on both days, alleging that both detentions were impermissible under Chapter I, Article 11 of the Vermont Constitution and the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. Defendant's motion was denied by written order, and he subsequently pled guilty, conditioned on the outcome of this appeal. V.R.Cr.P. 11(a)(2).

¶ 11. The district court first noted that defendant did not contest the validity of either day's initial stop, but challenged only his extended detention and the use of the canine sniff. Citing our decision in State v. Emilo, 144 Vt. 477, 481, 479 A.2d 169, 171 (1984), the district court stated that a police officer must have a reasonable and articulable suspicion of criminal activity before detaining a person for further investigation after a routine traffic stop.² Further, the court noted dicta in our decision in State v. Sprague, 2003 VT 20, ¶ 17, 175 Vt. 123, 824 A.2d 539, supporting the proposition that an officer may extend the "scope and length" of a stop beyond its original purpose when the officer has "sufficient justification" for doing so. The court went on to characterize this sufficient justification as "sufficient reasonable suspicion," and noted that "[o]fficers are not barred from making observations, or asking a few routine questions, or using information radioed from [CAD]."

¶ 12. The district court concluded that Officer Trudeau had a sufficient basis to detain defendant on May 5 based on four "objective facts." According to the district court: (1) the officer "knew that defendant had prior involvement with drugs from [CAD] and from other sources"; (2) defendant "appeared nervous"; (3) defendant could not produce a driver's license, proof of registration, or proof of insurance; and (4) "could not explain why he was in Vergennes that day."³ The court also noted that the officer's prolonged detention of defendant on May 5 resulted in only a "minimal" additional seizure because the officer had only finished writing...