Williams v. Com.

• Decision Date: 06 April 2004
• Docket Number: Record No. 0930-03-1.
• Citation: 42 Va. App. 723,594 S.E.2d 305
• Court: Virginia Court of Appeals
• Parties: Madrid Elsworth WILLIAMS v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia.

594 S.E.2d 305

42 Va. App. 723

Madrid Elsworth WILLIAMS v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia.

Record No. 0930-03-1.

Court of Appeals of Virginia, Chesapeake.

April 6, 2004.

S. Jane Chittom, Appellant Defender (Public Defender Commission, on briefs), for appellant.

Margaret W. Reed, Assistant Attorney General (Jerry W. Kilgore, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee.

Present: ANNUNZIATA, FRANK and McCLANAHAN, JJ.

ANNUNZIATA, Judge.

Madrid Elsworth Williams was convicted in a bench trial of possession of cocaine with the intent to distribute in violation of Code § 18.2-248 and sentenced to five years in prison, three years and six months suspended. Williams appeals his conviction on the grounds that (1) the evidence used against him was unlawfully seized because the police improperly impounded his car, (2) the evidence was insufficient to prove he possessed the cocaine, and (3) the evidence was insufficient to establish his intent to distribute the cocaine. For the reasons that follow, we affirm.

I. Background

On appeal, we view the evidence, and all reasonable inferences that may be drawn from the evidence, in a light most favorable to the Commonwealth as the party prevailing below. Garcia v. Commonwealth, 40 Va. App. 184, 189, 578 S.E.2d 97, 99 (2003). So viewed, the evidence establishes that, on October 16, 2002, at approximately 3:00 a.m., Officer Vincent McLean observed a vehicle make an illegal "U-turn." He stopped the driver, Madrid Elsworth Williams, who was alone in the car.

McLean asked Williams to produce his driver's license and the vehicle's registration. Williams searched the glove compartment for "a few seconds," but he could produce neither the vehicle's registration nor a driver's license. McLean asked Williams if he would accompany him to his patrol car where he could verbally obtain Williams's information. Williams complied.

McLean ran the information Williams produced through dispatch and learned that Williams's license was suspended. Williams stated that the car belonged to his girl-friend, but McLean could not recall whether he provided a name. "I think he just said `girl-friend,'" McLean testified. McLean and Williams remained in the car while McLean completed the appropriate summonses."

When Officer James Spaven arrived on the scene, McLean asked him to prepare the vehicle for towing and impoundment. Spawn performed an inventory search of the vehicle and discovered a "Newports" cigarette box in the glove compartment. The cigarette box contained twenty-four individually packaged rocks of crack cocaine. No ingestion devices were found in the car. Spaven showed McLean the evidence, who then informed Williams that he was under arrest for possession of cocaine. Williams responded, "Oh, man, thanks for not charging me with PWID [possession with intent to distribute]."

At trial, McLean gave the following reasons for impounding the vehicle: "If there is not a licensed driver inside the vehicle, then we tow it for several reasons, safety of the contents of the vehicle, plus at the time this vehicle had a broken-out window, and this neighborhood is not a safe place to leave the vehicle in." McLean also said that he could not determine the owner of the vehicle because Williams could not produce the vehicle's registration information.

The Commonwealth called Detective R.M. Holly as an expert in the use, packaging, and distribution of narcotics. Holly testified that the certificate of analysis established that the cocaine found in the cigarette box weighed 1.95 grams. Heavy users, Holly explained, would use approximately half a gram per day. In his opinion, the cocaine recovered from the car was inconsistent with personal use because users could "get twice as much for the amount of money" if the drugs were purchased in block form. "The fact that [the cocaine was] individually wrapped" also informed Holly's opinion that it was intended for "something other than personal use."

Williams testified in his own defense. Williams claimed that he provided the vehicle's registration card, with the name of his girlfriend listed as the owner, to McLean. Williams said he told McLean the car belonged to her and that he asked the officer to call her. Williams denied saying "thanks for not charging me with PWID" until he was brought before a magistrate. Although Williams stated that he was unaware of the narcotics in the glove compartment, he admitted that he smoked the cigarette brand "Newports."

