State v. Pringle
| Decision Date | 30 December 1986 |
| Docket Number | No. 86-1386,86-1386 |
| Parties | 12 Fla. L. Weekly 145 STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. Julius PRINGLE, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Lauren Hafner Sewell, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tampa, for appellant.
David L. Denkin, Sp. Appointed Public Defender, Sarasota, for appellee.
Julius Pringle was charged with possession of cocaine, pleaded not guilty and, prior to trial, moved to suppress all evidence obtained pursuant to an allegedly illegal "pat-down" search. The state has appealed from the trial court's order suppressing the evidence. We reverse.
A Sarasota Police Department patrolman received a tip from a reliable informant that a black man named Sam Schueler could be found at or near an automobile with tag number 418-DAJ, which was parked at the town hall. The informant relayed that Schueler would have a three-inch glass vial containing cocaine rocks. This information was relayed to Officer Etheridge who responded to the scene described by the informant. There he and several other officers found a car bearing Florida tag 418-DAZ. Two black males were in the car. The driver, holding a wad of money, identified himself as Julius Pringle and stated that he did not know the identity of the passenger who had just entered the car.
The passenger exited from the car. As he talked to Officer Waugh, who had accompanied Officer Etheridge, Officer Waugh noticed a bag of cocaine on the seat of the car, close to the passenger's side. Officer Waugh then arrested the passenger.
Officer Etheridge testified at the suppression hearing that he thought he had observed a narcotics deal and that he believed, based upon past experience, it was probable that Pringle was armed. He conducted a pat-down search of the defendant, felt what appeared to be a three-inch vial, and pulled it from Pringle's pocket. A presumptive field test supported the suspicion that the vial contained cocaine.
Etheridge stated that he patted the suspect down for weapons, but at the moment when he extracted the vial from Pringle's pocket he was not under the impression that it was a gun or a knife.
The trial court suppressed the evidence obtained from Pringle's pocket on the basis that the officer had conducted an illegal search; by removing the vial from Pringle's pocket, Etheridge had gone beyond the scope of a permissible pat-down under the principles outlined in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968). Terry permits a stop of an individual based upon a police officer's reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is occurring; incident to that stop the officer may conduct a...
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