Young v. State
| Decision Date | 13 June 2013 |
| Docket Number | No. 79A04–1206–CR–310.,79A04–1206–CR–310. |
| Citation | 989 N.E.2d 842 |
| Parties | Richard YOUNG, Appellant–Defendant, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee–Plaintiff. |
| Court | Indiana Appellate Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from the Tippecanoe Superior Court; The Honorable Thomas H. Busch, Judge; Cause No. 79D02–1108–FA–15.
Daniel J. Moore, Laszynski & Moore, Lafayette, IN, Attorney for Appellant.
Gregory F. Zoeller, Attorney General of Indiana, Andrew Falk, Deputy Attorney General, Attorneys for Appellee.
Richard Young (“Young”) appeals his convictions and sentence for conspiracy to commit dealing in methamphetamine, a Class A felony; 1 and dealing in methamphetamine (manufacturing), a Class A felony.2
We affirm.
1. Whether the trial court properly denied Young's motion to dismiss pursuant to Indiana Rule of Criminal Procedure 4(B).
2. Whether the State presented sufficient evidence to sustain Young's conviction for possession of methamphetamine.
3. Whether Young's sentence is inappropriate.
On January 22, 2011, Young and one of his housemates, James Glaze (“Glaze”), asked Young's girlfriend, Angela Boorom (“Boorom”) to drive them in Young's Chrysler 300 to several places in Tippecanoe County, Indiana. After a number of stops, Young asked Boorom to drive him to a rural area. At a certain point, Young told her to stop, and he walked out into a field, carrying nothing with him. After about fifteen minutes, Young came back to the car carrying a Coleman thermos and a clear pitcher. Young got into the car, and the occupants put the windows down due to the smell of anhydrous. Young told Boorom that they were going to “take [the containers] back to the residence to finish cooking them off.” (Tr. 239, 243).
Meanwhile, Indiana State Police Trooper Joseph Winters (“Trooper Winters”) was driving North on Interstate 65 in Tippecanoe County when he noticed Young's car sitting northbound on County Road 500 East, parallel to the Interstate, with its lights off. As a result, Trooper Winters exited onto a county road.
As Trooper Winters headed west on a county road, he saw Young's car coming toward him at a reduced speed. When Trooper Winters passed the car, he noticed that its windows were down despite a temperature of only eight degrees. Trooper Winters turned around and attempted to catch up with the car, but Boorom accelerated away from him.
Trooper Winters began to pursue the car and watched as the car ran at least two stop signs. At one point, Trooper Winters' view of the car was blocked by a hill, and at this point Young threw the two containers out the window. As Trooper Winters began to catch up to the car, Glaze jumped out of the car and began to run away. Trooper Winters finally forced Boorom to pull over, and he directed her to get out of the car. Young, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, gave Trooper Winters his Indiana identification card.
Trooper Winters gave Boorom a sobriety test then placed her in the custody of another officer who took her to a Lafayette hospital for a blood draw. Trooper Winters read Young his rights and then noticed that there were drain cleaner bottles, latex gloves, boxes of pseudoephedrine, and ephedrine in the car. Trooper Winters then found chemical resistant gloves.
After finding these items, Trooper Winters suspected that he had found a methamphetamine lab. Accordingly, he arrested Young while Tippecanoe County Sheriff's Deputy Thomas Lehman (“Deputy Lehman”) retraced the route that Boorom had taken in her flight from Trooper Winters. In the area where Trooper Winters had lost sight of Young, Trooper Winters and Deputy Lehman found a clear plastic pitcher in the middle of the road and a red Coleman thermos in a ditch. A chemical smell emanated from the thermos, and the pitcher had a pink solution in the bottom of it. In the area, Trooper Winters and Deputy Lehman found other items of drug paraphernalia, including stripped lithium batteries, a box of pseudoephedrine, and a “foilie” (used to ingest methamphetamine) with burn marks on it.
Trooper Ronald Fisher (“Trooper Fisher”), a member of the Lafayette and Peru Meth Lab Teams, arrived at the scene with a meth lab cleanup truck. He first examined the Coleman thermos and confirmed that it contained anhydrous ammonia. He then examined the pitcher, which he believed was the reaction vessel. The contents had “sloshed” up on the side of the pitcher and had not yet settled back down. He confirmed the presence of ammonia and, after performing an acid test he learned that the solution was more base than acid, meaning that the solution was more toward the beginning of the methamphetamine manufacturing process. He then collected a small sample of the solution, leaving “at least ninety percent of the contents ... still in the vessel,” taking just the “small portion that our lab needs to test.” (Tr. 182).