Before trial, Williams filed a motion to suppress the evidence on the ground that the police improperly impounded his car. The trial court denied the motion. Williams renewed his objection to the impoundment by a motion to strike at the close of all the evidence. Williams also argued that the evidence was insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he possessed the cocaine and that he intended to distribute it. The trial court denied the motion to strike and convicted Williams as charged. This appeal followed ll. The Vehicle Impoundment Was Proper

Williams contends the vehicle he was driving was illegally impounded and that the fruits of the inventory search were improperly admitted into evidence.¹ On appeal of the trial court's denial of Williams's motion to suppress, this Court views the evidence in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, the party prevailing below, and grants to it all reasonable inferences that may be drawn from the evidence. King v. Commonwealth, 39 Va.App. 306, 307, 572 S.E.2d 518, 518-19 (2002). This Court gives deference to the trial court's findings of historical fact unless they are plainly wrong or without evidence to support them. Id. at 309, 572 S.E.2d at 519. "The burden to establish that the denial of the motion to suppress constituted reversible error rests with the defendant." Id. at 308, 572 S.E.2d at 519.

Searches and seizures conducted without a warrant are presumptively invalid. Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 372, 113 S.Ct. 2130, 2135, 124 L.Ed.2d 334 (1993). However, Virginia recognizes a "community caretaker" exception to the general rule. See King, 39 Va.App. at 309,

572 S.E.2d at 520. The exception is grounded in the policy considerations recognized by the United States Supreme Court in South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 96 S.Ct. 3092, 49 L.Ed.2d 1000 (1976), and Cady v. Dombrowski, 413 U.S. 433, 93 S.Ct. 2523, 37 L.Ed.2d 706 (1973). Those policy considerations include: 1) the protection of the owner's property while it remains in police custody, 2) the protection of police against claims or disputes concerning lost or stolen property, and 3) protection of the public and the police from physical danger. Reese v. Commonwealth, 220 Va. 1035, 1039, 265 S.E.2d 746, 749 (1980); see generally Opperman, 428 U.S. at 373-76,

96 S.Ct. at 3099-3100; Cady, 413 U.S. at 442-48,

93 S.Ct. at 2528-2531.

Under the community caretaker exception, the police may conduct a warrantless inventory search of a vehicle provided the following conditions are met: 1) the vehicle must be lawfully impounded; 2) the impoundment and subsequent search must be conducted pursuant to standard police procedures; and 3) the impoundment and subsequent search must not be a pretextual surrogate for an improper investigatory motive. King, 39 Va.App. at 310, 572 S.E.2d at 520; see also Servis v. Commonwealth, 6 Va.App. 507, 521, 371 S.E.2d 156, 163 (1988)

.

Here, the inventory search was conducted pursuant to standard procedures and no evidence establishes that the police had an investigatory motive. The sole remaining question is whether the police properly impounded the vehicle. See Servis, 6 Va.App. at 521,

371 S.E.2d at 163 (noting that "the crux of the issue in this case is whether the defendant's car was lawfully impounded"). We answer the question in the affirmative.

We must consider "not whether there was a need for the police to impound [the] vehicle but, rather, whether the police officer's decision to impound was reasonable under the circumstances." United States v. Brown, 787 F.2d 929, 932 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 837, 107 S.Ct. 137, 93 L.Ed.2d 80 (1986); see also Opperman, 428 U.S. at 372-74,

96 S.Ct. at 3099-3100. "Objective reasonableness remains the linchpin of determining the validity of action taken under the community caretaker doctrine." King, 39 Va.App. at 312,

572 S.E.2d at 521.

This Court in King found the police impoundment of the defendant's vehicle was unreasonable and improper under the following facts. King was stopped for speeding on a heavily congested highway in Virginia. Id. at 307, 572 S.E.2d at 519. Although King held a valid Maryland driver's license, the police determined that his Virginia license had been suspended for failure to pay parking fines. Id. The police also determined that King was the registered owner of the vehicle. Id. at 312, 572 S.E.2d at 521. Although King's vehicle was legally parked and was not impeding traffic, the police officer who ordered the impoundment testified that he "`wouldn't put a vehicle there and just leave it there.'" Id. at 307-08, 572 S.E.2d at 519. We held that the police officer's "subjective view" of the propriety of the car's location could not "substitute for objective facts establishing that the public's safety was at risk or that a need to safeguard the vehicle existed." Id. at 311-12, 572 S.E.2d at 521. Because no objective facts supported the officer's determination that the vehicle posed a risk to public safety or that the vehicle and its property needed safeguarding, we held the impoundment unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment. Id. at 313-14, 572 S.E.2d at 522.

Williams contends the decision in King compels reversal here. We disagree. The police stopped Williams in the vehicle, which had a broken window, at three o'clock in the morning in a neighborhood described as an unsafe place to leave the property. Williams could produce neither a registration card evidencing ownership nor a...