Storm v. Daily
| Decision Date | 29 October 2019 |
| Docket Number | Case No. 1:18-cv-00163-DCN |
| Parties | RICKIE STORM, Plaintiff, v. PARMA POLICE OFFICER J. DAILY (#410), Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Idaho |
Earlier in this matter, the Court ordered Plaintiff Rickie Storm to file an amended complaint to remedy deficiencies in his original Complaint. Dkts. 10, 3. Plaintiff has filed a proposed Amended Complaint, which is subject to review by the Court to determine whether it should be dismissed under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915 or 1915A. Dkt. 13. Having reviewed the record, and otherwise being fully informed, the Court enters the following Order.
Plaintiff alleges that Officer J. Daily of the Parma City Police Department violated his Fourth Amendment rights by carrying out various traffic stops, searches, seizures, and interrogations without reasonable suspicion. At the time of these incidents, Plaintiff was on parole. As the result of one of these stops, Officer Daily found methamphetamine on Plaintiff's person. Plaintiff was arrested and charged with a parole violation; his parole was revoked; and he was returned to prison.
The Court is required to review complaints filed in forma pauperis, or complaints filed by prisoners seeking relief against a governmental entity or an officer or employee of a governmental entity, to determine whether summary dismissal is appropriate. The Court must dismiss a complaint or any portion thereof that states a frivolous or malicious claim, fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted, or seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief. 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915(e)(2) & 1915A(b).
The Fourth Amendment protects citizens from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. U.S. Const. amend. IV. This protection extends to brief investigatory stops of persons or vehicles that fall short of traditional arrest. United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 273 (2002) (citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 9 (1968)). A passenger in a car stopped by the police is considered "seized" in the same sense as the driver and may assert a Fourth Amendment claim for a wrongful seizure. Brendlin v. California, 551 U.S. 249, 257-58 (2007).
"As a general matter, the decision to stop an automobile is reasonable where the police have probable cause to believe that a traffic violation has occurred." Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 810 (1996). Brief investigatory stops do not violate the Fourth Amendment "if the officer's action is supported by reasonable suspicion to believe that criminal activity may be afoot." Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273 (citing United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7 (1989)).
Reasonable suspicion means a "minimum level of objective justification." Sokolow, 490 U.S. at 7. Reasonable suspicion does not need to rise to "the level required for probable cause, and it falls considerably short of satisfying a preponderance of the evidence standard." Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 274. To determine whether reasonable suspicion existed, the court considers "totality of the circumstances surrounding the stop." United States v. Hall, 974 F.2d 1201, 1204 (9th Cir. 1992).
"Reasonable suspicion 'is formed by specific, articulable facts which, together with objective and reasonable inferences, form the basis for suspecting that the particular person detained is engaged in criminal activity.'" United States v. Thompson, 282 F.3d 673, 678 (9th Cir. 2002) (quoting United States v. Rojas-Millan, 234 F.3d 464, 468-69 (9th Cir. 2000)). The determination is made with reference to the "collective knowledge of the officers involved, and the inferences reached by experienced, trained officers." Hall, 974 F.2d at 1204 (quoting United States v. Sharpe, 470 U.S. 675, 682 (1985)). Officers must be permitted "to draw on their own experience and specialized training to make inferences from and deductions about the cumulative information available to them that might well elude an untrained person." Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273.
An investigatory stop based on reasonable suspicion satisfies the Constitution even if that reasonable suspicion is based on an officer's good-faith mistake of fact. United States v. Miguel, 368 F.3d 1150, 1153-54 (9th Cir. 2004). Further, the Supreme Court has held that even an officer's reasonable mistake of the law supports the view that a stop was reasonable. Heien v. North Carolina, 135 S.Ct. 530 (2014) () (emphasis added)).
