State v. Jake

• Decision Date: 25 June 2019
• Docket Number: No. A-1-CA-36931,A-1-CA-36931
• Parties: STATE OF NEW MEXICO, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. JEREMY JAKE, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Court of Appeals of New Mexico

STATE OF NEW MEXICO, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. JEREMY JAKE, Defendant-Appellant.

No. A-1-CA-36931

COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

June 25, 2019

This decision of the New Mexico Court of Appeals was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Refer to Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of unpublished decisions. Electronic decisions may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official version filed by the Court of Appeals.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF SAN JUAN COUNTY

Daylene A. Marsh, District Judge

Hector H. Balderas, Attorney General

Santa Fe, NM

Margaret Crabb, Assistant Attorney General

Albuquerque, NM

for Appellee

Bennett J. Baur, Chief Public Defender

Nina Lalevic, Assistant Appellate Defender

Santa Fe, NM

for Appellant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

VANZI, Judge.

{1} Defendant Jeremy Jake appeals the district court's order denying his motion to suppress evidence obtained from a traffic stop on the ground that the stop was not supported by reasonable suspicion. We affirm.

BACKGROUND

{2} At approximately 10:00 p.m. on December 21, 2016, Officer Daniel Sedillos was driving on a two-lane road divided by a double yellow center line when he passed Defendant traveling in the opposite direction. After observing Defendant driving "near the center line," Officer Sedillos made a U-turn and began to follow Defendant. Shortly after turning around, Officer Sedillos saw Defendant swerve over the double yellow center line with both left tires and quickly correct back into his lane, at which point he stopped Defendant. Defendant was cited for failure to maintain his lane, in violation of NMSA 1978, Section 66-7-317(A) (1978), which provides,

Whenever any roadway has been divided into two or more clearly marked lanes for traffic . . . a vehicle shall be driven as nearly as practicable entirely within a single lane and shall not be moved from such lane until the driver has first ascertained that such movement can be made with safety[.]

Additionally, Defendant was ultimately arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated (DWI) in violation of NMSA 1978, Section 66-8-102(C)(2) (2016).

{3} Defendant moved to suppress the evidence obtained from the traffic stop, arguing that the initial stop violated the Fourth Amendment and Article II, Section 10 of the New Mexico Constitution because it was not supported by reasonable suspicion. At the suppression hearing, Officer Sedillos, the sole witness, testified to his observations of Defendant's driving. On cross-examination, Officer Sedillos stated that there were no other vehicles passing Defendant at the time he saw Defendant swerve out of his lane. While Officer Sedillos did not see any hazard posed to another driver at the time of the swerve, he testified that if there had been another vehicle in the oncoming lane, Defendant could have crashed into it. In addition to Officer Sedillos's testimony, the district court reviewed the officer's dash cam video. The video showed four cars pass Defendant in the opposite direction before and immediately after Officer Sedillos stopped him. Although the dash cam did not capture the double yellow line at the point where Defendant swerved (according to Officer Sedillos), which occurred "quite a ways" ahead of the patrol car, Officer Sedillos testified that his view of Defendant's car and the road was better than that shown on the dash cam video and that he clearly saw Defendant swerve out of his lane.

{4} After hearing Officer Sedillos's testimony and reviewing the dash cam video, the district court denied Defendant's motion and entered findings of fact and conclusions of law. The district court's findings largely summarized Officer Sedillos's testimony about his observations of Defendant's swerve. However, the district court found that the dash cam video did not show Defendant's vehicle crossing the center line. Although the district court found that the dash cam video showed that at least three vehicles passed Defendant at the time of the stop, it found that "there were no other vehicles on the road [when Defendant swerved], therefore, it was not a safety issue." Aside from restating black letter law on reasonable suspicion, the district court did not make any relevant conclusions of law applying the law to the facts. Defendant now appeals.

