a place of the core good morning your honors my name is chris stanford i represent the appellant gerald jackson in this appeal from the district courts final judgment of conviction this appeal as i'm sure you're aware involves a prior had received a tip from an informant who was a neighbor in the area where a home invasion occurred birchwood avenue in chattanooga the home and i'm going to refer to the two separate incidents the first incident on july seventeenth i'm going to refer to as the home invasion and i'm going to refer to the jury store robbery as the robbery just for purposes of clarity the home invasion that detective early investigated on july seventeenth and july eighteenth essentially involved series of events where three black males entered into a residence bound the victim pistol whipped him stole various items of property from his residence and then used him as a human shield to enter the neighbor's residence and during the course of the three hour home invasion they sought drugs and money from the residence of the victim after an alarm sound at the neighbor's residence the three males fled the scene and that was the information that detective early gleaned from his interview of the of the victim and the neighbor at the home and at the scene of the home invasion he learned those facts were neither are there missing bumper on a suspicious car day after he spoke with this was approximately four am it's my belief on the seventeenth of july on the eighteenth of july he returned to do it neighborhood canvass and he spoke with a female who was not named at a residence on birchwood drive and that female indicated that she returned home during the evening hours of the seventeenth and noticed on  the street on the public street in front of her residence that a silver or gray car missing its front bumper was parked there she took note of the vehicle because she said she had never seen it before but she had no information about the home invasion she did not see the suspects of the home invasion flee to that car none of the individuals inside the residence saw all the suspects flee to that car so essentially i've got two arguments with regard to the informants to number one i don't believe that the informants tip was reliable because she refused to give a name and when we were at the you know as you are well your honor it's unclear from the record whether or not he had ever had any prior interactions with her but there is no proof to the effect that he had any prior interactions with this and forty he knew where she lived that is think it's the those words are used he certainly knew where she was and he said i could go back and find her did he not like that he said that he knew where she was located on that morning i think he was unclear as to whether or not that was her residence or the friend's residence but in any event an anonymous informant and an informant whose name is not stated correct and there's also the long opinion which was cited by the government which stands for the proposition that merely being a nameless informant is not necessarily enough to deem a tip unreliable however what what i have an issue with and what i will and this is not the crux of my argument so i'd like to move on from this in a moment but what i take issue with is that when we're at the district court level and i'm trying to confront and cross examine the witnesses against my client i am prohibited by the magistrate judge from even knowing the address where the anonymous informant was located on that particular date of course we don't know the name i have virtually no opportunity to investigate and then corrupt confront and cross examine that witness against my client so for purposes that was a violation of safety and she's anonymous and i'm withheld from that information and that's fine if she's anonymous she's anonymous then the standard applies to anonymous tipsters rather than known informants but it's the government things at trial probably without producing her good that's a little different well and i think it's i think it's important for purposes of a motion to suppress also because that is the threshold of terminations of whether or not my client out that it is seemingly fundamentally unfair to the defendant in this type prosecution to be told on one hand this is an anonymous tipster we're not going to give you information we're not going to lay to confront this tipster to investigate th but on the other hand when we make a ruling on whether or not this was a reliable tip this is a known informant all of a sudden so the government gets to have it both ways and the defense is left without any recourse in determining that i'd like to move on from this because i believe the strength of my argument comes from the fact that when when the tip is given by the informant the informant says there is a silver or gray car missing its front bumper park on the street in front of my house there is no connection between that car and the home invasion public cars are parked parked on public streets all the time apart park my car on public streets from time to time when i'm visiting friends does that mean that if a crime occurs while i'm visiting a friend and my car is parked on a public street i'm subject to be pulled over nineteen days earlier i don't think it should be your honor i think that the only th the difference is in a casual encounter with police say that for instance they had had some information tying my client to the home invasion and they encountered that my client on the street a casual encounter with police would be permissible under those circumstances but that's not the standard we're dealing with here the standard we're dealing with here is reasonable suspicion based on specific and articulable facts and when you look at what the officer could articulate he could articulate that a gray in silver car was parked on a public street after his and it's after midnight at the edge of the property line of the rob property that was both correct it is in the record your honor that the detective early stated that the car was parked in front of the tipsters residence and then later when i further question him on kronk cross examination you're correct he changes his story a little bit and says the car was parked at the edge of the property line of course i'm not allowed to know that implies that you probably could find her