State v. Williams
| Decision Date | 10 September 1997 |
| Docket Number | No. 96-1821-CR,96-1821-CR |
| Citation | 570 N.W.2d 892,214 Wis.2d 412 |
| Parties | STATE of Wisconsin, Plaintiff-Respondent, d v. Roosevelt WILLIAMS, Defendant-Appellant. . Oral Argument |
| Court | Wisconsin Court of Appeals |
APPEAL from a judgment of the circuit court for Milwaukee County: MAXINE A. WHITE, Judge. 1 Reversed and cause remanded.
On behalf of the defendant-appellant, the cause was submitted on the briefs of Melinda Swartz, Assistant State Public Defender. There was oral argument by Melinda A. Swartz.
On behalf of the plaintiff-respondent, the cause was submitted on the brief of James Doyle, Attorney General, and Donald D. Weinstein, Assistant Attorney General. There was oral argument by Warren D. Weinstein.
Before WEDEMEYER, P.J., and SCHUDSON and CURLEY, JJ.
Roosevelt Williams appeals from the judgment of conviction, following his guilty plea, for possession with intent to deliver cocaine. He argues that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence. He contends that, under Alabama v. White, 496 U.S. 325, 110 S.Ct. 2412, 110 L.Ed.2d 301 (1990), the police failed to sufficiently corroborate information from an anonymous telephone tip and, therefore, that the police did not have reasonable suspicion to justify stopping him. Williams is correct and, accordingly, we reverse.
The facts are undisputed. City of Milwaukee Police Officers Johnny Norred and Phillip Henschel testified at the evidentiary hearing that during the daylight hours of November 2, 1996, they received a police radio dispatch that stated:
[Squad] 73R drug dealing complaint, 4261 North Teutonia and the alley. Somebody's dealing drugs from a blue and burgundy Ford Bronco that's parked in the driveway on the side of the building. Complaint number is 1119.
Within approximately four minutes, the officers arrived at the scene and observed a blue and burgundy Chevy Blazer with two occupants, parked at the rear of 4261 North Teutonia Avenue in the City of Milwaukee. 2 Williams was sitting in the driver's seat; a woman was sitting in the front passenger's seat. Williams had his right hand behind the passenger's seat, out of the officers' view. 3
The officers immediately drew their weapons and ordered Williams and the woman to get out of the Blazer. 4 The officers searched them and ordered them into the locked back seat of the squad car. The officers then conducted a "field interview" of both Williams and the woman "to find out if this was indeed the people that the caller was referring to," and "to determine ... why they're there and ... what they're doing." Then, while Officer Henschel remained with Williams and the woman at the squad car to do "routine" checks regarding the suspects' identities, Officer Norred searched certain areas inside the Blazer. He was concerned that Williams "may have had a gun in his hands, and he possibly may have dropped it." Officer Norred found marijuana and cocaine base inside the Blazer, and the police subsequently discovered drug paraphernalia in the back seat of the squad car where Williams and the woman had been held.
The officers testified that before making the stop, they had only the information in the radio dispatch. They did not have a license plate number of the suspect vehicle or even a "description of the suspects that were supposed to be dealing ... [n]o age, sex, how many there were." They testified that they knew nothing of the identity or reliability of the caller whose information led to the radio dispatch. The officers also acknowledged that before stopping and ordering Williams and the woman out of the Blazer, they did not: (1) conduct any surveillance to see whether "there was any drug activity going on" in connection with the Blazer or its occupants; (2) conduct any surveillance to see whether "there [was] anything ... going on around the vehicle that was consistent with drug activity"; (3) observe Williams or the woman do "anything ... that appeared to be illegal"; or (4) observe any "furtive" gestures or "anything else" that "endangered [their] safety."
The transcript of the 911 call leading to the radio dispatch also was introduced at the evidentiary hearing:
OPERATOR Milwaukee Emergency Operator Number 62. How may I help you?
CALLER Yes, I'm calling ... O.K., I don't want to get involved but there's some activity that's going in ... going around in the back alley of my house where they're selling drugs and everything and I want to know who can I call to report so they can come around here.
OPERATOR Are they outside or is (unintelligible) ... already ... dealing from a house or what?
CALLER They're in the van and they giving customers, you know, drugs.
