State v. Guidry
| Decision Date | 21 October 2020 |
| Docket Number | 2019 KA 1624 |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana v. Rickey GUIDRY |
| Court | Court of Appeal of Louisiana — District of US |
Joseph L. Waitz, Jr., District Attorney, Ellen Daigle Doskey, J. Christopher Emy, Assistant District Attorneys, Houma, Louisiana, Attorneys for Appellee, State of Louisiana
Arthur A. Lemann, III, New Orleans, Louisiana, ***** Attorney for Defendant/Appellant, Rickey J. Guidry
BEFORE: HIGGINBOTHAM, PENZATO, AND LANIER, JJ.
Defendant, Rickey Guidry1 , was charged by bill of information with possession of cocaine, a violation of La. R.S. 40:967(C). He pled not guilty. After a trial by jury, defendant was found guilty as charged by a unanimous six-member jury. The trial court adjudicated him a second-felony habitual offender and imposed a term of two-and-a-half years imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of probation or suspension of sentence. Defendant now appeals. For the following reasons, we affirm the conviction and remand to the trial court for resentencing.
On the night of December 1, 2015, officers of the Houma Police Department ("HPD") Narcotics Task Force were on patrol in what police considered a "high drug and high crime area." Two narcotics agents, Richard Hunter and Corey Veal, were in an unmarked black GMC Sierra belonging to the HPD. At around 11:10 p.m. Agent Hunter, who was driving, observed a white pickup truck make three turns without using a turn signal. After the third turn, Agent Hunter turned on his blue lights and initiated a traffic stop, something he testified was part of his regular duties on the HPD Narcotics Task Force. Another narcotics agent, Corey Duplantis, was a K-9 officer who arrived about a minute later and provided backup for the traffic stop. Lieutenant Jeff Lirette,2 another K-9 officer, and Officer Mark Brashear arrived soon after Agent Duplantis.
After approaching the truck, Agent Hunter discovered a man, later identified as Garland McKinley, was driving. McKinley was unable to produce a driver's license when asked by Agent Hunter. While Agent Hunter spoke to McKinley, Agent Duplantis approached the passenger side of the truck and spoke to defendant. Agent Hunter then asked McKinley to step out of the truck, and Agent Duplantis requested defendant step out of the truck. During his investigation, Agent Hunter learned McKinley did not own the truck, but that defendant did.
According to Agent Duplantis, defendant told him the two were "just riding around." When defendant exited the vehicle as directed, Agent Duplantis saw "white crumbs" that he suspected to be crack cocaine on the passenger seat. The substance was on the left side of the seat, near the center console and the seat belt buckle. Agent Duplantis described the truck as otherwise "very well kept up." Upon seeing what he suspected to be illegal narcotics, Agent Duplantis retrieved a field drug testing kit from his police vehicle, and the field test indicated the substance to be presumptively cocaine. Conferring, the officers discovered statements given by McKinley and defendant were inconsistent. The narcotic agents asked for consent to search the vehicle, which McKinley granted and defendant, who owned the vehicle, refused. On defendant's refusal, Lieutenant Lirette retrieved his K-9 "Gunner" and "ran" him around the truck in an attempt to discover any other possible narcotics. The dog alerted officers to the presence of a narcotics odor emanating from the vehicle. Officers began to search the interior of the truck. Moving the front passenger seat revealed more pieces of crack cocaine on the passenger-side, back seat floorboard. After being arrested, defendant indicated to the officers that he was upset he was being charged "for kibbles and bits" and that he would not have been so charged in Lafourche Parish. Defendant did not deny the cocaine was his. Agent Hunter explained to the jury that it was his belief that based on where the cocaine was located and the condition it was in, defendant attempted to discard the cocaine after the traffic stop was initiated.
McKinley was issued citations for failing to stop at a stop sign and driving without a driver's license. He was not charged with possession of cocaine due to the cocaine being discovered near the passenger seat. McKinley was permitted to drive off with defendant's truck, at defendant's request, at the conclusion of the incident.
The substance obtained from defendant's vehicle was later forensically determined to be 0.1 grams of cocaine. Lieutenant Lirette testified it was not uncommon to find and prosecute possession of that amount. No drug paraphernalia was discovered in the truck.
