Youngstown Daily Legal News

Appellate court rules stop and search justified in drug case

ANNIE YAMSON
Special to the Legal News
Published: December 7, 2015

In the 2nd District Court of Appeals, a panel of three judges recently ruled that officers had the right to detain and search a man who claimed his encounter with the police was not consensual.

The defendant, Paul Baker, appealed from the judgment of the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas, where he was found guilty of aggravated possession of drugs after he entered a no contest plea.

According to Baker, his conviction should have been reversed because the trial court erred by failing to suppress the evidence gathered from a nonconsensual interaction with police.

According to case summary, in May 2014, Dayton Police Department Dispatch received a call from a female who identified herself and reported a suspicious person.

Officers Anthony Sawmiller and Debra Fraley responded to the scene a few minutes after the dispatch.

The officers, in uniform and a marked cruiser, observed one individual in the area, later identified as Baker, who matched the description given by the caller. They stopped the cruiser and began to approach Baker from behind on foot.

Court documents state that Baker kept looking back at the officers and when they asked him to “come here a second” he looked over his shoulder and responded, “Why? What did I do?”

Baker also stated that he had done nothing wrong but as he continued to walk away from the officers he shifted his body so that his right hand was constantly out of sight.

Once he started to move his right hand toward the front pocket of his pants, the officers moved in and restrained Baker.

A pat-down led Sawmiller and Fraley to believe Baker had hypodermic needles which led to a search, the recovery of two needles and a crack pipe and, ultimately, Baker’s arrest.

Baker contended that the trial court erroneously found the initial contact between him and the officers to be consensual and that they had reasonable suspicion they he was armed, thereby justifying the pat-down search.

In support of his argument, Baker claimed the encounter was not consensual because the police physically restrained him when he did not acquiesce to their request to talk.

In the opinion that he authored on behalf of the court of appeals, Judge Mike Fain cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s delineation of three types of police encounters: consensual encounters, Terry stops and seizures equivalent to an arrest.

“Encounters are consensual when the police merely approach a person in a public place, engage the person in conversation, request information and the person remains free not to answer and walk away,” Fain wrote. “This type of encounter does not implicate the Fourth Amendment.”

A Terry stop or an investigatory detention, however, is more intrusive than a consensual encounter.

“This type of encounter occurs when the officer has by either physical force or a show of authority restrained the person in such a way that a reasonable person would not feel free to terminate the contact,” Fain wrote.

An arrest or seizure can only occur when the police have probable cause.

In Baker’s case, the appellate panel held that the incident leading to his arrest began with a consensual encounter when the police only intended to speak with Baker.

“At that point, he was free to walk away, which he did. However the officers continued to follow and then physically restrained him,” Fain wrote. “It was at that point that the encounter lost its consensual nature and became an investigatory detention followed by an arrest.”

The court of appeals noted that the trial court was in the best position to resolve questions of fact and, since its findings were supported by credible evidence, it was obligated to accept them.

“Although this case presents a close call, given the totality of the circumstances, we conclude that the trial court did not err in overruling the motion to suppress, based on a findings that Baker’s furtive movements and behavior provided the officers with a reasonable and articulable suspicion that he might have possessed a weapon, thereby justifying the Terry stop and the limited pat-down of his person,” Fain concluded.

Presiding Judge Jeffrey Froelich and Judge Michael Hall joined Fain to form the majority and affirm the judgment of the Montgomery County court.

The case is cited State v. Baker, 2015-Ohio-4709.

[Back]