OPERATOR Do you have a description of the van?
CALLER Um, hold on, I can get for you.
OPERATOR Okay.
CALLER It's a blue and burgundy Bronco. Hello?
OPERATOR Okay. A blue and burgundy?
CALLER Ah hah. Bronco. It's right beside, it's right beside my apartment building.
OPERATOR Okay. Is it in the alley or is it ... it
CALLER It's right in the driveway. Beca ... ah, I stay at [caller's address].
OPERATOR Um hmm.
CALLER And we have like this big parking lot on the side of our apartment.
OPERATOR Okay.
CALLER And it is right in between the ... um ... the parking way and the alley.
OPERATOR So they're in the driveway?
CALLER Right. It's a dark blue and burgundy.
OPERATOR Okay, we'll send someone.
CALLER Okay. Thank you.
OPERATOR Thank you. Bye. 5
The trial court concluded that and, further, the officers "were reasonable" in approaching the vehicle and "in ordering the two people out." 6 We conclude, however, that although the police did indeed act responsibly in responding to the dispatch, and although, of course, the police had reason to be suspicious of the Blazer and its occupants, the police did not have reasonable suspicion justifying a stop under the Fourth Amendment.
A trial court's legal determination of whether undisputed facts form the basis for a constitutional investigative stop is subject to de novo review. See State v. Richardson, 156 Wis.2d 128, 137-38, 456 N.W.2d 830, 833 (1990). In Richardson, the Wisconsin Supreme Court reiterated the standards governing our evaluation of the police conduct:
To execute a valid investigatory stop, Terry [v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968) ] and its progeny require that a law enforcement officer reasonably suspect, in light of his or her experience, that some kind of criminal activity has taken or is taking place. 7 Such reasonable suspicion must be based on "specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion." These facts must be judged against an "objective standard: would the facts available to the officer at the moment of the seizure ... 'warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief' that the action taken was appropriate?" This test applies to the stopping of a vehicle and detention of its occupants.
The focus of an investigatory stop is on reasonableness, and the determination of reasonableness depends on the totality of circumstances:
It is a common sense question, which strikes a balance between the interests of society in solving crime and the members of that society to be free from unreasonable intrusions. The essential question is whether the action of the law enforcement officer was reasonable under all the facts and circumstances present.
Richardson, 156 Wis.2d at 139-40, 456 N.W.2d at 834 (citations omitted) (footnote added). Richardson also concluded that the United States Supreme Court's "reasoning in White [was] reasonable and appropriate not only for the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution but also Article I, sec. 11 of the Wisconsin Constitution" and, therefore, should be applied in determining whether a police stop, based on an anonymous tip, was reasonable. Id. at 141-42, 456 N.W.2d at 835.
In White, the United States Supreme Court considered whether an anonymous informant's telephone tip, as corroborated by police observations, provided police with reasonable suspicion justifying a Terry stop. White, 496 U.S. at 326-27, 110 S.Ct. at 2414-15. The police had received an anonymous phone call stating that White would be leaving a specifically identified apartment "at a particular time in a brown Plymouth station wagon with the right taillight lens broken, that she would be going to Dobey's Motel, and that she would be in possession of about an ounce of cocaine inside a brown attache case." Id. at 327, 110 S.Ct. at 2414. The police observed a brown Plymouth station wagon with a broken taillight in the parking lot in front of the apartment building, saw White leave the building carrying nothing in her hands, followed her as she drove the station wagon most of the approximate four-mile route to Dobey's Motel, stopped her, and found that she had marijuana in an attache case and cocaine in her purse. See id. at 327-31, 110 S.Ct. at 2414-17.
The Supreme Court concluded that, "[a]lthough it [was] a close case," the combination of the anonymous call and the police observations corroborating some details of the informant's tip established reasonable suspicion for the stop. Id. at 332, 110 S.Ct. at 2417. Significantly, however, the Supreme Court explained:
[I]t is not unreasonable to conclude in this case that the independent corroboration by the police of significant aspects of the informer's predictions imparted some degree of reliability to the other allegations made by the caller.
We think it also important that, as in [Illinois v.] Gates, [462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983) ], "the anonymous [tip] contained a range of details relating not just to...
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