United States v. Riggs, 513

• Decision Date: 15 February 1973
• Docket Number: Docket 72-2181.,No. 513,513
• Citation: 474 F.2d 699
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Fairh RIGGS, Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

474 F.2d 699 (1973)

UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Fairh RIGGS, Appellant.

No. 513, Docket 72-2181.

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

Argued January 18, 1973.

Decided February 15, 1973.

Martin D. Dehler, Asst. U. S. Atty. (Robert A. Morse, U. S. Atty., E.D.N.Y., and Raymond J. Dearie, Asst. U. S. Atty., of counsel), for appellee.

Henry B. Rothblatt, New York City (Rothblatt, Rothblatt, Seijas & Peskin, New York City, of counsel), for appellant.

Before FRIENDLY, Chief Judge, and OAKES and TIMBERS, Circuit Judges.

FRIENDLY, Chief Judge:

The sole question on this appeal from a conviction, in the District Court for the Eastern District of New York, for possessing two kilograms of narcotics with intent to distribute, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), is the legality of the acts of law enforcement officers that led to the discovery of the narcotics. These included stopping the appellant, Fairh Riggs, at LaGuardia Airport and asking for identification, a consequent "plain view" of a plastic bag containing white powder in her purse and, finally, a search of her camera case which disclosed the two kilograms of heroin. Although the incident arose in the context of a purported anti-hijacking investigation, we sustain the acts of the law enforcement officers on the basis that they had sufficient reason for suspecting Miss Riggs of a narcotics violation to authorize what was done.

On the basis of the testimony permissibly credited by the trial judge in his reported opinion denying appellant's motion to suppress after an extensive hearing, United States v. Riggs, 347 F.Supp. 1098 (E.D.N.Y. 1972), the facts were as follows: The events, all occurring on Sunday, September 26, 1971, began with the arrival of Miss Riggs, a young black female wearing a brilliant orange coat and carrying no luggage, at the Detroit Municipal Airport at about 8:45 A.M. She was accompanied by two males. At the American Airlines counter she bought three one-way tickets to New York and paid for them with cash which she produced from a brown paper bag. Her ticket was purchased in the name of "P. Griggs." Since she met the "profile," see United States v. Bell, 464 F.2d 667 (2 Cir.1972), then being used by American Airlines, the clerk at the counter summoned a supervisor. By the time the supervisor arrived, one of the males had boarded; the other was still near the counter but he and Miss Riggs acted as if they did not know each other.

Both passengers were stopped before boarding the flight and were asked for identification. At first both denied having any, but later appellant produced some identification, perhaps a driver's license, in the name of "Fairh Riggs." The supervisor inquired what was in the brown paper bag; Riggs answered it was her lunch. He asked to check the bag, Riggs opened it, and he saw it was filled with "stacks of money." The supervisor permitted her to board; the male passenger was also allowed to do so, after a frisk. Appellant's counsel conceded at argument that none of these happenings at Detroit violated appellant's Fourth Amendment rights.

Rendered suspicious by all of the above, the airline supervisor related the facts to Detective Schmidt of the Michigan State Police, who was headquartered at the airport. Detective Schmidt testified that the large amount of cash Miss Riggs was carrying, and the unusual way in which she was carrying it, led him immediately to suspect that she was engaged in narcotics traffic. A check revealed that while the state police had no record for "P. Griggs", they did have one for Cynthia Joyce Griggs, also known as Betty Jackson, a young black female who had been arrested in 1966 on a narcotics charge but whose case had been dismissed after the main prosecution witness was murdered. The Detroit Police Department reported that Cynthia Joyce Griggs had been recently arrested with nine other persons on a narcotics charge as a result of a search of her apartment which also turned up three handguns and a shotgun, and that she was currently on bail. The Detroit office of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs confirmed that Cynthia Griggs was known to them as a narcotics dealer.

Believing, not unreasonably, that the "P. Griggs" ticketed on the flight might in fact be Cynthia Joyce Griggs, Detective Schmidt passed on to Detective Stone of the Port of New York Authority Police at LaGuardia Airport all the information that had been collected. Plainclothesmen dispatched to meet the flight from Detroit reported that the woman had left in one taxi and the two men in another. Detective Stone then notified each of the airlines and the United States Marshal's anti-hijacking detail at LaGuardia of all the above and of the likelihood that the three might be returning after having made a buy of narcotics; he added, apparently only on the strength of the Detroit Police report, that they might be carrying weapons.

