State v. Willoughby, Docket No. 33350 (Idaho App. 1/8/2008)
| Decision Date | 08 January 2008 |
| Docket Number | Docket No. 33350. |
| Parties | STATE OF IDAHO, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CHRISTOPHER WILLOUGHBY, Defendant-Respondent. |
| Court | Idaho Court of Appeals |
Appeal from the District Court of the First Judicial District, State of Idaho, Kootenai County. Hon. Charles W. Hosack, District Judge. Hon. Benjamin R. Simpson, Magistrate.
Order suppressing evidence in DUI prosecution, affirmed.
Hon. Lawrence G. Wasden, Attorney General; Jessica M. Lorello, Deputy Attorney General, Boise, for appellant.
Frederick G. Loats, Coeur d'Alene, for respondent.
The State appeals from the district court's appellate decision affirming the magistrate's order granting Christopher Willoughby's motion to suppress evidence obtained by the police to prosecute him for driving while under the influence (DUI). We likewise affirm the magistrate's order suppressing the evidence.
The following facts were found by the magistrate from the evidence presented at a hearing on Willoughby's motion to suppress. On July 4, 2005, Officers Gillmore and Carroll, of the Coeur d'Alene Police Department, were dispatched to a "physical fight in progress" in the parking lot of an apartment building located in Coeur d'Alene. Officer Gillmore arrived a few seconds before Officer Carroll. They were in separate patrol vehicles and arrived at the parking lot under "Full Code," with overhead lights and sirens on.1 When Officer Gillmore arrived, he saw a vehicle stopped behind some parked cars, with Willoughby in the driver's seat. There were three or four other persons present and at least one was a female getting out of Willoughby's car. Officer Gillmore parked about fifteen feet from Willoughby's vehicle and Officer Carroll parked just to the west of Gillmore. Both officers left their overhead lights on. Willoughby spontaneously stepped from his vehicle as Officer Gillmore exited his patrol vehicle and asked the persons present where the fight was. The persons present all denied any knowledge of a fight at that location. Officer Gillmore continued to ask about the fight and then noticed that Willoughby had "glassy droopy eyes, a long face, and was relaxed." Officer Gillmore also smelled the odor of an alcoholic beverage on or about Willoughby. Willoughby admitted driving his vehicle to the location.2 Based upon his training, experience and observations, Officer Gillmore formed the opinion that Willoughby was possibly driving under the influence and asked Officer Carroll to take over for a DUI investigation. Officer Carroll, after performing a DUI investigation, ultimately arrested Willoughby for DUI.
Willoughby filed a motion to suppress all evidence obtained by the officers, contending that his detention by the officers while they conducted their investigation was not supported by reasonable, articulable suspicion. The magistrate granted Willoughby's motion. The magistrate determined that the officers' conduct in arriving at the parking lot with the overhead lights on their vehicles operating and leaving those lights on while they interrogated the people in the parking lot about the reported fight constituted a seizure of the persons present, including Willoughby. The magistrate also determined that the officers did not have reasonable suspicion to believe that the persons seized were engaged in, or about to engage in, criminal activity, to justify the seizure of Willoughby, or the other persons present. On appeal by the State to the district court, the magistrate's order suppressing evidence was upheld. The State then filed a timely appeal to this Court.
On review of a decision of the district court, rendered in its appellate capacity, we examine the record of the trial court independently of, but with due regard for, the district court's intermediate appellate decision. State v. Bowman, 124 Idaho 936, 939, 866 P.2d 193, 196 (Ct. App. 1993). The standard of review of a suppression motion is bifurcated. When a decision on a motion to suppress is challenged, we accept the trial court's findings of fact which are supported by substantial evidence, but we freely review the application of constitutional principles to the facts as found. State v. Atkinson, 128 Idaho 559, 561, 916 P.2d 1284, 1286 (Ct. App. 1996).
The State contends that the magistrate erred both in concluding that Willoughby was seized by the officers during their investigation and that there was not reasonable suspicion for the officers to believe a crime was being committed when the officers responded to the location of the parking lot. We will address these contentions in turn.
