U.S. v. Singh

• Decision Date: 02 April 2004
• Docket Number: No. 03-4715.,03-4715.
• Citation: 363 F.3d 347
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Harsimrat SINGH; Randhir Singh Khangura, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

363 F.3d 347

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Harsimrat SINGH; Randhir Singh Khangura, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 03-4715.

United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.

Argued January 23, 2004.

Decided April 2, 2004.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

ARGUED: Kearns Davis, Assistant United States Attorney, Greensboro, North Carolina, for Appellant. William Lindsay Osteen, Jr., ADAMS & OSTEEN, Greensboro, North Carolina, for Appellee Harsimrat Singh; James Daniel Williams, Jr., Durham, North Carolina, for Appellee Randhir Singh Khangura. ON BRIEF: Anna Mills Wagoner, United States Attorney, Sandra J. Hairston, Assistant United States Attorney, Greensboro, North Carolina, for Appellant.

Before WILLIAMS, TRAXLER, and KING, Circuit Judges.

Reversed and remanded by published opinion. Judge KING wrote the opinion, in which Judge WILLIAMS and Judge TRAXLER joined.

OPINION

KING, Circuit Judge:

Harsimrat Singh and Randhir Singh Khangura were indicted on March 31 2003, in the Middle District of North Carolina for possession with intent to distribute marijuana. Singh and Khangura thereafter sought to suppress a large quantity of marijuana and currency seized from the trailer of their tractor-trailer rig. The district court heard evidence on the suppression issues and granted the relief requested. United States v. Singh, No. 1:03CR94-1 (M.D.N.C. Aug. 28, 2003) (the "Opinion"). The Government has appealed, maintaining that the court erred in ruling the seizure unconstitutional. Because the seizure was supported by probable cause and passes constitutional muster, we reverse and remand.

I.

A.

The facts underlying this dispute, as presented to the district court at an evidentiary hearing in Winston-Salem on July 28 and 29, 2003, are largely uncontroverted.¹ On March 8, 2003, federal agent Eric Green learned from a confidential informant in Atlanta, Georgia (the "CI"), that a tractor-trailer rig (the "Rig") containing a large quantity of marijuana had broken down on Interstate 85 ("I-85") south at mile-post 201 or 202 near Greensboro, North Carolina. The CI further advised Green that the disabled Rig's tractor was silver in color, that its tractor and trailer bore Canadian license plates, and that it was being driven from Canada to Atlanta by "two Indian males" who were awaiting tow truck assistance. Opinion at 2. Green relayed this information to one of his colleagues in the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement ("BICE"), agent James Bryant, in Charlotte, North Carolina. Bryant, in an effort to locate and intercept the smuggled contraband, relayed this information to the North Carolina Highway Patrol (the "NCHP"). J.A. 69, 71.

After determining that mileposts 201 and 202 on I-85 were not in the Greensboro area, the NCHP attempted to locate the Rig at mile-post 101 on I-85 and at milepost 202 on Interstate 40, near Greensboro. Failing to locate the disabled Rig at these locations, NCHP officers recontacted agent Bryant to seek clarification on the location of the Rig. Bryant, in turn, contacted agent Green in Atlanta, requesting such information. J.A. 92. As a result, the CI phoned the truckers, who were with the disabled Rig in North Carolina, and obtained clarification on their location. Through these communications, the CI, in agent Green's presence, ascertained from the truckers that the disabled Rig was near milepost 202 on I-85, approximately seventy miles north of Greensboro and just south of the North Carolina-Virginia line. This information was then relayed to the NCHP. Opinion at 2-3. (The information provided by the CI is hereinafter referred to as "the Tip.")

Upon determining that milepost 202 on I-85 was located in North Carolina's Granville County, NCHP Sergeant Bill Grey directed an officer to go there, and he confirmed the presence of a disabled rig matching the description provided by the CI. When that information was relayed to Grey, three NCHP officers — Grey, Terry Siler, and Greg Strader — departed the Greensboro area in separate cruisers, proceeding north seventy to eighty miles on I-85 to Granville County. Contemporaneously, Grey contacted an NCHP K-9 narcotic detection unit and requested that it proceed to milepost 202 to assist in locating contraband.² Id. at 3.

Upon reaching milepost 202, the officers located the disabled Rig. By that time, the trailer of the Rig had been dismounted from its tractor, and the tractor and trailer were attached to separate tow trucks. Because the officers were unable to cross the I-85 median, they proceeded north to Exit 204 before turning southbound. Strader then proceeded to the site where they had observed the disabled Rig, and Grey and Siler followed shortly thereafter. When Strader arrived at mile-post 202, the tow trucks had departed, towing the Rig south on I-85. Consequently, Strader, Grey, and Siler continued south on I-85 in search of the Rig. Id. at 3-4.