In United States v. Miles, 247 F.3d 1009 (9th Cir. 2001), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit outlined what is permitted in a traffic stop and why:
It is well-settled that "[t]he purpose of a Terry stop is 'to allow the officer to pursue his investigation without fear of violence.' " United States v. Taylor, 716 F.2d 701, 708 (9th Cir.1983) (quoting Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 146, 92 S.Ct. 1921, 32 L.Ed.2d 612 (1972)). Generally, "[a] Terry stop involves no more than a brief stop, interrogation and, under proper circumstances, a brief check for weapons." United States v. Robertson, 833 F.2d 777, 780 (9th Cir.1987). If the stop proceeds beyond these limitations, an arrest occurs, which requires probable cause. Id. "There has been an arrest if, under the circumstances, a reasonable person would conclude that he was not free to leave after brief questioning." United States v. Del Vizo, 918 F.2d 821, 824 (9th Cir.1990).
In Whren, the Supreme Court unanimously rejected the argument "that the constitutional reasonableness of traffic stops depends on the actual motivations of the individual officers involved." 517 U.S. at 813. Instead, the Court held that a traffic stop is per se reasonable under the Fourth Amendment so long as the police have probable cause that the motorist has violated any portion of the traffic code. Id. at 813-15. Thus, the Court upheld the seizure of illegal drugs found by plainclothes officers during a traffic stop, rejecting the defendants' argument that the stop was pretextual because plainclothes officers do not normally stop cars for minor traffic violations. It is clear, then, that pretextual traffic stops are not prohibited by the Fourth Amendment. The police officer's "[s]ubjective intentions [whatever they may be] play no role in ordinary, probable-causeFourth Amendment analysis." Id. at 813.The Court also rejected the argument that the standard should be different where "civil traffic regulations" are concerned. See id. at 810-11.
To summarize, "it is now clear that a police officer may stop and search any vehicle so long as the officer is able to articulate any kind of traffic or equipment violation." See United States v. Choudhry, 461 F.3d 1097, 1098 (9th Cir. 2006) ().
During a lawful investigatory stop, police officers may lawfully conduct a "frisk" or "pat-down search" of a driver or passenger if the officer reasonably suspects the person is armed and dangerous. Terry, 392 U.S. at 23-24.
The first step in a search of a person is the frisk or pat down for weapons. If, during that preliminary search, "an officer feels an item that he recognizes as contraband or evidence, that 'touch' may provide probable cause for the arrest of the person and seizure of the evidence." Miles, 247 F.3d at 1013 (relying on Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 375-76 (1993). Now armed with probable cause, the police officer is permitted to go to the second step of reaching into the suspect's pocket where the suspicious item is located. United States v. Mattarolo, 209 F.3d 1153, 1158 (9th Cir. 2000).
On the other hand, if the officer does not touch something in the pocket that raises a reasonable suspicion that it contains a weapon or contraband during the first step (the frisk or pat down), then there is no reasonable suspicion to allow the officer to go further to explore the contents of the pocket. A permissible "touch" during the frisk or pat downis not the equivalent of squeezing, sliding, or otherwise manipulating the contents of a pocket if an officer has determined that the person does not have a weapon. Miles, 247 F.3d at 1014-15. Inventorying a person's pockets is permissible only after a party is in custody or has been "arrested," meaning that the circumstances right before the search should have led the party "reasonably to believe that [he] could not freely leave." Lowe v. United States, 407 F.2d 1391, 1397 (1969). Therefore, the nature of a reasonable frisk depends on whether the person has reason to believe he cannot leave and is in custody or under arrest—with or without the officer having said so.
Plaintiff alleges that Officer Daily undertook a series of traffic stops and searched his person to harass him. The Court will review each stop and incident under the criteria set forth above.
On September 15, 2016, Parma City Officer Daily pulled over a vehicle Plaintiff was driving for the reason that Plaintiff had just left a known drug house. Plaintiff alleges that he did not know it was a drug house and had never been to Parma before. Plaintiff was issued a misdemeanor citation for driving without privileges.
Neither Plaintiff's intent nor the officer's intent play into the analysis of the traffic stop. Rather, the inquiry is whether Officer Daily stated a cause for the stop based upon a reasonable suspicion under the totality of the circumstances. In his Amended Complaint, Plaintiff clarifies that a friend dropped him off at the "drug house," because another friend had asked him to pick up a car from the "drug house." Dkt. 13.
Upon leaving the "drug...
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