About 1:40 P.M. an American Airlines supervisor at LaGuardia telephoned Detective Stone that a woman fitting the description of P. Griggs had purchased with cash a one-way ticket for a 1:55 flight to Detroit and was in the lobby at Gate 9. Stone instructed the supervisor to call the United States marshals while he and his partner proceeded to the Gate.

The supervisor called Deputy Marshal Huttick, who had been informed of the facts earlier related by Detective Stone; he told Huttick that a woman matching Griggs' description was in the lobby at Gate 9 awaiting a return flight to Detroit, mentioned that on this occasion the ticket had been bought in the name of "Fairh Riggs," and added that she met the "profile." Huttick and his partner O'Flaherty immediately went to Gate 9. Riggs had already entered the jetway, but they stopped her before she boarded the plane. They showed their credentials and said they were making a security check. O'Flaherty asked to see the plane ticket, found it was indeed in the name of "F. Riggs," and asked for some verification. Placing on the floor in front of her a leather camera case which had previously been strapped over her shoulders, appellant opened her purse and produced a utility bill bearing the name "Farah Jackson." O'Flaherty asked for better identification. Appellant again opened her purse, wider this time; both marshals saw on the top a clear plastic bag containing white powder. Riggs fumbled with her purse for a few seconds and pulled out a letter from the utility company also addressed to "Farah Jackson." O'Flaherty then flipped open the top of the camera case, saw two plastic bags filled with white powder, and money stuck underneath the bags and on the sides.¹ Miss Riggs, her pocketbook and camera bag were taken to the marshal's office, where field tests confirmed that the bags contained 1.9 kilograms of 75% pure heroin. Riggs was then formally placed under arrest.

Appellant argues that because the American Airlines "profile" did not quite conform to the Federal Aviation Administration profile discussed in United States v. Lopez, 328 F.Supp. 1077 (E.D.N.Y.1971) and United States v. Bell, supra, 464 F.2d 667, and because the marshals did not in good faith believe that Riggs constituted a threat to the security of the airplane, there was no justification for anti-hijacking measures. We need not pass upon these arguments, nor on the question, raised in United States v. Meulener, 351 F.Supp. 1284 (C.D.Cal.1972), how clearly the subject of an anti-hijacking search must be warned that he can avoid the search by declining to board the airplane. See also United States v. Bell, supra, 464 F.2d at 675 (Friendly, C. J., concurring). For we hold that the Deputy Marshals' request for identification as appellant attempted to board her return flight was justified, under Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968), and Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 92 S.Ct. 1921, 32 L.Ed.2d 612 (1972), by their reasonable suspicion that Riggs was in fact Cynthia Joyce Griggs and had made a purchase of narcotics which she was about to transport to Detroit with a view to distribution, and that their search of her camera case was justified both by the probable cause which they then possessed to arrest her for that crime and by their reasonable suspicion that she might be armed.²

A number of "specific and articulable facts," Terry v. Ohio, supra, 392 U.S. at 21, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 provided an adequate basis for the marshals' reasonable suspicion to justify the minimal intrusion upon appellant's privacy represented by a request for identification. We start with her purchase of airplane tickets, with cash taken not from a purse but a brown paper bag, and the efforts of appellant and her two companions to avoid any appearance of recognition. Compare United States v. Canieso, 470 F.2d 1224, 1226, 1230 (2 Cir.1972). We add her carrying "stacks of money," doing this in a brown paper bag, and lying about the bag's contents to the Detroit airline supervisor. This was enough to create the suspicion that appellant was going to New York on no ordinary errand but on one for which large sums of cash on the barrelhead would be needed—something characteristic of narcotics purchases, as the Michigan state police detective knew from his experience in similar situations. These suspicions were confirmed when Riggs returned to LaGuardia Airport—only two hours after arrival—with the brown paper bag now accompanied or supplanted by a camera case—and bought a ticket back to Detroit.

Arguably this alone would have sufficed to justify a demand for identification under Adams v. Williams, supra, 407 U.S. at 145-146, 92 S.Ct. 1921, 32 L.Ed.2d 612, but we need not so decide. Appellant's eastbound ticket had been in the name of "P. Griggs." The police could reasonably have been suspicious under the circumstances that this was another alias designed to conceal that appellant was really Cynthia Joyce Griggs, with her record of arrests for...