DISCUSSION

{5} "Because suppression of evidence is a mixed question of law and fact, we apply a two-part review to the district court's denial of the motion to suppress." State v. Scharff, 2012-NMCA-087, ¶ 8, 284 P.3d 447. "[W]e review the facts in the light most favorable to the prevailing party, deferring to the district court's factual findings so long as substantial evidence exists to support those findings." State v. Neal, 2007-NMSC-043, ¶ 15, 142 N.M. 176, 164 P.3d 57. "Substantial evidence is such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion." State v. Jean-Paul, 2013-NMCA-032, ¶ 4, 295 P.3d 1072 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). "[W]here the district court made no findings of fact, our practice has been to employ presumptions and as a general rule, we will indulge in all reasonable presumptions in support of the district court's ruling." State v. Zamora, 2005-NMCA-039, ¶ 8, 137 N.M. 301, 110 P.3d 517 (omission, alteration, internal quotation marks, and citation omitted). "Our review of a district court's determination of whether reasonable suspicion existed is de novo based on the totality of the circumstances." State v. Leyva, 2011-NMSC-009, ¶ 30, 149 N.M. 435, 250 P.3d 861.

{6} As a preliminary matter, Defendant claims that the district court's findings are "extremely unclear and cannot be relied upon." Defendant argues that it is unclear if the district court found that Defendant crossed the center line because the district court simultaneously found that (1) "Officer Sedillos . . . observed both left tires of . . . Defendant's vehicle cross over the center line[,]" and (2) "[the dash cam] video . . . did not show [Defendant's] vehicle crossing the center line." In our view, these are not necessarily contradictory findings. The testimony established that due to poor lighting and the distance between Officer Sedillos's patrol car and Defendant's vehicle, the dash cam video did not capture the center line at the point where Officer Sedillos testified that he saw Defendant swerve out of his lane. And Officer Sedillos testified that he clearly saw Defendant cross the center line and that his view was better than that shown on the dash cam. While the district court did not explicitly find that Defendant's tires crossed the center line, we assume it credited Officer Sedillos's testimony because it denied Defendant's motion to suppress. See State v. Martinez, 2018-NMSC-007, ¶¶ 15-18, 410 P.3d 186 (deferring to district court's implicit acceptance of the testifying officer's perceptions despite inconclusive dash cam video); Zamora, 2005-NMCA-039, ¶ 8 (stating that we will indulge in all reasonable presumptions in support of the district court's ruling when it does not make any findings of fact). We therefore defer to the district court's implicit acceptance of Officer Sedillos's testimony that Defendant crossed over the center line.

{7} We now turn to Defendant's argument that the stop was not supported by reasonable suspicion. Defendant argues that Officer Sedillos did not have reasonable suspicion to stop him because Defendant did not violate Section 66-7-317(A), as a matter of law, because "his conduct did not create an unsafe driving condition." Specifically, Defendant contends that his movements must unsafely impact nearby vehicles in order to violate Section 66-7-317(A). The State, in turn, argues that Section 66-7-317(A) does not contain a requirement that the motorist's lane departure affect other traffic. Alternatively, the State argues that Officer Sedillos made an objectivelyreasonable mistake of law in believing that Defendant violated Section 66-7-317(A), despite the lack of vehicles in the immediate vicinity.

{8} Before we proceed with our analysis, we note that Defendant's argument requires us to clarify the elements of Section 66-7-317(A). While we recognize and agree with the special concurrence that this statute is in need of clarification, we do not believe that it is proper to do so in this case. First, well-established principles of statutory construction require that we must analyze a "statute's function within a comprehensive legislative scheme" and may not consider subsections "in a vacuum." State v. Rivera, 2004-NMSC-001, ¶ 13, 134 N.M. 768, 82 P.3d 939 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted); see Key v. Chrysler Motors Corp., 1996-NMSC-038, ¶ 14, 121 N.M. 764, 918 P.2d 350 ("[A]ll parts of a statute must be read together to ascertain legislative intent. We are to read the statute in its entirety and construe each part in connection with every other part to produce a harmonious whole." (citation omitted)). Our Supreme Court has recognized the dangers of attempting to interpret statutes by analyzing certain text in isolation:

While . . . one part of the statute may appear absolutely clear and certain to the point of mathematical precision, lurking in another part of the enactment, or even in the same section, or in the history and background of the legislation, or in an apparent conflict between the statutory wording and the overall legislative intent, there may be one or more provisions giving rise to genuine uncertainty as to what the [L]egislature was trying to accomplish. In such a case, it is part of the essence of judicial responsibility to search for and effectuate the legislative intent—the purpose or object—underlying the statute.

State ex rel. Helman v. Gallegos, 1994-NMSC-023, ¶ 23, 117 N.M. 346, 871 P.2d 1352.

{9} Second, to the extent the statutory construction issue has been raised in this case, the record and the briefing before us is inadequate to permit...