The Fourth Amendment guarantees the right of every citizen to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. However, the Fourth Amendment does not proscribe all contact between the police and citizens. Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Delgado, 466 U.S. 210, 215 (1984); Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 19 n.16 (1968). So long as a reasonable person would feel free to go about his or her business, an encounter with a police officer is consensual and the encounter need not be justified by reasonable suspicion. Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429, 434 (1991). "Only when the officer, by means of physical force or show of authority, has in some way restrained the liberty of a citizen may we conclude that a `seizure' has occurred." Terry, 392 U.S. at 19 n.16; see also State v. Ferreira, 133 Idaho 474, 479, 988 P.2d 700, 705 (Ct. App. 1999); State v. Pick, 124 Idaho 601, 604, 861 P.2d 1266, 1269 (Ct. App. 1993). In other words, unless the circumstances of the encounter are "so intimidating as to demonstrate that a reasonable person would have believed he [or she] was not free to leave if he [or she] had not responded," one cannot say that an officer's request results in a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Delgado, 466 U.S. at 216. As a result, a police officer generally does not violate the Fourth Amendment by merely approaching an individual on the street or in another public place, by asking if the person is willing to answer some questions or by putting questions to him or her if the person is willing to listen. Bostick, 501 U.S. at 434; State v. Zubizareta, 122 Idaho 823, 826, 839 P.2d 1237, 1240 (Ct. App. 1992); State v. Osborne, 121 Idaho 520, 523, 826 P.2d 481, 484 (Ct. App. 1991).
The burden of proving that a seizure occurred is on the defendant seeking to suppress evidence allegedly obtained as a result of an illegal seizure. State v. Page, 140 Idaho 841, 843, 103 P.3d 454, 456 (2004); State v. Reese, 132 Idaho 652, 654, 978 P.2d 212, 214 (1999); State v. Fuentes, 129 Idaho 830, 832, 933 P.2d 119, 121 (Ct. App. 1997). Taking into account all the surrounding circumstances, the critical inquiry is whether a reasonable person would have felt free to disregard the police, decline the officer's request or otherwise terminate the encounter. Page, 140 Idaho at 843-44, 103 P.3d at 456-57; State v. Nickel, 134 Idaho 610, 613, 7 P.3d 219, 222 (2000); Reese, 132 Idaho at 653, 978 P.2d at 213; State v. Gutierrez, 137 Idaho 647, 650, 51 P.3d 461, 464 (Ct. App. 2002); State v. Nelson, 134 Idaho 675, 679, 8 P.3d 670, 674 (Ct. App. 2000); Pick, 124 Idaho at 604, 861 P.2d at 1269; State v. Jordan, 122 Idaho 771, 774, 839 P.2d 38, 41 (Ct. App. 1992); State v. Fry, 122 Idaho 100, 103, 831 P.2d 942, 945 (Ct. App. 1991).
The use of overhead signal lights on a police vehicle is one of the circumstances that is considered in determining whether a reasonable person in another vehicle in proximity to the police vehicle would be deemed seized by the officer's activities. This Court has recognized that where a police officer parked his vehicle behind the defendant's already-stopped vehicle on the roadside and the officer had his amber flashing lights on to alert oncoming traffic to the vehicles off the roadway, the defendant was not "seized" i.e., the defendant's "movement was not restricted for Fourth Amendment purposes by the officer's initial contact." Pick, 124 Idaho at 605, 861 P.2d at 1270. Nor does the use of a spotlight by the police to illuminate a parked vehicle, without also using overhead emergency lights, constitute a show of authority that would lead a reasonable person to believe that he or she was not free to leave. State v. Baker, 141 Idaho 163, 107 P.3d 1214 (2004).
A different result may obtain where the officer's vehicle displays its colored emergency lights. Thus, by application of statutory provisions regulating motor vehicle traffic, we said in State v. Mireles, 133 Idaho 690, 991 P.2d 878 (Ct. App. 1999):
Here, by contrast, [Officer] Hulse's act of turning on the overhead lights, although not necessarily intended to create a detention, did constitute a technical, de facto detention commanding Mireles to remain stopped pursuant to I. C. § 49-625. A person is seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment if, in view of all the circumstances, a reasonable person would have believed he or she was no longer free to leave. State v. Waldie, 126 Idaho 864, 866, 893 P.2d 811, 813 (Ct. App. 1995). Once Hulse activated the police car's emergency lights, Mireles, assuming he was cognizant of the fact, was not free to drive away. See I.C. § 49-1404 ().
133 Idaho at 692, 991 P.2d at 880. In Mirales, just as in Willoughby's circumstance, the defendant's vehicle was already stopped before the police vehicle arrived with its emergency lights flashing. Similarly, in State v. Schmidt, 137 Idaho 301, 47 P.3d 1271 (Ct. App. 2002), this Court held that the police officer's act of parking his vehicle in such away to block an exit route and with the vehicle's overhead emergency lights on constituted a seizure of a parked vehicle in which the defendant was a passenger, which...
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