Trooper Fisher also field tested the solution, and the solution tested positive for methamphetamme. From the positive methamphetamme test and the positive ammonia test, Trooper Fisher determined that the solution's contents had reacted and turned some of the pseudoephedrine into methamphetamme. Trooper Fisher then packaged the rest of the solution in the reactor vessel for transportation to be destroyed as hazardous material. Trooper Winters submitted the sample of the solution to the Indiana State Police Lowell Laboratory, where a forensic drug chemist subsequently determined that the solution contained a mixture of methamphetamme and pseudoephedrine weighing 4.66 grams.
Trooper Winters took Young to the State Police Post, read him his Miranda rights, and asked him what he had been doing. After some dissimulation, Young told Trooper Winters that the items found were a methamphetamme lab that he had stolen, and that he was going to give it to someone else to finish the methamphetamme.
Young then gave Trooper Winters permission to search his home. At the home, Trooper Winters found, among other things, a bag of white powder, a syringe, a spoon with residue, and extensive items of drug paraphernalia. The white powder field tested positive for methamphetamme, and the police lab later determined that the powder was 2.29 grams of methamphetamme.
Boorom testified that the home's garage was used as a methamphetamine laboratory where Young and Glaze cooked drugs between two to three times per week. Indeed, Young and Glaze cooked a batch of methamphetamine on the night before their encounter with Trooper Winters. Boorom also testified that she had purchased many grams of pseudoephedrine over an extensive amount of time and that Young used the pseudoephedrine in making methamphetamine. Boorom further testified that Young sometimes gave discounts or made trades with customers if they would provide pseudoephedrine for future batches.
On August 15, 2011, the State charged Young with the following counts: conspiracy to commit dealing in methamphetamine; a Class A felony; dealing in methamphetamine (manufacturing), a Class A felony; dealing in methamphetamine (possession with intent to deliver), a Class A felony; possession of methamphetamine, a Class B felony; possession of methamphetamine, a Class C felony; possession with intent to manufacture, a Class D felony; maintaining a common nuisance, a Class D felony; possession of paraphernalia, a Class A misdemeanor; and two counts of unlawful purchase of pseudoephedrine, Class C misdemeanors. The State also filed an habitual substance abuse offender enhancement. At his initial hearing on August 17, 2011, Young requested a public defender, but the magistrate initially declined to appoint one. Young then asked, “Is this when I tell you that I want a fast and speedy trial?” (Supp. Tr. 15). The magistrate responded that Young would need to make a written request before the judge. Young said that he did not think he could hire an attorney, and the magistrate told him that he could make the request himself and that “we'll note that in the record.” (Supp. Tr. 15). The magistrate set a trial date of November 26, 2011. The magistrate then decided to appoint a public defender for Young. Before setting Young's bond, the magistrate told Young to tell his public defender that he wanted to file a motion for speedy trial. In his order on the initial hearing, the magistrate noted, “The Defendant orally requests fast and speedy trial and the court directs the defendant to confer with attorney and file written request with court.” (App.28).
On April 5, 2012, Young's public defender filed a motion to dismiss pursuant to Indiana Rule of Criminal Procedure 4(B), explaining that (1) the case was set for April 10, 2012; (2) Young had made an oral request for a speedy trial at the time of the initial hearing and prior to the public defender's appointment; (3) the public defender had not filed a speedy trial request and acquiesced in the setting of the trial date; and (4) Young had requested that the public defender file the motion. (App.31). The trial court denied the motion.
A jury found Young guilty on all counts and he was subsequently determined to be an habitual substance abuse offender. At the sentencing hearing, the trial court merged the remaining counts into the Class A felony conspiracy to commit dealing in methamphetamine and dealing in methamphetamine (manufacturing) counts. The trial court imposed concurrent thirty-five year sentences and enhanced the dealing in methamphetamine conviction by eight years due to the habitual substance abuse determination. The trial court suspended three years to probation.
Young contends that the trial court erred in denying his April 5, 2012 motion to dismiss pursuant to Indiana Rule of Criminal Procedure 4(B). We review de novo a trial court's denial of a motion to discharge a defendant. Fletcher v. State, 959 N.E.2d 922, 924 (Ind.Ct.App.2012)....
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