because it sounds like she's the next door neighbor on one side or the other if you have to understand i'm prohibited from by the magistrate judge of even knowing the location of any of these houses for purposes of protecting the safety of i don't know the house that was rob i do not your honor and i asked specifically during my motion to suppress i just know that it was a house a duplex on  drive in chattanooga that is all i'm allowed to know apparently for the safety of this we know the name of the victim on the home invasion we do not your honor ever filed a police report didn't appear in the newspapers there was a police report honor i don't know if it made it in the record it may have i'm going to hear on that i apologize but it in any event i'm i'm left with this feeling that detective early you know essentially gets a tip that there's a car park on a public street as you pointed out after midnight or been seen before never been seen before other cars parked around there that's correct and to be a late night party which let's correct but you know if i've looked at this area of chattanooga and there are multiple duplexes and a line on the street i'm not trying to testify here and inject interject facts but there are multiple driveways along the street where other cars were presumably part they just it's not enough to rise to the level of reasonable maybe in a minute we're going to going to get into the bumper but with so this would be exactly the same if you had the whole license plate now your honor i don't think that the district this description of the car was not particularize i have a problem with the lack of nexus between the car and the criminal activity if you had the whole license plate you still thing thing no no reason absolutely make model  house that's not good about your honor i don't i don't think it was next to the robbery house it's clear from the transcript that the tipster said it was in front of her residence well the tipsters house was not the victim she was not the vic i understand that but  rrect me if i'm wrong because you just said ok not that he changes his story but he now said that it was on the edge of the raw duplex property line and did it right he did something but i'm unclear as to where that i take your argument that it's conceivable that the car was there for innocent purposes it's conceivable his girlfriend lives across the street you know he was going to watch the packers game late at night or  work craft i don't know but then the question is how plausible is that versus the alternative inference ok understand i say that many times ok thank you counsel good morning may it please the court i'm bill roache i represent the united states defended suppression motion was rightly denied because the vehicle that was stopped matched the description of the vehicle that had been seen at the specific time and location of the home invasion and was occupied by three individuals who matched the description of the perpetrators from the home invasion when investigator oeuvre matched them other than being black males that was all the description that investigator had your honor he when he arrived at the site of the home invasion that evening he learned that there were three black males it was all he learned from the victim of the home invasion he learned that from the victim he well it's either the victim your honor or one of the two victims so it was either the victim who was bound and tied up the words the next door neighbor whose house was broken into second and then he came back the next day of course he learned the specific description of the vehicle and i wanted to point out  thing in the record investor investigator early testified that the neighbor had told him that the vehicle in question the bumper le silver vehicle four door beat up all over that it was parked right next to the residence on the street and so the residence meaning the residence it appears from the transcript that it that he is saying the residence as in the residence of the home invasion so we don't know the proximity how close the neighbor lived to the victim but i think it's reasonable to assume from the record that it was fairly close given the given the description here adversaries that the officer had first testified or reported that the car was was in front the house i think that the car was on the street it was parked on the street in front of so the the victim of the home invasion lived in a duplex and then the neighbor lived either down the street or next door to the duplex but the car was parked on the street and not in the parking lot for that but i thought i thought he had said that the officers first statement had been that the silver car was in front of the wrong who then later well it was close it was near the property line that i missed here him or did i do think that he said there is a discrepancy my reading of the record i don't see that discrepancy i think it's clear that the car is parked outside of the residence on the street and i think that's important here because it shows that it does show a nexus between the home invasion and the vehicle so the neighbor told investigator early that not only was the car parked on the street out in front of the residence but she gave a very specific and particular description of the vehicle she said it was a four door silver or gray that it was beat up all over and that it was missing the whole front bumper and she also said that it was noticeable to her because she had never seen it there before in addition she saw it at precisely the time that the home invasion happened sometime right around midnight and so the fact that the vehicle had not been there before gave investigator early reasonable suspicion to stop the vehicle briefly and investigate to either confirm or dispel his suspicions and i would also point out that investigator early didn't initiate the stop of the vehicle in till he was able to connect both the description of the vehicle and also the vehicles occupants which matched the description of the perpetrators from the home invasion and so given those facts and the  standard for reasonable suspicion that it has to be specific and articulable argument here is that these facts about the the vehicle are very particular very specific facts about the vehicle in addition to the  invasion the robbery of the jewish there were there was a car with their