Upon locating the Rig, Strader observed that the lead tow truck was towing the Rig's trailer and that the other tow truck, with the Rig's tractor, was following closely behind. Opinion at 4. He also observed that the Rig's tractor and trailer each bore Canadian license plates. J.A. 167. Using his speed detection equipment, Strader determined that the lead tow truck was travelling seventy-one miles per hour in a sixty-five mile-per-hour work zone, and he stopped it at I-85's mile-post 180, near Oxford, in Durham County. J.A. 152. The second tow truck then also stopped, pulling onto the shoulder of I-85 in front of the lead tow truck and Strader's cruiser. Opinion at 5.

The driver of the speeding tow truck, Erskine Williamson, exited to speak with Strader, and the two men met at the front of the truck. As Strader was explaining the speeding incident to Williamson, they were joined by Michael Huff, the driver of the second tow truck. Soon thereafter, Grey joined the conversation, and Strader asked Williamson whether the Rig had been in an accident or had broken down. Williamson explained that the Rig had broken down, that one of the Rig's occupants was the passenger in his tow truck, and that the other trucker was in Huff's truck. Williamson advised the officers that the truckers "were anxious to have their tractor repaired as soon as possible, no matter what the price," and that they wanted the tractor "towed to the repair shop where Williamson and Huff worked but wanted the trailer towed to a different location so it could be picked up." Id. at 6. Huff advised the officers that the trucker in his tow truck had become "visibly nervous or agitated" upon seeing Strader pull alongside. Id. Indeed, according to Huff, after seeing Strader signal for Williamson to stop, the trucker in Huff's tow truck "almost jumped out of his skin" and immediately attempted to place a call on his cell phone. J.A. 207. Strader, Williamson, and Huff viewed this behavior as both "strange" and "unusual."³ J.A. 125, 148, 151, 309.

Strader then directed Khangura to exit Williamson's tow truck. After joining the two officers, Khangura was identified, and he was questioned by Strader regarding the Rig and its contents. Strader ascertained that Khangura and his co-driver were not American citizens, but were "from another country." J.A. 180-81. Khangura explained that he and his co-driver were travelling from Boston to Charlotte and that they were running empty, hoping to arrange for a load in Charlotte. Opinion at 7-8. Grey and Strader considered these responses suspicious, doubting that such a long journey would be undertaken with no guarantee of remuneration. J.A. 148, 207. Strader then returned to his cruiser with Williamson and Grey and wrote Williamson a warning citation for speeding. Meanwhile, Huff and Khangura remained near the front of Williamson's truck. Opinion at 8.

After Strader prepared the citation, Williamson was advised to "stand by" while the officers spoke with Singh and Khangura. Grey and Williamson then rejoined Huff and Khangura. Strader, however, went past the group to Huff's tow truck and requested Singh to exit it. Singh was questioned briefly, and he generally provided the same responses Strader had received from Khangura. Additionally, Singh explained that he had worked for Yadu Transport, the company named on the trailer, for three weeks. Khangura stated that he had worked for Yadu for only one week. Singh and Khangura then provided conflicting information regarding the number of rigs in Yadu's truck fleet. They were then asked if they had marijuana, cocaine, or guns in the tractor or the trailer, and both responded in the negative. In light of the Tip and the corroborating circumstances, the officers requested permission to search the Rig, and at least one of the two men orally consented. The officers then presented Singh and Khangura with a written consent-to-search form, memorializing the verbal consent, which they both executed.⁴ Id. at 8-9.

Shortly after Singh and Khangura signed the consent-to-search form, the NCHP K-9 unit, which had been requested to stand by, arrived and used its drug detection dog "Rico" to sweep the outside of the Rig's tractor and trailer. Rico alerted to the "odor of narcotics" at the left side of the front of the trailer and at the trailer's rear doors.⁵ Id. at 9. The officers then opened the unlocked doors of the Rig's trailer and found that two plywood panels lining the front wall "seemed different" — they were "newer in color" and had a different general appearance from those panels lining the trailer's side walls. Id. at 10. Rico was placed inside the trailer, and he immediately "alerted on the front wall." Id. The plywood panels were then removed and several black duffle bags and a Heineken beer box were discovered. The duffle bags contained approximately 500 pounds of marijuana, and the Heineken beer box contained more than $300,000 in United States currency. Id. The officers promptly seized the marijuana and currency and took Singh and...