Tanner v. State

• Decision Date: 20 June 2007
• Docket Number: No. 03-06-00217-CR.,03-06-00217-CR.
• Citation: 228 S.W.3d 852
• Parties: Ryan Jeffery TANNER, Appellant v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

228 S.W.3d 852

Ryan Jeffery TANNER, Appellant v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee.

No. 03-06-00217-CR.

Court of Appeals of Texas, Austin.

June 20, 2007.

Edward K. Downing Jr., Austin, for Appellant.

M. Scott Taliaferro, Asst. District Atty., Austin, for State.

Before Chief Justice LAW, Justices PURYEAR and HENSON.

OPINION

DAVID PURYEAR, Justice.

After the trial court conducted a hearing and overruled his motion to suppress, appellant Ryan Jeffery Tanner pled guilty to the second-degree felony offense of possessing with intent to deliver more than one but fewer than four grams of methamphetamine. See Tex. Health & Safety Code Ann. § 481.102(6) (West Supp.2006), § 481.112(a), (c) (West 2003). The trial court assessed punishment at five years in prison and a $500 fine, but pursuant to a plea agreement, suspended this sentence and placed Tanner on community supervision for five years. On appeal, Tanner contends that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence, arguing that the arresting officer lacked reasonable suspicion to stop him. We affirm the trial court's judgment.

Factual Summary

The only evidence produced at the hearing was the testimony of the arresting officer, Henry Maldonado of the Travis County Sheriff's Office. Maldonado testified that at about 3:00 a.m. on January 21, 2005, he was conducting a routine patrol in a "pretty excluded [sic] area" with very little ambient light coming from a gas station about one-quarter of a mile away, when he saw Tanner and a young woman pushing bicycles out from a dark area behind the Lone Star Bar. Maldonado did not see them commit any traffic violations. Although Maldonado stated in an affidavit executed immediately after the arrest that he contacted Tanner and the woman because he thought they "might need assistance due to the cold weather and time of day," he testified at the suppression hearing that he was suspicious because they were coming from behind the Lone Star Bar at 3:00 a.m., which he knew typically closed by 2:00 a.m. Maldonado admitted that he was not familiar with the bar's employees and did not know how long it took to clean the bar after closing, nor did he testify that the area had a history of burglaries, vandalism, or drug trafficking. The record does not reflect that any criminal activity had occurred in or near the bar that particular evening.

Maldonado flashed his patrol car's lights to signal for Tanner and his companion to stop. The woman, who was walking behind Tanner, stopped, but Tanner continued walking without changing his pace or direction, even after Maldonado called out to him.¹ Maldonado drove about 50 yards to Tanner, who then stopped. Maldonado observed two large knives clipped to the inside of Tanner's pants pockets. Maldonado inspected the knives and determined that they were legal and then patted Tanner down for additional weapons, finding one small knife. According to his affidavit, Maldonado asked Tanner if he had any other contraband, particularly drugs, and Tanner replied, "I don't know; you can check." Maldonado asked for permission to search Tanner's pockets, and Tanner replied, "Go ahead and take the stuff out." During his search, Maldonado found a closed pocketknife sheath in Tanner's left front pants pocket that had clear plastic sticking out from the inside. Maldonado opened the sheath and saw a small clear plastic bag that held ten smaller bags of methamphetamine. Maldonado testified that each bag appeared to contain the same quantity, as if the drugs were separated for delivery.

The trial court, calling the decision "a close call," denied Tanner's motion to suppress.² Pursuant to the plea agreement, the court suspended the five-year sentence and imposed community supervision for five years. The trial court certified Tanner's right to appeal matters that were raised by written motion and ruled on before trial.

Standard of Review

Citizens have the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. U.S. Const. amend. IV. However, if an officer has reasonable suspicion to believe that an individual is involved in criminal activity, the officer may conduct a brief investigative detention. Carmouche v. State, 10 S.W.3d 323, 328 (Tex.Crim.App. 2000). The reasonableness of a temporary detention must be considered in view of the totality of the circumstances at the inception of the encounter, and the officer must be able to point to specific, articulable facts that, combined with rational inferences from those facts, would lead him to reasonably suspect that a specific person had engaged in or was or soon would be engaging in criminal activity. Garcia v. State, 43 S.W.3d 527, 530 (Tex.Crim.App. 2001). Reasonable suspicion must be based on more than a non-specific suspicion or mere "hunch" of criminal activity. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 27, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968). The State has the burden to show that the officer had an objective basis for the stop, and the officer's subjective intent is irrelevant to the determination of reasonable suspicion. Garcia, 43 S.W.3d at 530. We look only at the facts known to the officer at the inception of the stop; an initially unlawful stop is not validated by the discovery of criminal activity. See Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 484, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963).