characters or that's true your honor investigator early made that connection after he had already initiated the traffic stop based on the description from the home invasion so when he was walking up to the vehicle to two to approach the vehicle he did notice that the hubcaps of the car was missing hubcaps and that the wheels were black he it's it's it's clear from the record of it he didn't actually see the wheels before it made the stop so we're relying on the missing front bumper and the fact that the occupants of the vehicle met the description right the jewelry the information you might say that he could confirm that connected to the jewelry robbery at the time of the stop would only have been the silver color the the jewelry store didn't say it was missing the front that's corrected it it looks like from the record that the video camera from the jury saw robbery showed the side of the vehicle and so on emma call a highway investigator early was coming head on so he noticed the bumper and i would say that you know his testimony the record is he says you know he almost snapped his neck or broke his neck when he looked at it because it was such a distinct fact i think you know the case if you look at some of the cases especially from the circuit you know united states versus long united states versus hearst when you have a description of a vehicle that specific like that you know that that generally meets the standard for for reasonable suspicion i would also point out that the defense counsel the second argument about there being no connection between the car i think and you know judge call you recognize this in the in his order just the fact that the car was parked on the street at this pacific time and that the neighbor had never seen it there before in his view that was enough to show reasonable suspicion and you know argument here is that not only do we have the specific and distinct characteristics of the car  and being in the location at the time of the home invasion but we also have you know investigator early making that connection between the description of the perpetrators who were occupying the vehicle and so while the vehicle initially  gave him suspicion to turn around and follow it he didn't actually initiate the stop until he was able to connect the core the bumper of this car with with the home invasion and the responding briefly to defense counsel's first point about the reliability of the of the informant judge bugs i think you might have been referring to the heinous versus bagley case the known versus unknown informant and i think here you know given the fact that investigator early had the chance to speak to this neighbor face to face and assess her credibility i think under this court's precedent it's  you know she is a known informant and so therefore her her testimony is more reliable and i would also point to a similar supreme court case illinois versus gates that says you know known informants given their information is given more credence more credibility when an informant is notes i think here i don't think the absence of her name is important it was the content over information it was the uniqueness of the situation where she called where she saw the car and when she saw the car and given the totality of the circumstances here i think that investigator early had specific and articulable facts to support his reasonable suspicion anything else judges thank you thank you want to start by briefly clearing up the discrepancy between early as two statements detective or at least two statements on page ten of the motion to suppress transcript lines twenty two and twenty three he begins to explain that  what the in the female informant notified him of regarding the vehicle and said that a gray vehicle was parked out in front of her residence page forty of the transcript goes on and that's my cross examination of detective early on i said how far away from the residence that this allegedly occurred was the car parked would be your estimate and he responded and said it was right if you had the property line it was parked right there at the edge of the property line so i have no idea whether or not those two statements contradict each other because i have no idea where this informant resided because the judge wouldn't allow me to inquire into that at the they easily could stand together if her of her property adjoins the else they could but that's not in the record your honor he just wanted to point out that the car was initially parked in front of her house and then let's say it's an ambiguity that is surely a contradiction absolutely my issue with the informant's information is not with the specificity of the vehicle i want to make that clear that is not the issue here both the content of the informant's information and the reliability are what is important in this court's determining as to whether or not that was a reliable source when you look at the cases cited by the government and the cases in the circuit the supreme court cases that look at whether or not reasonable suspicion exist for a stop in closer cases you've got long in long there's a pick up truck that a neighbor sees being loaded by individuals who he knows to be drug dealers who are collecting a drug debt from his neighbor because she has a drug issue he predicts that that vehicles going to be traveling toward cherry street in knoxville and toward the interstate he predicts the direction of travel within minutes officer see that car being driven by a black male they pulled the car over and that was deemed reasonable suspicion here nineteen days had elapsed it is almost inconceivable that this quarter any court could imagine that the three armed individuals and the home invasion are still running around together nineteen days later with you know some connection to that home invasion it is a huge amount of time that had elapsed in any event when he pulls the car over he doesn't find one single shred of evidence that corroborates that these individuals were the ones involved in the home invasion there were a t v a game and the car being parked on the street thank you counsel thank your time's expired we thank you we do appreciate your taking this case into the criminal justice act think of service to our system of justice as well as to your defend thank you for having me based will be submitted and the clerk may call the next case