In assignment of error number one, defendant contends La. R.S. 40:967(C) is unconstitutional as applied to his case. Though he concedes that the jurisprudence in Louisiana is that a conviction "may rest upon possession of any amount of the drug[,]"3 he also contends that Louisiana should adopt an admittedly minority view that "in order to be criminal, the amount possessed must be usable."4 Defendant specifies that he is not arguing on sufficiency grounds, but the "due process constitutional implications" of the application of the statute to the facts of this case because it is "inconsistent with the proper legislative goals." Defendant challenged the constitutionality of the statute as applied to his case in a pre-trial motion to quash. The State argues that the possession of any amount of cocaine is a violation of the law, which is long-established precedent within Louisiana.
Louisiana Revised Statutes 40:967(C) requires proof that a defendant knowingly or intentionally possessed a controlled dangerous substance as classified in Schedule II. A conviction for possession of a controlled dangerous substance may rest on the possession of mere traces or residue of the substance, even absent admissions by defendant, which might constitute guilty knowledge. State v. Ferguson, 2015-0427 (La. App. 1st Cir. 9/18/15), 181 So.3d 120, 130, writ denied, 2015-1919 (La. 11/18/16), 210 So.3d 282 ; see also State v. Wooten, 49,710 (La. App. 2d Cir. 4/15/15), 164 So.3d 937, 943 ; State v. Leblanc , 2004-1032 (La. App. 1st Cir. 12/17/04), 897 So.2d 736, 739-40, writ denied, 2005-0150 (La. 4/29/05), 901 So.2d 1063, cert. denied, 546 U.S. 905, 126 S.Ct. 254, 163 L.Ed.2d 231 (2005) (); cf. State v. Ganier, 94-2582 (La. App. 4th Cir. 8/23/95), 660 So.2d 928, 931-33, writ denied, 95-2333 (La. 1/26/96), 666 So.2d 657 ().
Defendant does not contest the fact that crack cocaine was found in his truck in his immediate vicinity. Defendant also does not cite any case law, Louisiana or otherwise, in support of his position, nor does he provide any support for his contention that the legislative intent behind La. R.S. 40:967(C) was not to apply the statute to a situation like that of defendant. The case defendant cites, State v. Sylvia, 2001-1406 (La. 4/9/03), 845 So.2d 358, was decided in 2003. In the intervening seventeen years, the Legislature has declined to clarify further its intent regarding trace amounts. Further, though defendant argues the amount of crack cocaine he possessed was "worthless," it was still in his possession at the time of the traffic stop. Without more, this claim is meritless.
In his second assignment of error, defendant argues the trial court erred when it denied his motion to suppress the evidence obtained from the search that followed the traffic stop. Defendant argues that the traffic stop was a pretext for a narcotics investigation that was prolonged beyond the time period necessary to investigate the alleged traffic violations. Defendant contends that the traffic stop was purposefully delayed twice as long as the seizure found unreasonable in Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 355-56, 135 S.Ct. 1609, 1615, 191 L.Ed.2d 492 (2015) (). In response, the State notes the probable cause to search defendant's vehicle developed contemporaneously with the investigation of the traffic stop and that the case is distinguishable from Rodriguez.
As an initial matter, a warrantless search is per se unreasonable unless the search can be justified by one of the narrowly drawn exceptions to the warrant requirement. State v . Cox, 2018-0769 (La. App. 1st Cir. 2/22/19), 272 So.3d 597, 602, writ denied, 2019-0604 (La. 9/17/19), 278 So.3d 973, and cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 140 S.Ct. 1279, 206 L.Ed.2d 262 (2020). A trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress the evidence is entitled to great weight, because the district court had the opportunity to observe the witnesses and weigh the credibility of their testimony. State v. Jarrell, 2007-1720 (La. App. 1st Cir. 9/12/08), 994 So.2d 620, 625. Correspondingly, when a trial court denies a motion to suppress, factual and credibility determinations should not be reversed in the absence of a clear abuse of the trial court's discretion, i.e., unless such ruling is not supported by the evidence. However, a trial court's legal findings are subject to a de novo standard of review. Cox, 272 So.3d at 602. In determining whether the ruling on defendant's motion to suppress was correct, we are not limited to the evidence adduced at the...
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