The constitutional prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures, a "relatively simple concept[ ]," United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7, 109 S.Ct. 1581, 104 L.Ed.2d 1 (1989), guards against "arbitrary invasions solely at the unfettered discretion" of law enforcement officers. Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47, 51, 99 S.Ct. 2637, 61 L.Ed.2d 357 (1979). We require only a "minimal level of objective justification" on the part of the officer, Sokolow, 490 U.S. at 7, 109 S.Ct. 1581 (quoting Immigration & Naturalization Serv. v. Delgado, 466 U.S. 210, 217, 104 S.Ct. 1758, 80 L.Ed.2d 247 (1984)), and our "determination of reasonable suspicion must be based upon commonsense judgments and inferences about human behavior." Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 125, 120 S.Ct. 673, 145 L.Ed.2d 570 (2000). "[T]here is `no ready test for determining reasonableness other than by balancing the need to search [or seize] against the invasion which the search [or seizure] entails.'" Terry, 392 U.S. at 21, 88 S.Ct 1868 (quoting Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U.S. 523, 534-37, 87 S.Ct. 1727, 18 L.Ed.2d 930 (1967)).

When reviewing a trial court's decision on a motion to suppress, we give almost total deference to the court's determination of historical facts but review de novo its application of the law to the facts. Maxwell v. State, 73 S.W.3d 278, 281 (Tex. Crim.App.2002). When the trial court does not make explicit findings of historical facts, we view the evidence in the light most favorable to the court's ruling and assume the court made implicit findings of fact supported by the record. Carmouche, 10 S.W.3d at 327-28. The trial court is the sole judge of the credibility of the witnesses and their testimony. Maxwell, 73 S.W.3d at 281.

Discussion

There is no question that an investigative detention occurred when Tanner stopped walking in response to Maldonado's demand.³ Thus, the State was required to prove that Maldonado had reasonable suspicion for the detention at the time the stop began. Tanner contends that the trial court's denial of his motion to suppress violated his constitutional rights and that the police lacked reasonable suspicion for the stop.⁴ To show reasonable suspicion, the State points to Maldonado's testimony that he stopped Tanner and his companion because they were walking at 3:00 a.m. from a dark area behind the bar, a business that "had been well closed by that time." He also testified that his suspicions increased when Tanner's companion stopped soon after he flashed his patrol car's lights, but Tanner continued walking until Maldonado drove up to him.

The reasonableness of a search "is determined `by balancing its intrusion on the individual's Fourth Amendment interests against its promotion of legitimate government interests.'" Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial Dist. Court, 542 U.S. 177, 187-88, 124 S.Ct. 2451, 159 L.Ed.2d 292 (2004) (quoting Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 654, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 59 L.Ed.2d 660 (1979)); see also Terry, 392 U.S. at 20-21, 88 S.Ct. 1868 (in assessing reasonableness, courts should focus on governmental interest that arguably justifies intrusion on constitutional rights). An officer may not act solely on a hunch, but his determination of "the likelihood of criminal activity need not rise to the level required for probable cause, and it falls considerably short of satisfying a preponderance of the evidence standard." United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 274, 122 S.Ct. 744, 151 L.Ed.2d 740 (2002); see Sokolow, 490 U.S. at 7, 109 S.Ct. 1581 (reasonable suspicion requires "minimal level of objective justification").

In conducting our review, we must heed the Supreme Court's admonitions that "the concept of reasonable suspicion, like probable cause, is not `readily, or even usefully, reduced to a neat set of legal rules,'" Sokolow, 490 U.S. at 7, 109 S.Ct. 1581 (quoting Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 232, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983)), and that assigning a precise definition to reasonable suspicion "is not possible." Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 695, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996). Our inquiry into reasonable suspicion is "multi-faceted," and determinations made in other cases "`will seldom be a useful "precedent" for another.'" Id. at 698, 116 S.Ct. 1657 (quoting Gates, 462 U.S. at 238 n. 11, 103 S.Ct. 2317). Instead, reasonable suspicion is a "commonsense, nontechnical conception[ ] that deal[s] with `the factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act.'" Id. (quoting Gates, 462 U.S. at 231, 103 S.Ct. 2317 (quoting Brinegar v. United...